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Candidate for Okanogan County Commissioner Trinity Hightower Stucker sat down with MVE to share her thoughts about fixing the county’s $2.6 million budget deficit, the county’s economic outlook, and why no one seems to know her opponent, incumbent County Commissioner Jon Neal. The interview has been edited for clarity.
How are you finding the county? What are your impressions?
So, I should probably give you a little bit of background. My husband was born and raised in Tonasket and I have lived here since I was 8 years old. So, I’m fairly familiar with the county. We used to drive all over the county. We have ties from one community to the next. It really is a large family, and so, how do I find the county? With regards to the reason why I’m running, it’s because economically, Okanogan County is struggling.
My husband and I, we have a lot of deep roots here in the county, but a year ago, we started looking at what was going on. It’s getting harder to live here. It’s taking more money. Our kids are leaving. We’re exporting literally our most important commodity- and that’s our kids. And so we sat down as a family and decided, well, what are we going to do? What a lot of our friends were doing and leave Washington state? Or do we stay here? We decided to stay.
So at that point it’s like, okay, what do we do to make this feasible because I want my kids to come back, and that meant getting off the sidelines, because I’ve always been involved politically within the county, and actually running for county commissioner. That’s where a lot of the hang-ups, I think, are happening and we needed a stronger voice.
I want my kids to come back, and that meant getting off the sidelines… and actually running for county commissioner.
In my travels throughout the county, what I see is right now economically, we’re not bringing in businesses. We’re overregulated, and our county budget is not sustainable at this point.
[In the fall of] last year, we were asked, I am part of the Okanogan County Farm Bureau and the Republican Party, and we were asked by county commissioners to go through the budget. and find cuts because they were facing over $2 million deficit. We did. A group of volunteers got together and went through it line by line. We were asked to do that. And so we did, and we found places.
We didn’t touch the sheriff’s department. We did not go into the jail department or the prosecutors because as citizens, there are a lot of mandates within those departments that come from the state that we wouldn’t even know where to begin with cuts there and what is mandated and what’s grant funded. So we didn’t touch those departments.
We found significant cuts that you could make, and we took them to the county commissioners and presented our proposals. When the budget came out and was approved at the end of December, we found that they had not listened to one suggestion that we made.
When we found out none of the recommendations were taken into account, it appeared as if the can had been kicked down the road and nothing really addressed, that we would deal with the issues another year. This has been an ongoing issue.
What were the cuts that you were recommending?
One of those suggestions was, we were looking at it from the average income within Okanogan County and how much most households bring in. From my perspective, if you’re going to go down to the departments that you’ll oversee, and you’re going to say, hey, let’s make some cuts, you should lead by example.
Something that I would be willing to do if I were in their position would be- I’m willing to take a 10% decrease in my pay. I’m leading by example. That would have only knocked off $10,000, approximately $10,000, and that’s not even counting the benefits and everything. I’m willing to do that. What are you guys willing to do across the department heads? So that was one of the proposals. And that would have impacted about 10 or 12 departments, I believe.
That’s out of the box thinking. Have you experienced anybody else doing that on the government level?
Yes. In 2012, 13, I believe it was, Ray Campbell and Sheilah Kennedy ran for county commissioner and they were elected. They actually had done that voluntarily and taken a pay cut. It is legal. You can do it. You have to sign a form. It’s just how willing are you to do that and to lead by example? We are at the position in Okanogan County where we’re going to have to make those decisions.
You’re talking about department heads and commissioners taking a 10% cut, are you asking for rank and file employees to take a 10% cut?
That was not the proposal. That was across the department heads because within the departments, there would have to be cuts within different programs and I’m not talking employees. In our proposal, the only two jobs that were impacted, well, that were eliminated, were two of the three full-time positions that they had at the county fairgrounds. The county fairgrounds are not operational all year long. One of the buildings is, but not the whole fairground. So to have three full-time employees down there was not feasible.
