Three seek Cheney post

Three candidates are vying for Cheney City Council position 3 in the Aug. 18 primary election. Council members receive a monthly stipend of $310 a month. Ballots will be mailed July 29.

Jason MH Alvarado: This 26-year-old candidate hopes to join the City Council, after an unsuccessful bid in 2007.

“I want to say that I bring a fresh perspective to the council,” Alvarado said.

Alvarado settled in Cheney after getting his bachelor’s degree in computer science from Eastern Washington University. After his run for the council two years ago, he was appointed to the Cheney planning commission and serves as organization committee chairman in the Historic Downtown Cheney Partnership.

He has a long-term goal of serving as a state representative in Olympia.

“I’ve always thought community leadership was my calling,” he said.

Alvarado, who owns his own Web site development company, XeroOne Systems, said that the rewrite of the comprehensive plan will be an important issue in Cheney, since it will affect the city for the next 20 years. He hopes there will be more single-family homes in Cheney, as well as low-income housing and retirement communities.

He wants to bring more livable-wage jobs to the city as well as strengthen the funding for police and fire.

He has started working on a master’s degree in public administration, but has put that on hold while he grows his business.

Mike McKeehan: The incumbent council member is a retired elementary school teacher who has lived in Cheney since he was 12 years old.

McKeehan, 64, is running for his fourth term and is happy with the way the city is going – the city’s street and sidewalk repair program is in full swing and the park department is going well.

“I think we have great city employees,” McKeehan said.

He would like to see better signage along Interstate 90 announcing a business loop – people driving east could see that they can get off the freeway at the Tyler exit and come through town and then get back on after visiting Cheney.

He also wants to designate certain pedestrian routes in Cheney that will have snow-shoveling requirements to make it easier for children to walk to school in the winter.

He is a member of the hotel/motel tax committee and is also an Ice Age Flood Institute board member.

He said he hopes to have more single-family developments in Cheney and thinks that growth will be an issue. When he moved to Cheney in 1957, there were 3,000 people living in the city. There are now 10,000.

McKeehan attended Haverford College in Pennsylvania and majored in the classics – Latin and Greek. He said he used to teach his students how to say the Pledge of Allegiance in Latin. He attended the University of Washington to earn his master’s degree in classics and also holds a doctorate in the history of education.

McKeehan said he has always felt at home in Cheney and has high hopes for its future.

“I hope it’s as pleasant to live in as it is now.”

Kathleen A. Warren: Warren is an office manager in the Native American Studies Program at Eastern Washington University.

Warren, 51, said the first thing she would do if elected would be to give back the monthly stipend council members receive. She would like to give it to different city programs, such as parks and recreation for a swim pass sponsorship.

“If you want to serve in a public office, you shouldn’t be paid for it,” she said.

She also wants to bring more outreach programs to Cheney, such as a women’s shelter or summer meal programs for children.

“There’s so much possibility with Cheney,” Warren said.

She said she is just shy of receiving her bachelor’s degree in government from EWU and has served for four years on some of the bigger committees at the university.

Some of the issues Cheney will face in the coming years are bringing businesses into the Industrial Park and keeping small businesses open and thriving in Cheney, she said. She wants to market Cheney better and wants to continue to improve upon the relationship between Eastern and the city.

She said she doesn’t believe in making promises she can’t keep and if she doesn’t know the answer to a question she will find it.

Warren said she moved to Cheney to attend school and later got a job here. She said she looks at this campaign as an opportunity to serve the community.

“I’m committed,” she said.