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Motorists in Whitman County during the days before the state’s Aug. 19 mail-in primary deadline can’t help but notice the attractive campaign signs posted for Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers. She is seeking a third term as 5th district representative. The incumbent’s campaign seems to be picking up a full head of steam, and she’s predicted to nail down another term.
The Federal Elections Commission report as of July 31 puts the McMorris Rodgers campaign contributions at $1,083,675 with spending at $651,112.
A report in Sunday’s Lewiston Morning Tribune notes Microsoft’s Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer are among top level corporate executives who have sent in money. General Dynamics and R.J. Reynolds execs also have sent contributions.
McMorris Rodgers in previous races has been a tough campaigner who covers the miles in her district. With her experience and staff, she appears to be a strong favorite to win another term, despite running in a year when the Republicans are predicted to sustain a setback.
However, this time around the campaign is different. The 5th district incumbent is in a race which really isn’t a race when compared to the last two rounds. Although other names are on the ballot, McMorris Rodgers doesn’t have a strong opponent.
The last time around she was challenged by Peter Goldmark of Okanogan. Goldmark, a member of a family with a hallowed link to the state’s Democratic party, cranked up a strong campaign with TV ads featuring his ranching family mixed with the normal Democratic themes.
Goldmark is now challenging incumbent Doug Sutherland for commissioner of public lands. As a Democrat, he figures to get strong party support on the west side of the state. That outlook contrasts with the 5th district which now has a distinct GOP-leaning electorate.
Two years prior to the Goldmark challenge, McMorris faced Don Barbieri, Spokane hotel executive who plowed a lot of his own money into the campaign.
This time around, McMorris Rodgers faces a lineup of political lightweights. While the Goldmark and Barbieri campaigns enrolled strong backing from the Democrats, the foes this time around don’t have the same credentials, or the same kind of money.
According to the Spokesman Review, Mark Mays, a Spokane psychologist and attorney, is seen as the top opposition candidate for the Democrats. Mays, as of July 31 has raised $43,939 and spent $33,464. Those kind of numbers mean not a lot of campaign signs along Whitman County highways and byways.
Of course, veteran 5th district voters have seen past campaigns when the incumbent pulled out all the stops with strong financial backing while facing lightweight opposition. Democrat Tom Foley waged power campaigns against Republican challengers who lacked name recognition, money and support for their own party. Foley, who advanced up the power ladder to be speaker of the house, could expect a stack of corporate contributions and those were used.
A money flow to incumbents is one of the hard facts in today’s politics. Those corporate contributions on the McMorris Rodgers donor list shouldn’t be considered as special for the 5th district. The donations are also on the lists of candidates around the country. The money flow has been criticized, but it’s the way of doing business in a world where decisions in congress can impact corporations and where candidates now need a lot of money to campaign, even when they don’t have to campaign.
There's currently not a Green Party candidate in our state legislature, and if one is elected, it ain't gonna be from the 9th District.Heavy taxation to pay for free college education for everyone 30-hour work weeks 30 days of mandatory paid vacation for all workers Legalization of hemp for "food, fiber and fuel"
Clarkston sociology instructor Christopher Winter Monday filed his candidacy for the 9th District State Representative seat currently held by Joe Schmick, R-Colfax.
Winter, 49, will run under the flag of the Green Party on a platform of reforms to the state’s tuition and labor systems and to the manner in which public lands are managed.
“The working middle class is hurting because of the policies we are currently operating under,” said Winter. “In the richest nation in the world, this is ridiculous.”
He added his decision to run was partly based on a need to overhaul the current political system.
“Honestly, I didn’t want the incumbent, Mr. Schmick, to run unchallenged for his seat,” he said.
Winter is calling for a “more European” approach to paying for education and in labor practices.
In response to what he called a “phony” student loan program, Winter is proposing across the board tuition waivers for undergraduate students at state universities.
“This would be a social investment that helps everybody,” he said. “The current system only benefits private investors and academic institutions at the expense of students.”
He added the large debt load of student loans after graduation puts an undue amount of stress on young families.
“Students come out of college, and they have to pay $700, $800 every month just to pay off their student loans,” he said. “That’s money that could go towards Tae Kwon Do lessons, piano lessons or even family vacations.”
To pay for the reform, Winter proposes a new education tax.
“This will benefit society as a whole,” he said. “Since everybody will benefit, I think everybody should have to pay.”
To further pay for the waivers, he proposes a restructuring of state spending on education, especially from lottery proceeds, and less new construction on campuses.