Our proposal was to rewrite those job descriptions and make them where they were flex positions that could work in different departments at different kinds of needs and float throughout. So it would still be full time, but they would be floating positions that would meet the needs of departments that really did need help during heavy workloads.
So those two employees would not be unemployed. They would just go to other departments to fill those gaps.
That was our proposal, because some of the departments are understaffed. When we met with Commissioner [Andy] Hover, he had said an easy fix would be to cut one position from every department. Well, our response was that’s not feasible because a one size fits all does not fit every department. Some departments can take that hit, but others are already understaffed. You actually have to work that budget and figure out where you can take the cuts instead of just doing it broad-base. So put the work in and let’s figure this out and let’s move forward. That hasn’t happened.
The times that I’ve seen [County Commissioner] Andy Hover, he’s very budget conscious. He’s in his third term. He just got reelected two years ago. He’s a senior commissioner between the three of them. Did he tell you his reasons for not implementing some of your proposals?
No, that discussion has not happened.
Did you approach any other commissioner about that or give a public comment?
The lack of communication from the commissioner’s office over the last couple years has been part of the problem. It was amazing that they reached out to the community and asked for input. At that point, no, because I had been approached to run. I wanted to see how the other commissioners would handle this and wanted to watch the process play out.
At this point, are you for the tax increase or against the property tax increase?
I am actually opposed to it, and the reason why I’m opposed to it is that it is once again a Band-Aid. We’re not getting to actual solutions that will permit us to have a sustainable county budget.
If you increase the taxes on our county residents who are already feeling the pressures of tax increases, how many more are we going to lose out of the county? Are we going to lose that demographic of young families that are working here trying to make a living here and are starting to run the businesses? Are they going to leave? And then you’re left with an aging population that are on set incomes and will end up in a property tax bracket where they’re paying less property taxes. That means less taxes into the county coffers.
Now there’s also a large part of funding that goes to the schools and levies, like the hospital districts, the fire districts, stuff like that. But the largest portion goes to school funding, actually. And a lot of families have a hard time meeting those costs.
Are those proposals enough?
No, those aren’t enough. There were other various things that right off the top of my head, without having it here, I cannot, right off the top of my head, go into it.
Do you think that as a commissioner you can solve these issues without raising taxes?
That is a difficult question to answer at this point because the reality is the jail alone is bleeding two million dollars.
And they’re understaffed.
They are. There are unfunded state mandates at this point. We really do need commissioners pushing back against and bringing this story to Olympia. This is the law that you guys passed. This is how it is impacting our county. We need to get this fixed because our county is about to go under, and if Okanagan goes under, who picks it up?
We need to get this fixed because our county is about to go under, and if Okanagan goes under, who picks it up?
Friction with Olympia
The county commissioners do have a lobbyist. I think the lobbyist represents Eastern Washington. I think it’s Jon Neal that goes out there to Olympia. You can cross your fingers, but I don’t know if they actually hear you. When you talk about regulations, a lot of it is from the state, right?
Well, yes, because the county gets its power from the state. Those unfunded mandates definitely come from the state, such as legal defense. They [Olympia] are paying a ridiculously low amount. We need to have a stronger voice and be more effective and have a better network that reaches across and actually says, okay, these are the impacts to our county.
Has anyone pulled together the economic impacts on our county and on our services from these unfunded mandates? Because if you don’t have that numerical story to present to them, to back up what you’re telling them… because I can sit here and talk to you all day, but unless you have the evidence of how it’s impacting you and the numbers, that’s where you can get down to changing and hopefully getting funding shifted in that direction because we do have the funding at the state level. We do. It’s just a matter of shifting it from pet projects to the mandates down at the county level, and right now we have a lack of willingness over in Olympia to have that discussion of, I want my museum or I want my sculpture done. Whereas we want to fund and make sure that attorneys have the proper workload at the county level to make it feasible to implement these laws that we’ve passed. And so you have to have that discussion and it takes more, honestly, than a lobbyist that represents a multitude of counties. It takes that personal story from the county commissioners. This is how it’s impacting my county.
