Contests for Spokane Valley City Council shaping up (and other updates for candidate filing week)

While a couple days remain for interested candidates to throw their hats in the ring, it’s already clear the Spokane Valley City Council will look a little different next year.

And if one councilman has his way, the council may look drastically different.

Councilman Rod Higgins, the longest continuous serving member of the board, said he does not plan to run for re-election. Higgins, 82, was appointed in 2013 and won the seat in an election later that year. He was re-elected in 2017 and 2021. The conservative council mainstay served as mayor of the Spokane suburb from 2016 to 2020.

Higgins cited his age and a desire to get fresh perspectives and voices on the council in disclosing his decision not to seek re-election.

“I can tell you firsthand, no, I don’t think I’m Joe Biden, at least not in that bad of shape yet,” Higgins said. “But I can feel that I’m losing a step and stuff, and it’s time for somebody else to get in there.”

Two Spokane Valley business owners, each with prior campaign experience, launched their bids for Higgins’ soon-to-be-vacated seat well before filing week, during which candidates across Spokane County declare their intentions to run for public office. Candidates have until 5 p.m. Friday to file to run for city councils, school boards, fire commissions and other local offices.

Kristopher Pockell, a software engineer and co-owner of Elixir Sauce Company, and Mike Kelly, an entrepreneur who serves as chief financial officer for Salem, Oregon-based KT Contracting, each hope to win the open seat following the November election.

Both ran for the state Legislature in the district encompassing the Valley last fall. Pockell unsuccessfully challenged state Rep. Suzanne Schmidt as an independent, while Kelly fell short in a race for an open Senate seat eventually secured by fellow Republican state Sen. Leonard Christian. Kelly, despite carrying endorsements from several local prominent Republicans, lost steam in his campaign after details of a 1990 drug arrest in his hometown of Portland came to light.

Kelly was appointed to the city’s planning commission last year by Mayor Pam Haley, after moving to the Valley in 2019. He owns and operates several property management and real estate holding companies, and has worked as a consultant, financial adviser, paralegal, investment counselor and a certified tax preparer.

Pockell, a graduate of Spokane Valley’s Central Valley High School, said he hopes to focus on supporting first responders, developing the region’s economy and ensuring the Valley’s infrastructure continues to match pace with the rapid rate at which the city has grown over the past two decades, if elected.

Pockell’s already started to prepare for the position, he said, by regularly attending council meetings and budget discussions, meeting with the current iteration of the council to come up to speed on big ticket items and through the lessons learned through his campaign last year.

“It doesn’t have to be as polarizing as you see on a national level,” Pockell said of campaigning. “There’s room for different voices at the table, and we learned a lot talking to people, learning what they care about and thinking about ideas to solve the problems that we all see all the time.”

On Wednesday, Lisa Miller, a member of the Spokane County Board of Equalization, became the third candidate vying for Higgins’ open seat. While it’s her first bid for office in Spokane County, the California transplant previously served two terms on a neighborhood council in Los Angeles.

“I love my city and I love Washington State, and I would like to use whatever skills I have to help,” Miller said.

With experience as a law professor, an administrative hearing officer and general counsel for California Community Colleges, Miller said she has a wealth of legal knowledge to draw from. If elected, she would focus on “supporting public safety in a meaningful way,” while maintaining her values as a fiscal conservative, she said.

Miller catches as many council meetings as she can, and said she looks forward to connecting with voters on the issues they care about. She pointed to a lengthy debate about laws surrounding electric scooters in Spokane Valley at Tuesday’s council meeting as an example of how civically minded Valley residents tend to be.

“People really care in this town, and it doesn’t really matter if it’s a scooter or a tax increase, people care,” Miller said. “And I do too.”

As for the remaining board seats on the ballot this fall, Spokane Valley City Councilwoman Laura Padden and Mayor Pam Haley have filed for re-election, as has Councilman Ben Wick. No one had filed to challenge Haley as of publication deadline, according to state records, but Padden and Wick will have to contend with candidates backed by one of their fellow board members.

Councilman Al Merkel won’t be up for re-election until 2027, but that hasn’t stopped him from getting involved in the 2025 races early.

Chaos and controversy have plagued the council since Merkel’s arrival, as he’s repeatedly butted heads with the board over construction projects, grant applications and the complaints and investigations related to him. Last May, an independent investigator found Merkel repeatedly disrespected city staff and fellow board members, often engaging in “intimidating behavior.”