Winter is also proposing a 30-hour work week and mandatory 30-day paid vacations to rejuvenate workers.
“If the French can give their citizens a 30-day paid vacation, certainly the state of Washington and the US can,” he said.
If Washington’s workforce were more rested and less agitated, he added, the amount of alcohol and illicit drug used as well as the instances of spousal and child abuse would decline.
Winter, a former park ranger and fisheries technician, also called for reform in the management of public lands.
He said the state has turned over too much of that management to private companies, and that has lessened the appeal to quality employees.
Winter also called for the removal of barriers to the agricultural production of hemp for food, fiber and fuel.
Winter admitted his platform is ambitious, but added if reforms are to take place, they have to start somewhere.
“You’ve got to start in order to get it done,” he said. “I can tell you that if I’m elected I’m going to go after these reforms as hard as I can.”
Winter teaches sociology, both in person and online, at several colleges. He and his wife Christine have lived in the Clarkston area for 10 years. They have three children, Carson, Bridger and Hannah.
Pullman resident Tyana Kelley announced Tuesday her bid to unseat Joe Schmick, R-Colfax, from his post as 9th District State Representative.
The 28-year old Whitworth graduate admits she has little experience in politics, but feels her election to the House would expand the representation of 9th District citizens in Olympia.
“We need diverse representation from the 9th District,” she said. “And we need someone who can work with the Democratic majority to really represent Eastern Washington.”
Her youth and inexperience, she added, means she has “no agenda” to push through the legislature and “no baggage” to weight her votes.
Kelley said she intends to spend the summer door-belling the 9th District to better target what citizens of southeastern Washington want from their legislators.
“This position is meant to focus on the needs of the people of the 9th District, not to represent their own agenda and push it across,” she said.
Kelley criticized Schmick for not representing the youth and working middle class of the 9th District.
“The working class is more than just farmers and ranchers,” she said. “We have nurses, teachers and good, hard-working people in this district that are not being well-served by voting down the party line on every issue.”
Coming from three generations of employees of Kaiser Aluminum in Spokane gives Kelley a unique insight into the plight of the working class, she said.
The focus of Kelley’s campaign will be on improvements to the state’s health care and education systems, as well as expanding environmental protection programs.
“Our K through 12 education system is in trouble with the requirements of No Child Left Behind and the WASL,” she said. “We need to re-evaluate those programs.”
She added she will focus on lowering tuition costs and the burdens put on students by expensive student loans.
Kelley added local environmental programs, especially recycling programs, need to be expanded.
She called for stepped-up efforts by waste management firms to sort recycling so individuals do not have to sort their recycling themselves.
“When I lived in Spokane we didn’t have to sort our recycling before they picked it up,” she said. “It wouldn’t take much more for these companies to sort out recycling and it would increase participation dramatically.”
Kelley said she views this election as an opportunity to advance the causes of all the people of the 9th District.
“Any forward progress is good,” said Kelley. “Whether that’s in my own personal life or with the people of this district.”
Kelley has lived in Pullman for two years with her husband, Ryan.
Johnson resident Pat O’Neill filed Tuesday to challenge incumbent Jerry Finch for the District 2 seat on the Board of County Commissioners.
A former United Airlines mechanic, O’Neill, 60, calls for more accountability and more transparency from the county’s elected officials. He filed as a Democrat.
He believes the current climate in the courthouse has caused many citizens of Whitman County to lose interest in county governance.
“Citizens will be more involved if the county is more accountable and delivers more to them,” he said.
He proposes night meetings of county commissioners. He added televising those meetings would better involve the county’s citizens.
“We need to accommodate better the working voters of Whitman County,” he said.
O’Neill grew up on a dairy farm in Wisconsin. That experience, he said, would give farmers a better voice in the courthouse.
“I understand how hard it is for farmers to go out there and make a living,” he said. “I want to be a strong advocate in the courthouse for farmers.”
O’Neill also noted the need to address the decaying infrastructure of the county’s smaller towns. He blamed recent trends to limit the size and power of government for not helping small towns remain viable.
“As governments have shrunk, our small towns have paid the cost,” he said. “We need to get back to building America and we have to start right here.”
He noted small towns throughout eastern Washington have experienced the same plight.
That presents an opportunity for rural counties to band together and lobby for more support from Olympia and Washington, D.C.
He compared such a coalition to the recent mergers of Palouse grain co-operatives.