So the economic impact statement, that takes some time to produce. The economic impact of unfunded mandates, as you requested, who would do that work? You would have to pay someone, obviously, either a contractor or third party, or someone in the department.
Possibly, there are resources at the state level. The Department of Commerce and the different caucus staff do have members on their team that run numbers. And before bills are presented-
They give you the economic impact.
They should. They should have some of those numbers in place. Now when it comes to new laws, it’s all conjecture and projections and sometimes those numbers haven’t been fully ran out. However, I was speaking to Representative Andrew Engel last month or a couple months ago and I asked him, with some of the changes in the sales tax law, how how is that going to impact Oanogan County? When they proposed the bill, when they had all of these discussions, did they also run the numbers for rural counties? We excluded diapers and formula and this and that, and I said, do we have any kind of projections or numbers how this is going to come out because we’re facing a deficit, obviously. Do we have an idea of what that additional deficit is going to do? He wasn’t sure if that had been done, but he told me he’d follow up on it.
By doing that, working with him, he actually was able to give me some numbers and projections of how it’s going to impact the county. I had a leg up knowing that is an option over in Olympia because I used to work for [State] Senator [Bob] Morton straight out of college. And so I knew that there are committees, there are staff that do pull those numbers together and if you know how to ask for them, then you can get them. The story of those numbers was absolutely fascinating of how it could potentially impact Okanogan County. Those are the types of things that wouldn’t cost the county because that work’s already been done.
Economic Outlook
What do you think about ideas to grow the population of the county?
I just had a meeting with [Executive Director] Roni Diefenbach at Economic Alliance, and as she and I were discussing, the issue right now is, unfortunately, not even bringing new business into Okanogan County. The issue right now is saving the businesses that are here.
… the issue right now is, unfortunately, not even bringing new business into Okanogan County. The issue right now is saving the businesses that are here.
And what’s the issue- people are leaving?
People are leaving. Over regulation. The high cost. People aren’t going out for a lot of the businesses that we have here. We are a natural resource-based county. We have a lot of those businesses that are going under due to overregulation, taxes, different changes in the workforce laws.
That’s at the state level, right?
Yes. It’s not a matter of bringing businesses in right now. It’s a matter of keeping the ones that we have here alive to even have any sort of an economy because the tax base does not- when you have over 60% of our workforce publicly employed, those are taxpayer dollars.
60% of the county is publicly employed?
Over 60% of our workforce is public employees. You’ve got the federal, you’ve got the schools, you’ve got the county. That’s not sustainable. Because even the money that they are spending in the county is just regeneration of tax dollars. The only influx of tax dollars, new tax dollars comes from outside private businesses. So, you have to have those private businesses.
For more tax dollars.
They’re the only influx to support that tax-based industry or employment.
Rural areas are subsidized by urban areas. We don’t actually sustain ourselves. We get a lot of grants.
And that’s not sustainable in itself without private industry from those urban areas, is what I’m getting at. I’m not saying that we are solely sustainable.
Okanogan County is not sustainable. This valley is not sustainable.
I agree.
“Grant” is the most popular word around here.
I agree. I completely agree with you.
So, what’s your vision for that? Would you want more balance? More tax base from businesses? Keeping the ones that are already here, and maybe attracting new ones? Is that part of your vision?
I think that in order to even have those conversations, we have to look at what we’re spending first in this county. Before you can even have that conversation, you have to see exactly what that picture looks like. I don’t have a clear picture about that right now. I don’t have access to all of that right now. I don’t know the ins and outs. I don’t know what grants are funding want.
Isn’t the budget public information?
The budget is. I’ve seen the budget. But I have not asked for public records on all the grants that are being funneled through.
That’s not in the budget?
You would have to ask for the grant information in order to match it up within the budget, to see what parts of the budget are grant funded.
County Government
You mentioned a little bit dealing with the county. What’s your experience with customer service at the county level?
