PORT ANGELES — The five candidates for state Rep. Mike Chapman’s open legislative seat noted they all share the same priorities for the 24th Legislative District, even as they expressed different ways of tackling them.
Several candidates said they agreed with points made by their challengers, even those from opposing political parties, as they spoke during a Port Angeles Business Association forum on Tuesday.
Washington’s 24th Legislative District Position 1 seat is currently held by Chapman, D-Port Angeles, who’s running for the district’s state Senate seat, currently held by Sen. Kevin Van De Wege, D-Lake Sutherland, who’s running for state Commissioner of Public Lands.
With no incumbent and an open primary system, five candidates have thrown their hats in the ring for the seat, but only the top two vote-getters on Aug. 6 will move on to the general election.
The candidates are Matt Roberson, Republican and deputy prosecuting attorney for Clallam County; James “JR” Streifel, Republican and former firefighter and state employee; Adam Bernbaum, Democrat and former staffer for Van De Wege; Eric Pickens, Democrat and Port Angeles school teacher and Nate Tyler, Democrat and former police officer and Makah Tribal Council member.
Affordable housing, rising costs and public safety were all named by each of the five candidates as top concerns for the district, but how to address those issues was less cohesive.
“If the voters don’t repeal the Climate Commitment Act and they decide to keep it, I would look to making adjustments in that act to exempt fuel used for farming and other things that we could do to limit the impact on working families,” Roberson said.
Democratic candidates stood behind the Climate Commitment Act, even as they said they would amend it to be less burdensome for rural communities.
“First, we should make some changes to the energy code,” Bernbaum said. “The energy code has added far too many regulations and those regulations are inefficient. That means that we pay a whole lot for a new home today, and there are ways to make up those greenhouse gas emissions elsewhere.”
Addressing public safety also was a top issue for candidates, with Republicans citing the limits on police power enacted in the wake of the anti-police protests in 2020 as contributing to an increase in crime.
“To handcuff (police officers) and not let them do their job was very demoralizing,” Streifel said. “We used to get a ton of people applying. Now they can’t even get enough people to fill their list because they don’t have the support of our leaders.”
Pickens, a school teacher, said he would increase the behavioral health support for those who need it and make investments in education.
“If we truly want to fix these challenges, we need to address the trauma that has been experienced by our students,” he said. “Our students continually are impacted by trauma right now, and we have to comprehensive support for our students through and through.”
Tyler said the lack of law enforcement personnel is impacting police services in the district, particularly in rural areas.
“Give them the resources,” Tyler said of law enforcement. “We have a drug problem here. We can’t take away their drug task force money because it’s working. We’re seeing a tax on personnel (in hospitals) because of the issue we’re facing with fentanyl.”
According to the state Public Disclosure Commission, the Democrats in the race are leading in fundraising, with Bernbaum having raised the most with just under $60,000.
Pickens has raised the next most with $55,000, followed by Tyler with $40,000.
Republicans in the race have raised significantly less. Roberson has raised more than $9,000 and Streifel more than $3,000.
The majority of each candidate’s fundraising has been from individual donations, according to the PDC.
More candidate information and voter registration is available at votewa.gov.
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Reporter Peter Segall can be reached by email at peter.segall@peninsuladailynews.com.