In a later, separate independent investigation, Merkel was found in violation of state law and city code regarding public records for his social media activity. Those findings were later upheld by the city’s hearing examiner following an appeal by Merkel, and are the basis of a lawsuit the city launched against him earlier this year that alleges he is still not in compliance with state law.

After months of failing to find common ground with his peers, Merkel recruited candidates to replace them.

Wick, a councilmember from 2012 to 2015 before rejoining the council in 2017, has drawn a challenge from Daryl Williams, an employee of Fairmount Memorial Park who goes by “The Karaoke Guy” while operating his local karaoke pop-up business.

Williams, 74, said he has always had an interest in politics and local government and thinks “there is room for improvement” on the Spokane Valley City Council. He believes his general demeanor and approach could help alleviate some of the tension and communication issues between council members, issues that have plagued the board since Merkel joined in January 2024. The West Valley High School graduate added that Merkel encouraged and helped him file to be a candidate for the position.

“You’re there to represent the people who voted for you, not to pat yourself on the back,” Williams said. “I just want to get involved in my community.”

Merkel’s also helped Brad Hohn, manager of the salvage yard High Mountain Horsepower, in his attempt to unseat Padden. Hohn said the council members are good people “for the most part,” but he believes they “are losing focus of what the people really want.”

As an example, he does not believe the city is prioritizing the right infrastructure projects, pointing to the lack of completion of an overhaul of the Trent Avenue and Sullivan Road interchange that’s been in the works for years.

“You get a lot of people who complain about many different things, or how things should be ran, but yet they don’t vote or try to do anything themselves,” Hohn said. “It’s put up or shut up, you know?”

City of Spokane

The Spokane City Council will have three seats on the ballot this fall, which continued to draw more prospective candidates as filing week stretched on.

The South Hill is home to the only open seat, which is being vacated by Councilwoman Lili Navarrete. The race included two candidates as of Wednesday evening: Alejandro Barrientos, chief operating officer at SCAFCO Steel Stud Company, and Kate Telis, a former deputy prosecutor in New Mexico.

For the seat representing northeast Spokane, incumbent Jonathan Bingle filed for re-election and is being challenged by social justice advocate Sarah Dixit, organizing director for Pro Choice Washington and co-chair of the Spokane chapter of the Asian Pacific Islander Coalition.

Northwest Spokane Councilman Zack Zappone has a pair of challengers as he seeks reelection: private cigar lounge co-owner Cody Arguelles and Meals on Wheels board member Christopher Savage.

The city’s three municipal court judges, Kristin O’Sullivan, Mary Logan and Gloria Ochoa-Bruck, each filed for re-election Monday. As of Wednesday evening, Logan was the only to draw a challenge – from former Spokane City Attorney Lynden Smithson. Smithson oversaw the prosecuting side of the office before taking on the top role in an interim capacity in 2022. The council named him city attorney in 2023, a role he held until Mayor Lisa Brown took office in January 2024.

Local school districts

In the county’s largest district, Spokane Public Schools, all four board members in seats up for re-election have filed to retain their seats. Incumbents Nikki Otero Lockwood, Hilary Kozel, Nicole Bishop and Jenny Slagle have yet to draw a challenge in their respective races.

East of the county seat, Spokane County GOP Chair Rob Linebarger and Dr. Allen Skidmore, who has a family medicine practice in the Valley, are hoping to join the Central Valley School District. The positions’ incumbents, Pam Orebaugh and Tere Landa, respectively, have yet to file for re-election.

Beata Cox, Jonathan Horsle and Mike Bly, board members of the East Valley School District, have all filed for re-election and have yet to draw a challenger. Local Subway store owner Carolyn Petersen, who lost a bid to current district 3 seat holder Justin Voelker in 2021, is the sole candidate who’s filed for the position as of Wednesday evening.

The West Valley School District did not have a contested race as of publication. Incumbents Bob Dompier and Pam McLeod have filed to retain their positions, according to state records.

The Mead School District’s five-member governing board has two seats up for election this year, and Vice President BrieAnne Gray was the sole candidate to have filed by end of day Wednesday. Gray is seeking re-election for the first time.

In southwestern Spokane County, incumbent Elizabeth Winer will contend with Jessica Davis, owner of Airway Heights eatery Wolffy’s Breakfast Burgers and Brew, for a seat on the Cheney School District’s governing board. Kyle Belock, husband to Cheney City Councilwoman Jacquelyn Belock, filed to run for a separate seat on the board Wednesday.