I don’t have a whole bunch of experience with the different departments because I don’t have a lot of business with the county. What I’ve been hearing when I’ve been going out speaking to people across the county is it is very difficult to get a response in a timely fashion. I’ve been hearing high levels of frustration regarding being charged fee upon fee upon fee, and doing the work themselves. So they feel as if they’re being nickel and dimed and still having to do the work themselves.
Say you go out and buy a piece of property and you apply to have a site analysis, and you’re told to submit a drawing. Well, you do that, and you’re asked to do it multiple times over, and there’s no communication.
I was just talking to a lady yesterday, actually when I was filling up at the gas station, and she says, you know, it’s so frustrating. I’ve submitted the same drawing multiple times over to the two different departments- planning and building. I get charged $100 every time, and they don’t communicate among themselves. And she’s like, I followed their directions to the T and I’m still being asked to resubmit things. I’ve heard that from multiple people. That’s a high level of frustration for them.
Do you know the commissioners personally or just in an official capacity?
I do not know any of the three commissioners personally. I’ve always dealt with them from the public aspect.
I was just wondering if you think they’re aware of the problem.
They are aware of the problem. They’ve been told of the problem and usually the answer is, well, just put our name on the cc line in your email and that usually generates the response.
What would you do as a commissioner? Because it seems to be a cultural workforce issue, right? How would you fix that or how would you address it even?
Those departments are directly under the county commissioners, so that is something that you could give guidance on. It would be important to bring the departments together and see why there’s a breakdown in communication, why there’s a breakdown in coordination, and what proposals those departments and employees have to fix it. I think that’s a spot to start because they’re the ones that work in the departments and with each other. Facilitating that discussion, I think, is important as a county commissioner, because there has to be a change. People are paying for services and they don’t feel like they’re getting them.
Future of the County Fairgrounds
There was a brouhaha in middle of March when [Jon] Neal went after Nick Timm saying, you’re spreading this rumor that we want to close the fairgrounds. We don’t want to close the fairgrounds, but we may have to close the fairgrounds. There’s a difference between wanting and having to.
Which is a solid point.
Fairgrounds. So, there was a brouhaha in the middle of March where [County Commissioner Jon] Neal went after [County Commissioner Nick] Timm saying, you know, you’re spreading this rumor that we want to close the fairgrounds. We don’t want to close the fairgrounds, but we may have to close the fairgrounds. There’s a difference there between wanting and having to.
You came out on Facebook against closing the fairgrounds.
No. I came out against shutting down the fair. So the fair and the fairgrounds are two separate things.
Yes, yes, yes, yes. So, shutting down the fair, does the fair break even at least?
So my husband sat on the fair board for years. The fair, at that period of time, was profitable. It depended on how you ran it. A lot of times, in order to make the fair happen, you bring in volunteers. That is the only way the fair happens. The community comes together, they get the barns ready, they get the fairgrounds ready. They water the track, they rake the tracks. It’s a lot. Is it profitable? Yes, if done right.
Back in those days, the fairground funds were not rolled into the general fund. They were always kept separate. Now, it’s just this set budget. We’ll fill the gap kind of thing for the last several years. That’s how it’s been. We’ll just fill the gap kind of thing instead of saying, this is the money you guys have from last year, what are you going to do with it this year?
So the money the fair brings in is going to the general budget and when it’s time to put on the fair, it comes out of the general budget. So, it’s kind of muddy a little bit.
Yes. Instead of, here’s this amount that you had. Let’s make the fair happen and make sure that you have enough money in the account next year to do the fair. That has changed over the years.
What is your vision for the fairgrounds, 365 days a year? Do you see it as a place for bringing in events?
That’s a multifaceted question because people have to have money to spend money. When their household budgets are short, what’s the first thing that they cut out?
Entertainment.
The extras. They cut out going out. They cut out entertainment, and they start bringing it closer. They don’t end up going places. So, as far as the future, I honestly don’t think that anybody could give you an honest answer. I mean, we could throw out dreams, but until you get a financial handle on what’s going on, you’re throwing dreams, and I’m not interested in doing that. I’m interested in staying focused in reality.