“They didn’t combine to reduce their services,” he said. “They combined for increased purchasing power and to make sure their growers benefit.”
O’Neill currently operates a landscaping business. Prior to that he delivered fertilizer for the Colfax Grange Supply, and worked 35 years as an aircraft mechanic for United Airlines.
He added he lost his pension when the airline filed Chapter 11 Bankruptcy in 2005.
O’Neill and his wife Connie have been married for 38 years. The couple has three grown children.
Several elected officials in Whitman County and Washington's 9th District will face challenges in the state's general election.
The in-person candidate filing period opened Monday, and several candidates have declared their intentions to run for office.
Colton resident Patrick O'Neill, a Democrat, filed for the District No. 1 county commissioner seat occupied by Republican Jerry Finch of Pullman. Finch has filed for re-election.
District No. 2 County Commissioner Greg Partch, a Republican from Garfield, also has filed to defend his seat. He is currently unopposed.
Superior Court Judge David Frazier also has filed and is currently unopposed.
Democrat Tyana Kelly of Pullman and Green Party candidate Christopher Winter of Clarkston have filed as candidates have for a seat in the Legislature's 9th District representative.
The position is held by Joe Schmick, a Republican from Colfax who was appointed to the post in November. Schmick has yet to file for candidacy, but has indicated he plans to do so.
State Rep. Steve Hailey and Sen. Mark Schoesler also have filed for re-election and so far are unopposed.
The filing period for state and county positions closes at 5 p.m. Friday.
Washington will hold its primary election Aug. 19 and its general election Nov. 4.
Earlier this week we told you about freshman Rep. Joe Schmick’s first challenger, the Green Party’s Christopher Winter of Clarkston. Now it appears the Colfax Republican has drawn another.
That would be Pullman Democratic activist Tyana Kelley, who signed up Tuesday. But that’s about all I can find on Kelley without picking up the phone, something I don’t have time for at present.
This will be Schmick’s first time facing voters as a Representative. He lost in a four way primary in 2006 for an open seat that eventually went to Rep. Steve Hailey, R-Mesa.
Schmick was appointed to the House late last year to replace Rep. David Buri, a Colfax Republican who stepped down to get into the lobbying business.
Steve Van Dyke of Rosalia has decided to drop plans to challenge Greg Partch for the district one county commissioner seat. Van Dyke, who has already filed papers with the Public Disclosure Commission, said he opted out of the challenge because he will need to commit hours of time while serving as executor of the estate of his mother, the late Elaine Van Dyke.
Van Dyke, 53, serves as transportation supervisor of the Rosalia School district where he has served for 30 years. A 1972 graduate of Rosalia High School, has earned a degree in automotive and heavy equipment repair at Spokane Community College before joining the staff at Rosalia.
Van Dyke said he could very well be interested in making a run for the commissioner’s seat in another four years.
State Rep. Steve Hailey of Mesa, who has undergone treatment for colon cancer after being diagnosed at the start of the last legislative session, has officially kicked off his 2008 re-election campaign. Hailey said he has undergone a regimen of chemotherapy, and his doctor is extremely pleased with the progress he has made toward recovery.
In recent days, the Mesa Republican has attended community and public events in Adams, Spokane, Whitman, Asotin, Garfield and Franklin counties to announce his re-election bid.
“We still have a lot of work to be done in Olympia, and I look forward to representing the citizens of the 9th District to work on important legislation that continues to affect the lives of the people who live in Eastern Washington,” Hailey said.
He feels his most important work in the legislature is not to pass more laws, but to help other legislators understand why and how legislation determines our way of life in Eastern Washington. He added what he enjoys most about being a legislator is being able to help individuals get through the government maze.
Rep. Hailey said he decided to go public with the news of his cancer diagnosis last January because he wanted to be honest and open with his constituents. Although unable to be in Olympia during much of the legislative session, Hailey continued to be involved in key issues important to residents in the 9th District. He has been able to return to an active work schedule on his ranch.
Hailey said one goal he would like to pursue in the next session would be to change the state’s “use it or loose it” policy for water rights. He feels residents can do a better job of conserving ground water all over the state if the state can get away from this attitude.
Hailey’s legislative committee assignments include the House Agriculture and Natural Resources, Transportation, Select Committee on Environmental Health and the joint Committee on Veterans’ and Military Affairs.
