Paper: Candidate Raps Programs, But Profits Affirmative-Action Programs Provided 60 Percent Of Business Income

Nona Brazier, who is seeking the Republican nomination for governor, campaigns as a successful entrepreneur who disdains affirmative action and race-based contracting.

But affirmative-action contracts, dismissed by the black businesswoman as “the colored drinking fountain of 1996,” have provided more than 60 percent of the income for her garbage-hauling business since 1984, The Seattle Times reported in a copyright story Thursday.

Brazier was in Spokane, her campaign office said Thursday. She did not immediately return calls for comment on the newspaper story.

The Times reported that Brazier and her companies also owe federal, state and local governments about $500,000 in unpaid taxes and workers’ compensation premiums.

The former chairman of the King County Republican Party offered no explanation why her companies failed to meet their financial obligations, the newspaper reported.

“If I wasn’t going to pay them, I would have walked away from them,” The Times quoted her as saying. Over three years, she said, her Brazier Construction “will pay off these bills and liabilities, which it’s not legally obligated to pay.”

Brazier and her husband, Martin Brazier, have been sued at least 10 times, folded one heavily indebted business and nearly lost their house to lenders, The Times reported.

The candidate, acclaimed by supporters for her charisma and business credentials, says overregulation caused the failure of her garbage-hauling business, Northwest Recovery Systems Inc.

“Character comes from trouble,” she told The Olympian, which first reported her corporate troubles last month. “When the crisis comes, they want me to be in the governor’s office because I’ve been there. I’m the combat soldier, and I’ve got a couple of Purple Hearts to prove it.”

Still, critics attack her for decrying the very affirmative action programs that she benefited from.

“I think it’s clear that the kind of hypocrisy she’s shown between her public statements and private action disqualifies her for public office,” Jim Sells, attorney for the Washington Refuse and Recycling Association, said.