As far as the fairgrounds, would I love for those grounds to stay open year round? Absolutely, because we do not have facilities in Okanogan County that can handle large groups and occasionally there are demands for facilities like that. However, you also have to ask yourself- if there is a large demand for that constantly, do we not think that somebody somewhere would not build a facility to fulfill that need? And so far that has not happened.
You’re talking about the private sector.
Yes.
Do you think that if there was a need someone would build it as a private enterprise?
I think they would. It would be a business opportunity for them and people like to make money.
Do you think the county should get rid of the fairgrounds?
No. No.
Do you think it should be dormant 9 months out of the year?
I don’t know what that looks like right now because we have facilities that are condemned currently. Granted, we’re looking at refurbishing and rebuilding. That takes money. How do you do that with a deficit?
You’re talking about the fairgrounds or something else?
The fairgrounds.
And so it has fallen into disrepair.
It has. In my opinion, there should have been funds set aside every year, whether it was $40,000, there should have been money reinvested into those grounds every year to keep them up and functioning because the reason why we lost our fire contracts is they would give a list of issues that they had with those grounds that they would want fixed before the next year, and they came back the next year and it wasn’t fixed. They gave another list, came back, the next year wasn’t fixed. That’s why we lost the fire camps.
Fire camps– when they’re fighting fires, they need a place to stay.
And so we lost that from the fairgrounds, and that honestly was a revenue source that could have been reinvested in those grounds to keep that fire camp. Now, it’s gone. Now, they use the stampede grounds. They use schools and they’re building DNR facilities out at the airport in Omak, and they will have all the fire camps up there.
I had that discussion with the fairgrounds manager. I said, are you going to be able to bring back the fire camps? And he says, I’m pretty sure I’ve got them this year. Well, I was at a fire chiefs meeting the other night and I hear that they’re breaking ground. Now, granted, up at the airport. Now, granted, that’s going to take several years for that project. That’s multiple millions of dollars, and so it’s going to take several years for that project to be completed, but when it’s completed, you can no longer depend on that revenue for the fairgrounds. Whether we have the fire camps this year or not, I don’t know, but how that’s handled in the meantime, between completion of that facility up at the airport, that’s going to be crucial.
So, Chris Branch was there before Nick Timm. What is it about these gentlemen that you think that they missed an economic opportunity for income from the fairgrounds?
I’m not sure that they have missed an economic opportunity. I think it’s probably more that they had different priorities, and so I’m not sure that I would claim that they’ve missed an economic opportunity.
I’m not sure that they have missed an economic opportunity. I think it’s probably more that they had different priorities…
Agriculture in Okanogan County
How is the farm community in Okanogan?
Struggling.
What are some of the issues?
The weather has seriously impacted our crop this year. I believe you probably heard that the county commissioners declared a disaster. That’s going to play into how many of these farms still remain viable after this year, most likely. The frost froze off the blossoms and damaged the trees.
… we’ll see how many of our farms are still around next year, which means more ag lands possibly being put on the market.
Can they revive or that’s it? The window’s gone?
Yep. You have a lot of farmers who mitigated for frost damage. They were spraying water. They were burning propane to keep the air warmed up over the orchards. You’ve got power costs, you’ve got propane costs, you’ve got labor costs, and they still lost the majority of the crops- our soft fruit. I don’t know what that impact is on the apples, pears, cherries, peaches.
I think it was 3 weeks ago, at least a month ago, they literally had ice hanging off the trees because we got those cold snaps, and it got down to the valley floor. It wasn’t just the mountains. So, they’re hurting, and we’ll see how many of our farms are still around next year, which means more ag lands possibly being put on the market.
It’s zoned for agriculture, right? They would have to get permission from the county for any sort of development. It would have to remain agriculture, right?
No. Not unless it has a conservation easement on it.
Family Life
What’s the age range of your children?
So my son is 19. My middle daughter, Liberty, she’s 10, and then Lillian Grace is seven.
Your 19 year old, where does he see himself?
