Two seats are open on the Woodland City Council, and candidates for each position know the city needs to find some new ways to bring in revenue for city services.
Dave Plaza, 52, Keith Bellisle, 48, and Nate Cook will face off for Position No. 3, where Marilee McCall announced in May she wouldn’t seek re-election. In Position No. 6, Benjamin Fredricks seeks his third term on the council, but must defeat Jeremy Heffernan. A third candidate for that seat, Michael Wheaton, wrote in an email that he dropped out of the race due to a lack of time.
Position No. 3
Plaza’s name may be familiar to Woodland residents. He worked for the Woodland Police Department from 2008 to 2015, starting out as a patrol officer and eventually getting promoted to detective. After a tense year-plus time period, he sued the city.
While working as a police officer, Plaza brought allegations of misconduct about then-interim Police Chief Brad Gillaspie to then-Mayor Grover Laseke. But after filing his complaints, Plaza said he was treated within the department like a criminal, being regularly accused of disciplinary violations. He spent nearly a year on administrative leave after being accused of stealing a Nikon digital camera from the department. A Washington State Patrol investigation into the allegations against Plaza yielded no evidence of a crime.
Plaza subsequently filed a lawsuit for $2 million against the city, and later added a public records lawsuit, seeking records and complaints about Gillaspie. His lawyers decided there was enough for a federal case, so they dismissed the local lawsuits. Plaza said the federal lawsuit, which asked for $5 million, was settled out of court, but added he couldn’t discuss his settlement.
There is no pending legal action between Plaza and the city, which is why he thinks now is the time to run for office.
“That was a part of the city’s history and mine that neither one of us were happy with,” he said. “It’s been settled. It’s done. I’m not going to linger on things in the past. Fortunately, the people who were responsible are no longer employees or officials of the city. It’s time we learned from those mistakes and move on.”
Plaza owns Fire Pigs Designs, which does screen printing and other work, and said that as a local entrepreneur he thinks Woodland needs to be more welcoming to new businesses.
“Previous administrations had been focused on ‘keeping Woodland a small town’ regardless of the fact that the mindset did nothing but damage our city by eliminating sources of revenue and jobs that would have been generated by new or expanding businesses and giving the city the reputation of being ‘anti-business,'” he wrote in an email.
He added that the city needs to work with local business owners as partners to create a better climate for businesses, one that stops the practice of increasing taxes on businesses and property owners in order to generate revenue.
“By creating a business-friendly environment, which will generate numerous streams of consistent revenue, the city and its residents won’t have to scramble if one business doesn’t live up to expectations, which then leaves city services, and the money needed to fund them, in jeopardy,” he wrote.
Bellisle, a para-educator, wrote in an email that Woodland has missed out on tax revenue by not allowing a marijuana retailer to open a store in the city.
“The money is there and it is consistent,” he wrote.
He also thinks Woodland needs to be more business-friendly and wrote that he can use his experience working with kids to help improve schools.
“Woodland needs neighborhood associations that offer the potential to solve many local challenges and to inject an influx of positive community pride,” he wrote.
One issue in the city this year is increasing taxes to pay for better transportation. The current city council has voted to put a 0.2 percent sales tax for transportation on the November ballot. Last year, 51.6 percent of Woodland voters opposed a similar measure.
Plaza wrote that he’s “not a fan of turning to taxation in order to increase the city’s revenue,” but realizes Woodland needs money to fund services. He also wrote that he would rather increase sales taxes than property taxes.
“A sales tax increase would increase revenue almost immediately and, unlike the property tax, would be paid by everyone doing business in Woodland: residents and people just passing through alike,” he wrote.
Bellisle wrote that he supports the transportation tax, and prefers a sales tax as opposed to bringing in revenue through an auto license fee, similar to how transportation districts in Battle Ground and Vancouver work.
“I think that the fee is not a problem for higher-income brackets, but for lower-income households, it may make a bigger difference that they feel immediately,” he wrote.
Cook, the third candidate for Position No. 3, didn’t respond to emails requesting comment.
Position No. 6
Both Fredricks and Heffernan think transportation is a major issue in Woodland. In an email, Fredricks wrote that the city needs to work to improve Exit 21 off Interstate 5 and provide direct access to Woodland’s industrial zone.
“I remain a strong advocate for the Scott Avenue Crossing, as this crossing will improve freight mobility and improve east/west connectivity for Woodland residents,” he wrote. “I’ll continue to work with our legislative leaders in Olympia and (the Washington State Department of Transportation) in order to ensure that these transportation issues remain on their radar for priority funding during their budget process.”
Heffernan wrote in an email that local officials need to put pressure on state representatives to bring transportation money to the region.
“The only way some of these large projects will end up getting done is by increasing industry in our area and forcing the hand of the state to address these issues,” he wrote. “They probably won’t address them until we have more industry.”
Heffernan also wrote that city councilors need to make funding for safety a priority, saying that the Woodland Police Department has been understaffed for years.
With Ilani Casino Resort opening nearby, it has put into question how much local cities can expect to bring in through gambling tax revenue, something that’s a large part of the general fund in La Center. Fredricks wrote that Lucky 21 Casino brings about $250,000 per year in gambling revenue to Woodland.
“The city council unanimously agreed to never allocate this revenue to a recurring expense,” he wrote. “I’m proud of that decision. Because of this we do not suffer from the same challenges faced in La Center. There are few to no options available to replace any lost gambling revenue.”
Heffernan wrote that it was a smart decision by the council to use that money for public-safety-related one-time purchases and training, as opposed to part of the operational budget.
“Revenue is generated through taxation,” he said. “The city does not make money, it takes money. The only way to make up for revenue loss is by either cutting costs to make existing revenue more effective or generate more revenue either by increasing taxes/fees or increasing the tax base.”
As for the sales tax, Fredricks wrote that he supports it only because the money has to go for street maintenance and new transportation projects.
“There is no magic pot of money out there to fund street maintenance and new projects,” Fredricks wrote. “We will continue to fund street maintenance and new projects with about half of what is needed on an annual basis. The only other option out there is to approve an increase in vehicle registration fees with an annual tab increase. I would not support that proposal.”
Heffernan said it only matters if voters support the tax, and based on last year’s vote, they do not.
“The state is shirking its responsibility by expecting small jurisdictions with limited revenue to handle to costs for projects that cost in the millions,” he wrote. “Pressure needs to be put on the state to send more of the revenue from gas taxes back to local jurisdictions, especially those with a population of less than 10,000. The only thing a city can do to raise money for transportation projects is find money currently in the budget, obtain grants, generate more revenue by encouraging more industrial/commercial business in the city or raise taxes/fees. The public does not seem interested in the latter.”