[Whitman County Commissioner Jerry] Finch pointed out a lot of rancor was directed at environmental groups because of that [giant Palouse earthworm] lawsuit. He said much of the disconnect between farmers and environmentalists has been brought on by “outsiders” at the universities who tell residents of the Palouse how to best manage their land.- "One percent left: Grad students seek to save Palouse prairie remnants," Whitman County Gazette, May 1, 2008
Tekoa’s Rick Squibb, the lone announced challenger for the District 2 county commissioners seat, Monday withdrew from the race.
Squibb, a long-haul truck driver, said his company, Western Distributing, offered him a local truck driving job in Denver. The move forced the Republican to cancel his bid to unseat incumbent Greg Partch, Garfield Republican.
“I hated to do it; I do not want to move,” said Squibb. “But their offer was just too good to pass up. Plus I can be at home every night.”
Squibb was running on the platform that current commissioners have focused the county’s resources too much around Pullman at the expense of the rest of the county.
Though not opposed to the county’s financing of infrastructure at the Hawkins Companies’ state line strip mall site, Squibb questions such an investment’s return for residents who would have to commute to Pullman to take such jobs.
“For the students, this will be a great thing,” said Squibb. “But as high as fuel is, I don’t see how it benefits the people of our smaller towns.”
Squibb said the county needs to ensure that its resources are distributed to communities like Tekoa, Rosalia and St. John. It is vital, he added, that those towns have viable employment opportunities for their citizens and receive a fair amount of the county’s resources.
The current commissioners’ focus on Pullman, he added, leaves the incumbents vulnerable in this election.
“I hope someone comes forward to go against him,” said Squibb. “Because there are a lot of issues that need to be brought up.”
However, he said, those efforts around Pullman might make it difficult for a challenger to best the incumbents in the county’s largest voting base.
“The way things are lined up, I honestly don’t think I could have beaten him in Pullman,” Squibb admitted.
Squibb lost a 2004 bid to unseat Partch, who was then running for a second term.
Encourage growth, promote a welcoming business atmosphere, and consider passing a City Council resolution in support of the proposed Wal-Mart Supercenter in PullmanThose are all worthy goals. But a resolution supporting Wal-Mart? That would have been a heck of a lot more timely and appropriate back in Fall 2004, not Spring 2008. The District III Appellate Court decision is due any day now and I'm sure ground will be broken shortly thereafter. By the time the council gets around to "considering" a resolution, it might all be over.
A large proportion of rural residents in the area, especially those living outside of its population centers, were born in the Basin. Their customs and lifestyles are typical of those found in rural areas of the West, in that they tend to have resource-based and land-production occupations, and are comparatively more conservative in their values and perspectives. One crude indicator of this social characteristic is the number of campaign contributions made by residents of Colfax, WA, in the 2004 election: all but one were made to the Republican Party or its candidates – in a state where a minority (46%) of voters voted for George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election.So, I guess we can interpret from that we conservatives are in favor of "poor planning" and "wasting water?"
However, in the Idaho portion of the basin’s rural areas, an exception is that some proportion of rural landowners either are faculty of the two universities or professionals attracted to the university-town of Moscow, and thus comparatively more liberal and affluent than their neighbors -- or they are even more liberal residents who have been attracted to the area as part of the back-to-the-land movement that began in the 1970's. One indicator of this social characteristic is the proportion of voters in Latah County that voted for George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election – 50% -- in contrast to a state in which a majority voted for Bush (69%).
It might also be noted that a major segment of the Moscow and rural Latah County population, given a more liberal political orientation and the fact that they have come from other more populated, congested and poorly planned areas of the country, are more concerned than other residents with growth management and the use of government and public policy to advance economic and community development in a way that they see as being progressive and well-planned. Some are opposed to certain kinds of economic activity (e.g., "big-box" retail stores) and have been labeled by others as "anti-growth."
In contrast, some residents of the Basin, especially in rural Whitman County, are more conservative in their beliefs and preferences, and some (including many farmers in the region) are among the region’s most conservative, especially in comparison to their fellow citizens on the "west-side" of the state of Washington and in Latah County. These individuals tend to believe that the less government involvement in citizens’ lives, the better, and they espouse principles of free-market economics, despite the subsidies that some receive from the federal government. Of particular relevance for water resource management, they are generally in favor of community development through increased economic activity (i.e., "pro-growth"), and would like to see their communities grow in terms of the basic industries and retail outlets available for local services, consumer choices and purchasing options, and general local prosperity, through the jobs, income and economic expansion generated.
An economic assault on MoscowWAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH! You had your shot and voters overwhelmingly rejected your point of view. Get a life.