Quote, “somewhere other than Okanogan County.” We’ll see if that happens because right now, his girlfriend is finishing up her nursing degree, so he is sticking around for two years. We’ll see what life does, if he actually ends up leaving.
You’re a businesswoman as well, right?
It depends on how you define business. I managed my family. I manage my funny farm, which is goats and kids and my husband, basically. So, as far as running a business, no, I have not run a business besides our funny farm and our personal finances.
So, you’re like Patty Murray, mom in tennis shoes, except not tennis shoes, maybe farm boots…
Well, I’m a mother dedicated to her kids and this county. I don’t want this county to go under, and right now I am seriously concerned about the financial projection that we’re headed down.
I don’t want this county to go under, and right now I am seriously concerned about the financial projection that we’re headed down.
What does your husband do?
My husband got hurt when he was 18. He’s a paraplegic. He worked at Wells Fargo for many years and he had to go out. He had some serious health issues come up pertaining to his injuries. I think it was 2016, 17. He actually quit Wells Fargo on a disability. He had to retire early.
He was able to work even with being a paraplegic.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. My husband and I actually met in college when we both went down to WVC [Wenatchee Valley College] in Omak together.
Was he a paraplegic?
He was. He was in a manual chair at that point. We would still go whitewater rafting and rock climbing and travel everywhere. Go skiing. It was a lot of fun. But he’s now in a manual chair about the time he retired. He had to go in for some more surgeries and he ended up in a manual chair.
Doctors lie, by the way. He was never supposed to be able to have kids. Now we have three.
That’s a commitment on your part, right? It says something about your character that you said yes.
Well, I don’t know about that. It is what it is. I love him.
Who is going to take care of the fort when you’re in Okanogan?
My husband and I work as a team and we have for years. I always try to put him as the public face because he’s Mr. Congeniality and I like to stay doing the work behind the scenes. When I was first approached to run for this office, I tried really, really hard to get him to run because we do work as a team. And he told me absolutely not. So, here I am.
Can he drive?
Yes. We travel all over the U.S. It would have been 2021, we took our kids for almost two months. We paid a family friend, a young family that just had a baby to stay at our place to take care of the funny farm and we took the kids, loaded up a minivan and headed out across the northern US to show the kids the different areas for almost two months. Went all the way to Maine, dropped down into the Great Lakes, Niagara Falls, the Poconos, everything. It was so much fun because we were able to pick spots, stay there for a while and immerse them in the culture and the foods and everything in the area. So, it was a lot of fun.
Your husband can take care of the farm.
I raised my kids very independent and my kids have been expected from the time they were little to do chores. In our last round of surgeries with my husband, I was over in Harborview with him. We flew out my mother-in-law from Iowa and she stayed on the farm with the girls. You had the adult there and those girls literally took care of all those animals the two weeks we were over there. It was absolutely amazing what they could do.
Does your farm provide you with everything?
It doesn’t provide us with everything. Up in that area, it’s hard to grow. After Lightning Creek took our place out, our garden and everything, because we had the fire come through Bonaparte, and that was actually on our return trip. We had just landed in Great Falls and we were going to stay there for a week and then lightning strikes hit and we headed home, and that’s when the fire burned through everything up there. The next spring, Lightning Creek cut loose and took out our neighbors and our house. But we were able to salvage our house and clean up around it, but it took out my whole garden area.
Up in Bonaparte, you have to have greenhouses and all that stuff to grow. So it doesn’t provide for us solely. I rely a lot on trades with friends and family that I am blessed to have throughout the valley and they provide me with fresh produce and fruit. It is absolutely amazing. We raise up pigs or goats and do trades. It’s actually pretty cool.
Commissioner Dynamics
You’re running against Jon Neal. We’ve talked about macro issues. Is there anything specifically that you would say that Jon Neal didn’t do that you would do differently or, aside from the general stuff that we’ve already talked about, which I think kind of falls on all the commissioners, right?
It does.
