Pridemore, Stewart differ on big issues: They disagree on charter, east county bridge, transportation
Clark County commissioner candidates Jeanne Stewart and Craig Pridemore find themselves in unusual political waters with the election just a month and a half away.
What should be the marquee election between two well-known candidates running for an open District 3 seat has been overshadowed by other races, including a hotly contested fight over a county charter.
But with the general election creeping up, the candidates are doubling down on efforts to stand out. Both are running for office following political losses.
Pridemore, a former county commissioner and state senator, ran for state auditor in 2012. Stewart lost her 2013 reelection bid against Alishia Topper in a Vancouver City Council race.
As they seek to regain the spotlight, they don’t expect expensive television and radio ads to do the trick. And while political signs are helpful, there’s already a sea of those, so it’s difficult to break away from the pack.
For Stewart and Pridemore, it’s all about face time.
“When you talk to people face to face, it’s so much different than when someone sees a picture of you,” said Stewart, a Republican.
After the death of her husband last month, which resulted in a temporary suspension of her campaign, Stewart said she’s regaining momentum by reaching out to people at events and in their homes.
In recent weeks, she’s been going to neighborhood association meetings as well as gatherings, primarily of groups no larger than 20 people.
Pridemore, a Democrat, has used a tactic that’s won him political favor in the past: walking across the county and ringing doorbells.
During a recent trip through Riveridge neighborhood cul-de-sacs, Pridemore wasn’t dissuaded from knocking on doors that had Republican signs out front. One house had signs for both incumbent Rep. Paul Harris and Lynda Wilson, the GOP hopeful for the other 17th District House seat.
“Here’s a good Republican household,” Pridemore said before ringing the doorbell. The woman who answered the door took Pridemore’s campaign literature but didn’t express interest in learning more about him.
That’s not an uncommon reaction, Pridemore said. Many people of all political stripes are guarded when candidates appear at their doors.
But he still spends several hours a week introducing himself to could-be voters of various political allegiances. When they reciprocate his engagement, they tend to want to talk about broad issues, such as the economy and transportation, he said.
Broader voter base
Pridemore outperformed Stewart in the primary election, netting 57.3 percent of the vote to Stewart’s 42.5 percent. But only voters on Vancouver’s west side, the county’s most liberal enclave, were eligible to vote. Both candidates know the countywide general election will likely skew more conservative, particularly in the northern part of the county.
That’s why Pridemore plans to focus his campaign efforts on the eastern portions of Clark County, where he believes more undecided voters reside.
“It tends to be more fertile territory out that way (in eastern Clark County),” Pridemore said. “The irony is north county is one of my favorite places.”
He has made trips up north, including a recent visit to the Woodland Chamber of Commerce.
Stewart, meanwhile, has also spent time in northern Clark County, including walking in the recent Brush Prairie Spirit Parade.
She carries precinct maps with her when she goes door to door, part of her tactic of targeting swing-vote neighborhoods. Stewart said her team has identified a campaign strategy that uses voter data from previous elections to color how she campaigns.
“Instead of just drawing people into Vancouver,” she said, “I want to go to where people are.”
Stewart’s been vocal about not wanting to appear too partisan. At recent campaign stops, she emphasized the need to bridge political divides.
One of those stops was before the Rotary Club of Vancouver, alongside Pridemore, where Stewart said it’s “no time for head-butting; no time for name-calling” in reference to extreme partisanship.
Behind the scenes, Republicans have embraced her, even as she downplays her partisan bona fides, while at the same time calling herself a “proud Republican.”
Steven Nelson, the former vice chairman of the Clark County Republicans, assisted her campaign when her husband died. The top donor to her campaign has been the Republican Party, with $8,500 contributed. Republican County Commissioners Tom Mielke and David Madore have also contributed.
“It does feel a little different,” Stewart said Tuesday, as she walked door-to-door along a neighborhood off Northeast 164th Avenue. “I’ve never been given a party affiliation in the past.” Vancouver City Council seats are nonpartisan.
She has tried to downplay the Republican affiliation during her campaign stops. But on occasion, she can’t escape it. At one door, Stewart said, a woman said she was a Democrat, wasn’t interested and closed the door.
Still, Stewart acknowledged it was a more “courteous” response than what she could have received.
While both candidates continue to crisscross the county to boost their profile, their activities aren’t entirely grass-roots.
Pridemore has so far raised more money than Stewart, with $58,312 to Stewart’s $36,530, according to the state’s Public Disclosure Commission. Both candidates have spent roughly $20,000.
By comparison, the 2012 commissioner election was viewed as being a big-money campaign.
Madore, who eventually won, spent $300,550 to do so, versus incumbent Republican Marc Boldt’s $90,357.
For the two candidates currently in the mix, they say, more money or not, they plan to beat the streets, taking it one doorbell at a time.
