Medical Lake mayoral race between two candidates who’ve held the title

Two well-known Medical Lake leaders are hoping to serve another four years as Medical Lake mayor – a familiar role for each of them.

In her first re-election bid, Mayor Terri Cooper is facing a challenge from one of her predecessors, John Higgins.

First elected in 2005, Higgins served three terms before opting not to run for re-election in 2017. He’s a lifelong resident who graduated from Medical Lake High School in 1966. Now retired, he spent 25 years as a forensic therapist for Eastern State Hospital before returning to his alma mater to serve as a paraeducator, as well as a hall-of-fame softball coach of nearly three decades.

Cooper is a lso a graduate of Medical Lake High School, and has also spent most of her professional and political career serving the West Plains. After working in banking, she began working as a court administrator in Medical Lake. She retired from her position as a Cheney Municipal Court commissioner after the Gray fire in 2023 after joining the court in 2004.

While the two each have strong ties to the region, Higgins said they contrast greatly in their vision for Medical Lake’s future.

“Her and I don’t see eye to eye on too much,” Higgins said.

Higgins said his desire to run again was spurred predominantly by his concerns for the city’s financial standing. Higgins said the city has received an influx of wildfire recovery funds to assist in the town’s recovery, and Cooper is making investments and spending at a rate that’s unsustainable.

“I’ve had a lot of people call me concerned about where the money has gone, who’s getting it and who’s making decisions on who’s going to get the money,” Higgins said. “There’s a lot of discontent out there from some of the landowners that lost houses and stuff.”

But Cooper stressed that Medical Lake received “zero” direct funding for recovery from the Gray fire. It was, however, reimbursed by the state and federal governments and its insurance company for expenses it incurred, including for emergency tree removal, replacement of damaged water mains and repairs and other work at Waterfront Park, which was hit by the fire.

Separately, Medical Lake received $6.2 million over the last few years in grant funding for improvements to the city’s sewer system, streets, sidewalks and the foliage and lamp posts along those sidewalks. Such projects give Higgins concern, as the city may not be able to manage any recurring costs , he said.

He said the recent decision by the state Legislature to gift the roughly 60 acres of Waterfront Park to the city is another decision that could prove unsustainable .

“When everything comes due, it’s going to be a financial burden on the city,” Higgins said.

Cooper said concerns about the city’s budget are unwarranted, pointing to last year’s budgeting cycle in which the city finished with a $500,000 surplus. The road projects, sewer work and downtown lighting and tree additions are part of her efforts to preserve the town’s charm while trying to carve a path forward, she said.

The city has eyed the park gift for multiple decades, Cooper said. Instead of batting around the idea of a purchase, or another 50-year lease, she secured it as a gift and would like to see it become a key part of her vision for Medical Lake to re-emerge as a recreation destination. The lake was a prominent healing place for local Indigenous tribes, a reputation that persisted even as the area became popular among the anglers and outdoorsmen of decades prior.

The gift of the land by the state doesn’t increase the cost to the city for maintaining the land, which it was doing previously under a lease, she said.

“There’s been some really great improvements for the public good, and I feel like we’re about halfway, kind of laying some of those foundations,” Cooper said. “Every year I have a focus, and this year has been park and rec programs and economic development.”

Recruiting and retaining top talent to fill the city’s 22 staff positions is a prior focus area in which she’s already seen success, Cooper said. She’s improved wages and benefits for city staff to ensure top talent is attracted to live and work in Medical Lake, and to ensure they stay.

Looking to attract talent from outside city limits concerns Higgins, as he does not believe they’ll stick around. While Higgins was in office, he said he explored and used partnerships with the region’s other prominent entities, including the state and county government, the local school district and Fairchild Air Force Base. He said he’d look to combine resources again if re-elected.

Cooper would like to see more small businesses founded and thriving in Medical Lake, which is why she advocated for a vacant property ordinance in the city’s commercial area that’s been in effect for over a year now. It’s done wonders in promoting economic development, she said, with around five new or expanded businesses since its implementation.

“It really did work,” Cooper said. “There’s still one or two businesses that are just coming into compliance with that, but buildings have sold and businesses are opening.”

The vacant property ordinance requires property owners to register their vacant buildings, post information on how to buy or lease the property and inspections from code enforcement officers to identify needed work in order to occupy it, so that information can later be passed on to prospective tenants or owners. The ordinance carries associated fines that can increase the longer a building is vacant and an owner is out of compliance.

Higgins said encouraging better use of the buildings and storefronts in the town’s core is a fine idea, and he too would like to see more mom-and-pop shops in town. He has real doubts on whether those shops would be able to succeed, though, given the city’s proximity to more expansive shopping offerings in Cheney and Airway Heights, or online vendors.

“Say it’s vacated, somebody put something in, are people going to support it?” Higgins said.

If elected, Higgins said he would reinstate a 24-hour , dedicated Spokane County Sheriff’s Office deputy in Medical Lake. In 2023, the City Council voted to revise its contract with the county for law enforcement services, narrowing the dedicated deputy’s hours to between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m.

“Crime doesn’t really happen in the daytime in Medical Lake,” Higgins said.

The agreement does not prevent other deputies from responding to calls after 7 p.m. Cooper told the Cheney Free Press at the time of the decision that after-hours response times would remain mostly the same, and that most calls for service came between those designated hours.

In an interview with The Spokesman-Review, Cooper touted the cost savings that came from the revision. The city went from paying $1.2 million annually to $600,000, which was halved again by a state appropriation she requested to cover the cost of responding to calls to Eastern State Hospital.

“We’re trying to make that a permanent thing, so we’ll go back to the Legislature again,” Cooper said. “It’s made a big difference.”

Cooper said her love for Medical Lake and desire to see it thrive motivated her to run the first time, but she did not fully appreciate her aptitude for the role until she was thrust into the turmoil of the Gray fire and the recovery since. She looks forward to the opportunity to serve for another four years.

“I felt that I knew where the broken places were, and wanted to take that on as a challenge and see what I can do,” Cooper said.

As a third-generation resident of Medical Lake, Higgins said he’s never had qualms about sacrificing his time and energy for the betterment of the community. He said he hopes to bring the transparency and approachability that was a staple of his prior three terms.

“I’m just more of a face-to-face person,” Higgins said. “I’ve always been a people person all my life, between work and coaching.”