You’re a woman who is going up against… there’ll be two guys there. Andy Hover is a pretty macho guy. Do you have any apprehension about being with those two gentlemen? Or just the dynamics of being one voice where Hover is kind of leading the pack?
So Jon Neal is, I don’t know him personally. I barely know him. I see him in meetings, but I don’t know him. He seems like a really nice guy, actually. I have nothing personal against him. The issues where I would do things differently is- very few people know who Jon Neal is.
He was the mayor [of Oroville.]
Very few people in North Okanagan County know who Jon Neal is. After Lightning Creek cut loose on our place, my entire neighborhood invited [him]. He was a newly elected commissioner. We invited him and Maurice Goodall from Emergency Management up to look at things and explain to him what the situation was, see if there was any recourse, because at that point, my neighbors were completely homeless, and they’re this elderly couple and it’s like, okay, this is our situation. Is there any way you can help. We never heard from him again.
Very few people in North Okanagan County know who Jon Neal is.
Did he come up?
He came up. Never heard from him. Hardly ever spoke. Never heard from him again, and that seems to be a reoccurring theme. Nobody knows him.
He’s a very quiet man.
Yes, but you should be out in your community. People should know. You should be talking to your constituents. I talk to people. I ask them- what’s working, what’s not working. I don’t wait for them to call me, because they’re out there trying to make a living, and I’m being paid to represent them. If that means me going to them on my time and dime to hear what’s going on, then that’s what needs to happen. And so, that’s where I see the biggest gap, and what I’m finding throughout a lot of conversations with people, communication and coordination are a reoccurring issue. I hope to improve that.
As far as the dynamics with Nick Timm and Andy Hover, am I apprehensive? No. I come from a construction family. My dad was a contract lineman. I’m the youngest of 5 kids. I was homeschooled, but I’ve also got a public education at a higher level, so I’ve already navigated a lot of different dynamics that most people would be very hesitant about handling.
My work over in Olympia with Senator Morton’s office really equipped me to deal with a lot of different dynamics and not just within my own echo chamber, but across the aisle. My husband and I, we have a very, very diverse group of friends from far far left to far far right, and we still are able to come together, have conversations and enjoy each other.
There is some hatred going both ways.
There really is. And division.
So when you said you have friends on the far left, what does that feel like to you? How does that relationship work?
It’s fine. It’s fine. We can talk about a lot of things and we have the mutual understanding that it’s okay to have different views. We just have to be able to simply talk and not let the divisiveness control our emotions, and that is very important, especially in today’s social atmosphere. There’s a lot of division and it’s unnecessary. We just need to come together and get the job done.
There’s a lot of division and it’s unnecessary. We just need to come together and get the job done.
The Farm Bureau seems really conservative to me. The commissioners, I know they’re all Republicans, but they seem moderate.
They are.
Where do you see yourself? I can’t tell where you are on that spectrum.
I am conservative.
So are they.
I’m more conservative than they are. Well, I don’t know about Jon Neal. On some issues, I think that I am more conservative than him, on others, he might be more conservative than me. I don’t know because we never hear from him. So I honestly can’t gauge him.
As far as Andy Hover, I think that could probably apply to Andy as well, depending on some issues.
Do you think you’re to the right of Andy [Hover]?
Probably. I would say that I’m definitely probably to the right of Andy. However, my focus, my goal is literally, numbers are numbers, and there’s more to the county commissioner job than the budget, but numbers are numbers. That’s the basis for keeping these county services going, and no matter where we come down on some of the social and political issues, we need to make sure that those numbers work.
I would say that I’m definitely probably to the right of Andy.
Is that your platform?
It is one of the main reasons for me personally. There are other issues. You know, the coordination with the different federal agencies and among the county departments regarding wildfire and land management. That’s a big one. Communication and coordination all the way across the board, openness, transparency- that seems to be lacking. I have some concerns about some of that, and I don’t know if it’s just because there are serious gaps in communication.
Where do you see the gap at the federal level?
