Camden: Dem or GOP to fill Wyman seat?

Open legislative seats – which are the appointments that come up most frequently – are filled from a list of party nominees by the county commissioners where the district is located. If they can’t reach consensus, it goes to the governor.

The governor also appoints vacancies on a board of commissioners under some circumstances from a list of the party of the person who left. Last year, Inslee appointed a Republican, Chewelah Police Chief Mark Burrows, to the Stevens County board after the full board was ousted by court order.

The governor has the authority to fill statewide positions, but under the law there’s no requirement the replacement has to be from the same party as the person leaving.

Republicans can make a decent argument that Wyman’s replacement should be a Republican. For the last 56 years, voters have chosen a Republican for the job, even as they have filled most other seats in most elections with Democrats. That’s probably more of a tribute to the people running than their partisan leanings. Wyman and her predecessor Sam Reed worked hard at keeping partisanship out of elections, which is the most partisan part of the job.

Those 56 years aren’t a record for one party’s control of a statewide office, by the way. Democrats have filled the auditor’s job since 1933.

Just as Wyman resisted pressure from fellow Republicans for refusing to brook suggestions that the 2020 election was “stolen,” Reed handled the 2004 fight over the state’s closest gubernatorial race between Chris Gregoire and Dino Rossi with an even hand.

Before Republicans demand too loudly that Wyman’s replacement be a Republican, they should check to see whether they objected to Republican Gov. John Spellman’s appointment of Dan Evans to the U.S. Senate after Henry “Scoop” Jackson died. Democrats objected, of course, and threatened to rewrite state law to require a replacement be from the same party.

But the anger did not last long, for the simple reason that Evans, a former three-term governor, state legislator and college president, was eminently qualified to fill the void left by Jackson, a 30-year veteran of the Senate. Plus, he won the special election a few months later, beating Democratic Rep. Mike Lowry.

Inslee could avoid griping from both sides – or at least receive it in equal shares – by appointing a competent person from within Wyman’s office without any strong partisan ties to run things until next November, when the job will be up in a special election. But what would be the fun of that?

Missing something

While some are criticizing and others are applauding Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich for spending $12,000 to advertise for new deputies in Times Square, Spin Control will only suggest that the sheriff should have spent more – if he spent anything – on a copy editor.

The big, bright, bold ads that make Spokane look like Las Vegas at sunset say they are from “Spokane County Sheriff Washinton State.” It’s as if the department ran out of Gs while promising thousands to new hires.