News - Local News

POSTED: Monday, Nov. 09, 2009

County Council sees conservative shift with Kershner, Knutzen victories

The Whatcom County Council appears to have switched to a conservative majority for the first time this decade after the Monday, Nov. 9, election vote tallying.

Bellingham small-business owner Kathy Kershner solidified her lead over former Whatcom County Councilman Dan McShane for the county's District 1 seat.

Kershner defeated McShane by a very slim margin - just 312 votes out of 54,682 counted in the race. The margin is outside the requirements for an automatic recount.

The council will see a conservative shift, with progressive County Councilman Carl Weimer the only incumbent to have retained his seat. The council will now include current members Barbara Brenner, Sam Crawford, Bob Kelly and Weimer and Council members-elect Kershner, County Planning Commissioner Ken Mann and small-businessman Bill Knutzen.

Crawford, Kershner and Knutzen are the more conservative votes, with Weimer, Kelly and Mann in the progressive voting bloc.

Brenner is a likely swing vote who has said she considers herself more fiscally conservative but a "bleeding heart" in terms of some social policies. She prefers to be called a moderate in terms of her political philosophy, she said.

Kershner, a U.S. Navy veteran and Whatcom County Republican Party precinct committee officer, was happy with the win and thanked McShane for being a "gracious opponent" who called her Monday to offer congratulations and help on any issues he has expertise in.

"Now that the real work begins," she said, "I want to focus on inviting the public back into the processes of our governing here in Whatcom County."

It was a tight race between the two, with McShane leading in early counts only to see his winning chances slip as the Whatcom County Auditor's Office began counting the later ballots. Conservative rural voters' tended to vote later toward or on Election Day.

"I'm fine," McShane said of his thoughts on the race. "There's a big project that I've been really wanting to do that involves writing a book. I started working on it this weekend sort of with (a potential loss) in mind."

McShane has been active civically the last two years he wasn't a public official, still lobbying for protections in the Lake Padden watershed as well as promoting a potential land swap with the state Department of Natural Resources.

"I can be selective about what I might be interested in. Mostly I've just tried to not so much lobby as get facts in the hands of either the county or city," he said.

Todd Donovan, a Western Washington University political science professor, is also the president of the local chapter of land-use advocacy group Futurewise and a board member of Washington Conservation Voters. He said it's unlikely the County Council's budget priorities will change significantly with a different council make-up. But for land-use planning, which Donovan acknowledged he is involved in, there is likely to be some changes in direction.

Conservative candidates seeking council seats raised concerns about updating the county's rural zoning, with part of that being a downzone some property rights activists complained would be detrimental to property and business owners outside cities. And farmers would be hurt by the changes, too. Mann, as a Planning Commission member, also expressed concerns about certain parts of the proposal forwarded to the County Council.

While updates to the urban growth areas around cities is supposed to be completed by December, before the new council members take office, the updates to the rural areas likely will go into next year, Donovan said. That will give the new conservative majority a chance to have their say.

One particular portion of the plan is very likely to change - the downzoning of rural acreage to one house per 10 acres. The conservative candidates, as well as progressive Mann, all were against that change, saying it was too strict while property owners were already being harmed due to the state mandate for the downzone.

There are also issues with strict septic tank regulations the county had to enact based on state law. Some on the council, especially Brenner, have been outspoken about their desire to make less restrictive parts of the law regarding the frequency, cost and how tank inspections are done.

Tax increases, if considered at all, may go to voters more often. The County Council has traditionally not increased property taxes, though in the last few years it created a mental health sales tax and increased a Flood Control Zone District tax.