As far as making sure that the US Forest Service, when they’re coming in and they’re rewriting all of their their land management plans- are they coming in and are they talking to the counties and getting their input on how they think those lands in our county should be managed? Are they commenting on those plans? The last time that the plan was released, and I could be wrong, but I don’t think I am, the county commissioners did not comment on it. Did they review it?
My concern is, have the county commissioners, did they even sit down and read the plan that was being proposed? Did they comment on the plan? Are they coordinating, making sure that the agencies are coming in because we have a lot of public lands here.
Do you think that the commissioners are overworked?
I don’t know. Do they feel like they are overworked?
That’s a good question…. Jon Neal is probably Andy Hover’s closest buddy on the [bench.] There’s a good energy between them. Andy relies on Jon and Jon’s pretty quiet.
Well, I think that Jon worked quite a few years with Chris Branch, so there’s that relationship that has already been built when he was mayor in Oroville.
I’ve seen Andy say, I’m going to make a motion, and he just kind of sits back in his chair and Jon’s like, yeah. Two out of three is all you need, right? So, there’s a comfort level there. So if he loses Jon, it’s going to be a very interesting commissioners’ bench. There is an alpha male kind of competition between Nick and and Andy, and then you’re coming in, this is like wildfire. What do you think about all that?
I think that that gives the opportunity for things to get changed.
Do you see an alliance with Nick Timm?
I do not think that you could say that there would be an alliance. I think that by me being there, it would actually encourage the other two commissioners to sit back, look at issues, think about them, and plan a path forward to work together.
The Sheriff’s Office
Sheriff Barcus, what do you think of the new interim sheriff?
I think that I’m going to keep my campaign as far away from that race as possible because I need to focus on my race and that is another elected office. That is a race that I am not weighing in on.
I think that I’m going to keep my campaign as far away from that race as possible…
So, you don’t want to endorse anyone.
I will not endorse anyone. I think that the voters need to make that decision.
She was one of the people that was presented to the commissioners.
I think that that would be an excellent interview with the chair of the Republican Party about that process.
You don’t agree with that decision?
Do I agree? I think that the central body brought forward three choices to pick from. I support what the Republican Party did, the process that they did. I think that that would be an interesting conversation, though, for you to have with Stacy Storm, the chair.
Okay. The jail is in a lawsuit. They’ve had a couple deaths. Do you want to comment about the state of the jail right now?
The jail falls under the department of the sheriff. The sheriff overseas the jail. That is a conversation that, if elected as commissioner, my involvement in that would be regarding the funding side of it and what needs to happen within the jail regarding the infrastructure. The infrastructure side would be my discussion on that.
Do I think that we need to have improvements within the jail? Yes. There are issues there. Do I understand them fully at this point? No, and do I have a proposal moving forward? No, because I would have to hear what the sheriff would propose first. It’s their responsibility to bring that forward in the budget discussions.
Final Thoughts…
You went to college. You have a bachelor’s degree?
I do. I was pre-law and I was one class short of double majoring in economics, but I was done.
You never wanted to pursue a professional career?
Oh, absolutely. I was headed for law school, and I was aiming for the law program in Italy. That was my goal. Gonzaga had a law program over in Italy and yes, that was my goal, but that was the year I was working for [State] Senator Morton at the time, and I got pregnant with our son, and that forced me to step back and really look at things, and that’s when my husband and I decided to move back home and I jumped into motherhood.
I focused on raising our kids, helping my husband, starting up the funny farm. I waitressed part time for quite a few years and I got my people-fix that way before I’d withdraw to my hill. And then, a lot of civic activity and volunteer work over the years. I was able to keep my squirrels. I play whack-a-mole with my squirrels, so I was able to keep them engaged with following legislation and stepping in on different issues and helping that way.
I’ve interviewed a lot of conservatives and it’s almost like there’s this hatred coming if you’re not fully to the right. You know what I’m talking about?
Yes I do, and we’re not going to get anywhere with that.
For more information about the candidate, visit https://trinity4okanogan.com/ and/or https://www.facebook.com/trinity.stucker
