Candidates in the upcoming general election faced off at a forum hosted by the League of Women Voters of Clark County on Wednesday evening, making their case to voters and parsing through their top priorities.
Headlining issues for candidates seeking a spot on Vancouver City Council were homelessness, community policing, government diversity and tax policy.
Three seats on the city council are up for grabs in November.
Former lawyer Maureen McGoldrick and incumbent Erik Paulsen are running for Position 2. Bail bondsman David Regan and incumbent Ty Stober are in the race for Position 5. Rounding out the ballot is Position 6, where Camas city planner Sarah Fox and longtime local politician Jeanne Stewart are racing to fill the seat currently held by Bill Turlay, who’s not seeking re-election.
At the forum, hosted at the Vancouver Community Library, candidates attempted to make the most of 90-second answers when asked six questions focused on their goals and the city’s challenges.
“Homelessness is the top issue I hear from folks in the community,” Paulsen said. “They’re going across the river and seeing what happens when a homeless issue turns into a homeless crisis.”
Paulsen said his other main priority is attracting family-wage jobs to the city.
His challenger, McGoldrick — who has kept a low profile during her city council run — said she’s most concerned with opening a homeless shelter specifically for women. She also suggested building apartments on Fort Vancouver National Site using federal funding.
“We need to get as many people as possible off the streets as soon as possible,” McGoldrick said.
For each mini-debate, questions varied slightly but followed similar themes.
Stober and Regan also touched on homelessness, discussing the benefits and challenges of the Navigation Center.
The Navigation Center, a day center providing services for people experiencing homelessness, serves far more people than it was originally designed for. It’s also proving a burden to the surrounding neighborhoods, where residents and business owners say drug use and littering have negatively affected the area.
Stober said it’s important to focus on the people who have been helped by having somewhere to access basic dignities such as restrooms and laundry facilities.
But Regan said the city has broken trust with the center’s neighbors, who feel the city’s not honoring its agreement. And as the city tries to build more homelessness facilities elsewhere, residents will remember how people near the first day center were treated, Regan said.
“How are we going to put something else in another part of the city,” Regan asked, “if we don’t have that trust?”
Stober also said he was proud of the city’s voters for passing Proposition 1 in 2016, establishing an affordable housing fund that’s since helped build or preserve 500 housing units. But the city can’t make much more progress on the issue without help from the state and federal governments, he added.
“Where are we at? A drop in the bucket,” Stober said.
Fox and Stewart are likely to see a competitive race on Nov. 5 — in the primary election, they were separated by 123 votes.
In addition to questions about the Vancouver Police Department’s use of force policies, the two candidates fielded questions about A Stronger Vancouver, a $30 million package of new programs and services designed to fix the city budget’s structural deficit.
“My biggest concern is the property tax increase on all the households,” said Stewart, who’s previously served on both the Vancouver City Council and the Clark County Council.
Fox acknowledged the amount of work and planning that went into the Stronger Vancouver package, which consists of 25 programs and 35 capital projects.
“The Stronger Vancouver, at the end of the day, is asking for a big push,” Fox said. “However, the task of planning a path forward to reach those goals is the primary importance of our city council.”
