Mielke, Richard decry campaign ad

A group supporting Democratic challengers in the Spokane County commissioners’ race is trying to tie the incumbents to former board member Phil Harris, who was ousted in the 2006 election.

Incumbent Republicans Todd Mielke and Mark Richard dismissed the commercial from Spokane Moving Forward as a last-minute attack that’s inaccurate and ineffective.

Stephen Barbieri, the director of the independent political action committee, said the ad is an attempt to reach undecided voters in the closing days of the campaign.

The commercial, which the group spent about $2,500 to air several times Thursday on KHQ-TV, ends with the message “Vote the Old Boys Out.” It shows video from a meeting when the commission consisted of Mielke, Richard and Harris, and says that despite the 2006 election, “the Phil Harris majority still calls the shots.”

That’s ridiculous, Mielke said.

Controversy arose over the county’s hiring of Harris’ son Steven. But Steven Harris has since been terminated and has filed grievances and an unfair labor practice against the county.

“Phil Harris has been gone for two years. It’s old news,” Mielke said.

Richard said the ad is a “cut and splice job” that’s full of inaccuracies. For example, the final scene shows him saying “this is not an attempt to avert public input,” and then laughing into the camera.

That implies the board is trying to hide something, Richard said. But the video was taken at a public meeting with the media present.

The commercial suggests voters reject Mielke and Richard so they can “go back to the payrolls of their special interests.”

But Mielke said the commercial itself is paid for by special interests from the development community, and until late Thursday, the group’s campaign contribution and spending information wasn’t even available on the Public Disclosure Commission’s Web site.

Donors aren’t listed on the commercial – they don’t have to be, PDC spokeswoman Lori Anderson said, because no one contributed more than $700 – but a report faxed to the agency this week lists real estate developers Don Barbieri and Sharon Smith, at $600 and $500, respectively. Don Barbieri, a one-time congressional candidate, is the father of Stephen Barbieri, who contributed $100. Other major donors are Don Hamilton and Lorna St. John, who are fighting the expansion of the Bigelow Gulch Road.

Both contributed $500.

The group’s reports weren’t online until late Thursday because they were faxed to the PDC rather than filed electronically, Anderson said.