When I took my seat on the Moscow City Council the Hawkins development was an inevitability.
By the end of my term [i.e., when the voters booted him out - tf] Hawkins was a possibility, nothing more. I took it for granted that it was my responsibility as an elected official to protect the natural resources and economic health of Moscow. [Obviously the voters disagreed - tf] The Hawkins development will be detrimental to both.
The possibility of the Hawkins project was so remote that without financial assistance the project would not move forward. Whitman County made the same bad decision that many other government entities have made - to offer financial incentives to lure new business. [That's why we're getting Hawkins and Home Depot ditched Moscow - tf] Then our Greater Moscow Alliance-dominated Moscow City Council went to work. I knew these guys had a business-first philosophy. I naively thought they meant Moscow business. Our GMA City Council made the Hawkins development a surety.
Moscow sits atop a resource that is in scarce supply worldwide - pure, clean, unpolluted water. We have yet to work out our own water issues. We need to carefully consider each new burden we place on our water supply. Our GMA City Council sees no need to conserve our water.
Our GMA City Council allocated our water to ensure growth in Whitman County. I am not opposed to growth in Whitman County. I believe we need a healthy region to have a healthy city. Placement by Whitman County of a "big-box village" right next to Moscow, miles from needed Whitman County utilities, is growth I can not support. The Hawkins development is nothing less than an economic assault on Moscow.
The GMA City Council voted against Moscow business and for squandering our resources. Thanks to our GMA City Council, Whitman County will be building infrastructure "in Moscow" that will ship our resources out, their waste in.
Aaron Ament, Moscow
Tekoa truck driver Rick Squibb announced Monday he will challenge incumbent Greg Partch, R-Garfield, in the Republican primary for the District 2 Whitman County Commissioner seat this fall.
Squibb, 48, served as mayor of Tekoa from September of 2000 to October 2002, and was on the city council off and on from 1989 to 2000.
Squibb also challenged Partch in 2004 when the Garfield incumbent ran for a second term.
Squibb received 31 percent of the vote in the Republican primary election that year.
Squibb pointed to efforts to drive Tekoa’s economy as an example of what could be done for other towns throughout the county.
“That town has come a long ways. By using that example, we can work to make the whole county more vital than what it is,” he said.
He cited the Tekoa business incubator on Crosby Street, which provides a low-rent building for startup businesses to establish themselves. The incubator spawned three companies that now employ several Tekoa residents.
“If you can do that in all the small towns in the county, that could create 50-60 jobs,” he said.
He claimed that would be more beneficial to the county than a concentration of jobs in and around Pullman.
The current commissioners, he said, have focused their efforts on developing the Pullman-Moscow corridor, at the expense of the rest of the county.
“Development in Pullman is great, but not if the rest of the county is suffering for it,” he said.
With fuel prices continuing to rise, Squibb questioned the benefits of jobs in Pullman if people have to drive nearly an hour to work there.
“The Pullman-Moscow corridor is an important piece, but that doesn’t help the people of Tekoa who need jobs,” said Squibb.
He criticized the commissioners’ recent decision to bond public money to develop infrastructure that would allow the Boise-based Hawkins Companies to build a 714,000 square foot shopping center on the Idaho stateline.
“If it does work out it could be a great thing,” said Squibb. “But if it doesn’t, are the taxpayers of Whitman County on the hook for it? Why put it on the backs of the county to help out a private developer?”
He also criticized the commissioners’ withholding of county .09 economic development funds. Those dollars, withheld by the current commissioners for possible needs in the corridor, need to be distributed to other towns, he said.
“We need to get back to where the .09 funds are benefiting our towns, and not just going towards the port’s private reserves,” he said.
That is something Squibb feels the incumbent has not done.
“Greg seems to feel like he should give everything to the port, but they have their own sources of money, they can do their own thing,” he said.
Also on Squibb’s agenda is better compensation for county employees.
“They made a promise they haven’t kept,” he said. “Sure they’ve built up the county’s cash reserves, but they did it on the backs of county employees.”
He worried that, without a marked increase in pay, finding a replacement workforce when current county employees retire would be difficult.
“I worked for the county for six months, but I couldn’t survive on the pay,” he said. “No one is going to want to work for what they pay.”
A 1977 graduate of Tekoa High School, Squibb now works as a long-haul driver for Colorado-based Western Distributors. He lives in Tekoa with his wife of 13 years, Holly, and 11-year old daughter, Mandy. Squibb’s older daughter Diana, a 2005 Tekoa graduate, currently resides in Arizona.
