PORT TOWNSEND — The two candidates for Jefferson County sheriff are relieved that the long and winding campaign trail will end Tuesday.
“This campaign has been the longest job interview I’ve ever had,” Dave Stanko told about 60 people at a Port Townsend Kiwanis Club meeting Wednesday.
Wendy Davis has also expressed relief that the often-controversial campaign is coming to a close.
Stanko, 66, a retired lieutenant from the Fullerton Police Department in California, and Davis, 47, who served with Bremerton and Poulsbo police departments, are competing to succeed Tony Hernandez, who is working as the police chief of Milton, east of Tacoma.
Ballots for Tuesday’s general election were mailed to registered voters Oct. 15 and must be postmarked or delivered to drop boxes or the Jefferson County Auditor’s Office, 1820 Jefferson St., Port Townsend WA 98368, by that day.
The candidates were asked what they would do to clean up neighborhood drug houses.
“Block watch can be an effective way to bring people together and talk about problems in that neighborhood,” Davis said.
“This works because we have eyes and ears in these neighborhoods, and that’s what community policing is all about,” she added.
“We can’t do this in the sheriff’s department without you, the citizens, being involved.”
Davis also said she would talk with landlords and “develop ordinances to deal with these types of issues to put some pressure on the landlords and then work with our drug units to apply enforcement to that neighborhood.”
Said Stanko: “I can’t solve anything myself. It’s ‘we’ and ‘us’ that can solve it.
“I want to bring a citizen advisory perspective to communities so we can solve these problems together.
“I’m a little disappointed to hear that our deputies are frustrated and think they don’t have anything they can do about this, but if we bring all of our community stakeholders together to talk about this, we can come up with a solution.”
Stanko said the solution “could be as simple as getting the prosecutors to not do any kind of plea bargaining, or maybe getting OPNET [Olympic Peninsula Narcotics Enforcement Team] involved more in Jefferson County.”
Both candidates promised improved customer service.
Stanko said he had heard of calls to the Sheriff’s Office not being returned.
“From my management perspective, that’s not acceptable,” he said.
Both candidates said the county is dealing with a drug problem that takes much of the department’s energy.
“Everyone talks about methamphetamine as the drug that’s causing the most problems, which meth is doing in this area,” Davis said.
“But heroin has come back into the picture because our government has come down on the products needed to make methamphetamine.”
She advocated finding more ways to deal with addiction.
“Addiction is an illness. It’s something we need to treat differently,” Davis said.
“Arresting people who have addictions and putting them in jail over and over and over again is not solving the problem.”
Stanko agreed that “heroin is an insidious problem, but meth is, too.”
He described drug abuse as a public health problem.
“We as a community have to work together to find a solution,” he said.
“Law enforcement gets involved with it when we have a crime and people go to jail, and it’s a vicious cycle.”
Both candidates are running as Democrats. Davis received the county party endorsement.
Stanko has said he will run as an independent in the future.
Davis left the Bremerton department as a sergeant, joined Poulsbo as deputy chief and left as a sergeant after agreeing to a demotion in light of a romantic relationship with a sergeant she supervised.
She is now a human resources manager and payroll specialist for Port Ludlow Associates LLC.
Opponents of Davis have criticized her record, some anonymously, something Stanko has denounced: “I have told all of my supporters to stay positive and stick to the facts,” he said.
Stanko’s personnel files are not available, since records at his former department are shredded five years after a person leaves, according to current Chief Dan Hughes.
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Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or cbermant@peninsuladailynews.com.