Boeing worker challenges McAuliffe

Incumbents face little opposition in the 1st Legislative District this year.

State representatives Mark Ericks, D-Bothell, and Al O’Brien, D-Mountlake Terrace, seek re-election and are both unopposed this year. Ericks wants to serve a second term and O’Brien seeks a sixth term of office.

The only legislator facing a challenge in the district, which includes Bothell and portions of Mountlake Terrace, Brier, Maltby and Lynnwood, is 16-year incumbent Sen. Rosemary McAuliffe, D-Bothell.

Her opponent this time around is Dennis Richter, 57, a Republican who is a lead electrical engineer for The Boeing Co.

It’s Richter’s first run for public office.

Richter will have his work cut out for him as he attempts to unseat the entrenched Democrat and former registered nurse. Both candidates are strong supporters of education — McAuliffe has staked out education as her area of expertise and has become one of the legislative leaders on the subject, chairing the Early Learning and K-12 Education Committee. Like McAuliffe, Richter advocates raising teacher pay and spending more money in the classroom.

In 2004, McAuliffe received 56 percent of the vote, defeating challenger Jason Bontrager. She received 55 percent of the vote in 2000 to defeat Leo Van Hollebecke and beat Ian Elliot handily in 1996.

McAuliffe’s raised more than $19,000 so far, with the largest contributions coming from education interests such as the Washington Education Association and the Washington School Principal’s Association. She’s also received strong financial support from Anheuser Busch, the beer company; Amgen, the drug company; and Vulcan, Paul Allen’s development company, according to Public Disclosure Commission records.

Richter says he knows his position on education is close to McAuliffe’s, so he’s targeting what he says is a “culture of unbridled spending” in Olympia.

“The Legislature should not be able to have unbridled tax and spend policies,” he said. “That’s just wrong.”

Richter, who jumped into the race the week of June 1, is proposing mandatory spending limits, which would require amending the state constitution.

“Let’s say between us we make $100 a year,” he said. “We come up with a percentage of that, like 5 percent. That’s all we can spend a year.”

He’s published a Web site, www.dennisrichterforstatesenate.com, where he outlines his basic philosophy of government.

That philosophy includes the proposition that state government “should provide only the very basic services required for our safety and so those few things (such as roads, energy and public education) that are not practical for any of us to do alone.”

Asked how he’d reconcile his desire for spending restraints with his call for increased spending on education, Richter said “you cut other programs.”

Education spending has to be a higher priority, he said. “If that means at the expense of other programs, that’s how it should be.”

Richter also is an advocate for alternatives to cars for getting around. He says more money should be spent on buses and less on light rail, which he calls an inefficient and expensive form of transportation.

McAuliffe, who emerged from a three-way primary in 1992 to win her first bid for public office, said she’s running again because “I have the experience and enthusiasm to serve the people of the 1st District. I’ve worked on their issues for 16 years and I’m good at it.”

She’s spearheaded efforts to examine the way public education is funded, sponsoring Senate Bill 5627 and working with the Basic Education Task Force to look into funding options that go beyond property taxes.