In a letter published in the Gazette last week, Roger Whitten argued that what we need is locally owned stores versus corporate owned big box stores.Here is Whitten's letter:
The truth is that there is plenty of room for both here in Whitman County.
Because of the entrepreneurial American spirit, small business is the backbone of our economy. In fact, Lowe’s Home Improvement Warehouse first started out as a mom-and-pop hardware store back in 1921 in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina. Through hard work and ambition, there is now at least one Lowe’s in every state in the union.
But since the advent of national retailers such as A&P and Woolworth’s, the American consumer has turned to shopping at chain stores. And why not? Chains are familiar, a big plus in our highly mobile modern society, offer more bang for the buck to working families, and particularly in rural areas, provide a much larger range of shopping choices than would normally be available. They also help the communities in which they locate by bringing in jobs and increased tax revenue and help local retailers by bringing in customers from a wide geographic area.
If shoppers can’t get what they want here, they’ll go elsewhere. And that’s exactly what has happened. An economist at the University of Idaho found that in 2004, Whitman County, including Pullman, had a net loss of $158.4 million in taxable retail sales to neighboring communities with more chain stores such as Moscow, Clarkston, Lewiston, and Spokane. As far as any “decrease in sales tax revenue from the existing locally owned stores,” our severe lack of retail is the real culprit.
Whitten stated that, “Money spent in a corporate owned big box store leaves the county.” But that’s not true at all. Money is fungible. That means that regardless of whether it originates in a locally owned store or a corporate owned store, all money is the same. A dollar spent in a local store that goes towards sales taxes, property taxes, employee salaries and benefits, charitable donations, etc., is no more valuable than a dollar spent in a chain store.
Will the Hawkins development “suck money out of the county” as Whitten claims? Will there be “no net gain in sales tax revenue?” The answer is a resounding “NO!” According to the Department of Revenue, Whitman County, excluding Pullman, generated $30,774,961 in taxable retail sales in 2006. Estimates for the Hawkins mall, at a mere 40% build out, come in at $123,823,621 in annual taxable retail sales. That’s right. One shopping development will generate FOUR times the existing retail sales of all of rural Whitman County! That means four times as much sales tax revenue for the county (approximately $1.3 million a year). And more development near Hawkins can be expected to follow. Even though Mr. Whitten is not going to “go into debt to help large corporations,” $10 million for such a return is a slam-dunk calculation in any economic equation.
Some have questioned why the County Commissioners are placing so much emphasis (and county funds) into the area around Pullman. The answer is simple. If you only have a limited amount to invest in a stock, you’re going to pick the company that is growing the most and can give you the biggest return. Forecasts for area growth have the City of Pullman increasing its population by 24.49% between 2006 and 2025. Whitman County is only expected to grow by 9.37% during the same period. However, the sales taxes generated by development in the Pullman/Moscow corridor will be used not just in Pullman, but all over the county; from Hooper to Palouse, and from Rosalia to Uniontown.
For these reasons, we should all support the bold actions taken by our County Commissioners to stimulate economic growth. For their role in delivering the Hawkins project alone, Commissioner Jerry Finch and Commissioner Greg Partch deserve another term and have my vote.
In regard to the Hawkins shopping mall development, I wonder if the Whitman County commissioners are factoring in the decrease in sales tax revenue from the existing locally owned stores. For if a person buys a stick of lumber at a Lowe's Home Improvement store instead of buying lumber from an existing locally owned store, there is no net gain in sales tax revenue.
In fact, it would be an economic loss to the county because money that stays local recirculates locally. Money spent in a corporate-owned big-box store leaves the county.
It is the small Mom and Pop type of businesses that bring money into the county and keeps it here. The large corporate stores suck money out of the county.
If they follow the zoning codes, Hawkins has every right to build a shopping mall on its property. I, however, am not willing to go into debt to help large corporations take money out of the local economy. The county commissioner's decision to give Hawkins $10 million for the development of their own land is a miscalculation in the overall economic equation.
League of Women Voters President Alice Schroeder said both political parties fought in court to have the right to conduct separate primaries.Exactly. This is NOT a general election. Open primaries, in general, are very bad, as they often allow the opposition to choose a party's nominee.
"People forget the parties are private entities," Schroeder said. "They have the right to demand only members of their party vote on their ballot."
"Basically if people are unhappy they have the right to establish a new party," she added.
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