Donations sparse in county races

It might be the economy. It might be that the stakes seem lower for some reason. It might be that there are so many other races this year.

Whatever the reason, three years after Steve Stuart beat Tom Mielke in the most expensive county commissioner race on state record, Clark County’s current crop of candidates are running at bargain prices.

As ballots arrived in mailboxes this week, the best-funded candidate was Ridgefield Democrat Pam Brokaw, whose $88,000 total includes labor unions and various business interests such as lawyers and the state Realtors association.

In a separate race, Hockinson Republican Marc Boldt has raised $61,000, with his biggest donations from development interests and the Realtors.

Both their opponents lag far behind: Mielke, a Battle Ground Republican running this time against Brokaw, has brought in $37,000; and Vancouver Democrat Jeanne Harris, opposing incumbent Boldt, $18,000.

The contributions, which pay for thousands of glossy mailers, yard signs and cable ads, pale next to those raised in recent years.

In 2005, Stuart and Mielke each raised about $190,000 in their race, and a Washington D.C.-based political action committee independently spent $86,000 on Stuart’s behalf after taking a $100,000 donation from the family of aspiring Cowlitz casino developer David Barnett.

In 2006, Stuart raised $247,000 and Republican Bruce Hagensen $82,000.

Clark County races are not subject to campaign finance limits.

Developers and other building interests, perennially the biggest force in funding Clark County politicians of both parties, say they’re flat out of cash.

“It’s not that we wouldn’t like to contribute more,” said Lisa Schmidt, a spokeswoman for Vancouver-based Nutter Corporation. “As you and I are talking, I am sitting here writing a letter that declines a giving opportunity.”

Nutter and its president, Jerry Nutter, gave $7,500 to Mielke in 2005, $5,000 to Stuart in 2006 and $2,500 to Mielke this year.

It’s one of the relatively few firms still donating at all.

In 2005, four of Mielke’s biggest donors were developers based in St. Helens, Ore.; this year, all the firms’ Web sites have vanished and their old phone numbers have been disconnected or reassigned.

The $40,000 they gave him that year would have been enough to fund his entire 2008 campaign so far.

Vancouver-based Scott’s Excavating, whose revenue is down one-third in the last year, gave Stuart $5,000 in 2005, $2,500 in 2006, and nothing to anybody in 2008.

“It probably really started hitting home, say, May, June,” said Teresa Reisch, Scott’s secretary-treasurer. “We just have not had anything extra.”

If her Vancouver office manager told her that he’d just met the perfect candidate, Reisch said she’d advise him to “get out and vote for the man.”

The contribution vacuum this year means that smaller donations can carry more weight.

David Rowe, executive director of the Building Industry Association of Clark County, says his group has actually stepped up its political giving to $125,000 this year, from $100,000 in 2006.

But this year, he said, raising money for political donations has been “like pulling teeth.”

Rowe’s group has put up $5,000 each for Boldt and Mielke.

Rowe rejected the idea that builders might be giving less because, with the county’s growth plan complete, they see less at stake.

“It’s just the opposite,” he said. “I think this is one of the most important elections.”

Republican candidates want to defend the growth plan from a state challenge, he said. Democrats don’t.

“The masses don’t understand what’s going on and what the issues are,” Rowe said. “Somebody’s going to have to step up and take leadership.”

Labor unions, meanwhile, are putting a big bet on Brokaw.

Of the $16,400 she’s raised from labor-affiliated groups, $10,000 has come from the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

The IBEW, one of the best-funded local unions, has been a vocal supporter of the Cowlitz Tribe’s proposed casino near La Center and, like Brokaw, of light rail across a new Interstate 5 bridge.

Brokaw has taken no position on the casino, saying it’s a federal issue. But she supports signing a new contract with the tribe in which it would promise to follow some local rules.

Ed Barnes of Vancouver, who chairs the electricians’ union PAC in Clark County, said Brokaw has been such a friend to local unions since running for a state House seat in 2004 that his group didn’t bother to interview Brokaw before endorsing her against Mielke.

“We’d interviewed her when she ran for the Legislature,” he said. “There’s no sense in going back a second time when she’s going to give you the same answers.”

Even amid the current economic slowdown, many companies still find reasons to donate.

Last week, as the current board of commissioners debated whether to borrow $41 million to pay for the roads that would be needed for a new $100 million shopping complex, the developer, George Killian, donated $1,000 to Harris’ cash-strapped campaign.

In August, Killian had donated $1,000 to Boldt, Harris’s opponent.

Also in the last week, Harris has been calling in her speeches for the county to rebuild the economy by investing county taxes in infrastructure, “much as we did in the days of FDR.”

Boldt said this week that he’s likely to vote against the loan for the Killian project.

As in past years, many contributors have business before the county.

For example, one company called Aspen Across the Street LLC has donated $2,500 each to Boldt and Mielke.

The firm, which lists its contact as Rob Hinton, owns 34 acres along Interstate 205, north of Costco on 88th Street. Last year, commissioners agreed to rezone part of the area from light industrial to the less restrictive “highway commercial” zone. Vancouver-based Hinton Development is now seeking to develop a 30-acre complex on the site.

Hinton did not return calls for comment this week.

Other donors have more general interests.

Walt Keeney, owner of Food Express Inc. of Arcadia, Calif., gave $1,000 to Brokaw’s campaign because she backs light rail and a new I-5 bridge.

Food Express owns a trucking facility near the Port of Vancouver. Eliminating bridge lifts and adding light rail and entrance and exit lanes will reduce congestion on the nearby highway, Keeney said.

“It costs me about 55 to 60 bucks an hour to have a truck sitting out there,” he said. “Time saved is money.”

Michael Andersen: 360-735-4508 or michael.andersen@columbian.com.