Democrat Luis Moscoso looked like he was going to cruise to re-election in the 1st Legislative District without an opponent in the Nov. 6 general election.
Mark Davies, a Republican, started a campaign for the state House seat, but he didn’t get enough qualifying signatures to waive the filing fee for the primary election. So Davies’ name did not appear on the primary ballot.
But Davies did get enough votes in the primary as a write-in to earn him a spot on the general election ballot.
As an unregistered write-in candidate in the primary election, Davies, who lives in Bothell, will appear on the ballot with a “No party preference” designation. However, he describes himself as a conservative Republican and said it’s a good time for him to try to unseat the incumbent.
“I believe people are looking at how the Democrats are running our country and our state and moving toward Republican ideals and values,” said Davies, 57.
Moscoso, D-Mountlake Terrace, was elected in 2010 to his first term in Postion 2 in the 1st District. He said he’s learned how to be an effective state legislator in his first term and is running for another term to continue the work he started.
“I want to be part of the discussion of what do we want state gvernment to do and how we want to pay for it,” he said. “We have reponsibilities to people in our state and we’re not meeting those responsibilities.”
If elected, Davies said one of his priorities will be making sure state government is solvent and functioning well. He wants to see full performance audits of all state agencies to determine areas that can become more efficient. Davies said he would use the savings to help fund K-12 education.
“The Washington state budgetary situation is tough and we need to get our fiscal house in order,” Davies said. “I feel like I am one who is conservative fiscally as well as socially and otherwise a good match to help in Olympia.”
He added that he believes strongly in private property rights and believes the state’s Growth Management Act should be repealed to give local governments freedom to handle growth.
“It highly restricts how municipalities can manage the growth within their borders and a repeal of the Growth Management Act as has been done in a number of other states, would free up counties to do their own zoning rules.”
Moscoso, 62, said he’s most proud of securing $250,000 for a grant program focused on criminal street gang prevention and intervention. The money is a step in the right direction but he plans to work toward securing more funding for such programs across the state, he said.
“As a freshman I didn’t expect to be in that big of a deal but I got fired up about it and still am,” he said. “We need to prevent kids from getting into gangs and you have to intervene before they get too far. You don’t just bust them on the other end. We cannot arrest our way out of juvenile violence.”
Moscoso, along with state Sens. Nick Harper and Rosemary McAuliffe and Rep. John McCoy, also sponsored a state voting rights act earlier this year to enable classes of voters to challenge at-large voting if there is evidence that minority populations are being marginalized.
“We’re definitely going to bring that forward and it’s unfortunate that we have to do this but the evidence we’ve seen in some parts of the state is it’s impossible depending on your racial ethnicity to get elected,” he said. “It’s bound to be controversial to some people but to do this you do have to prove discrimination.”
Both Moscoso and Davies want to focus on improving the state’s transportation systems.
Moscoso wants to work toward finding a sustainable source of revenue to maintain transportation systems in the state.
“From the roads and bridges to mass transit, and to light rail, none of them have an adequate sustainable funding base and we need to address that if we’re going to have any hope of improving transportation,” he said.
Davies feels the state’s ferry transportation system has been neglected.
“We need to keep our maintenance procedures strong to keep the boats in shape and we need to have some more boats to supplement when one of them is down,” he said.
Amy Daybert: 425-339-3491; adaybert@heraldnet.com.
What’s the job?
At stake is a two-year term as a state representative serving Legislative District 1, Position 2. The annual salary is $42,106. The district includes most of Mountlake Terrace, all of Brier and Bothell, part of Kirkland, unincorporated areas of King County between Bothell and Kirkland, and unincorporated areas of Snohomish County north and east of Bothell.
Mark Davies
Residence: Bothell
Age: 57
Party affiliation: Republican
Experience: Programmer at the Boeing Company. Served for 20 years as a Boy Scout leader as well as a high priest group leader for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Website: www.markdavies.info
Luis Moscoso
Residence: Mountlake Terrace
Age: 62
Party affiliation: Democrat
Experience: Incumbent state representative. Worked as driver and then manager for Community Transit. Elected to the state Democratic Party as secretary in 2005. Worked as government relations director for the Washington Public Employees Association until his retirement in 2009.
Website: www.electluis.net
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
