Odessa Mayor Admits He Lived In Airway Heights Board Will Issue Written Ruling On Mcdaniel’s Voter Registration

Odessa Mayor Denny McDaniel conceded near the end of a 4-1/2-hour hearing Wednesday that he lived near Airway Heights, about 60 miles away, during most of his current term in office.

“Yes, sir,” McDaniel said when Lincoln County Prosecutor Ron Shepherd asked whether McDaniel’s residential connection to Odessa for about 1-1/2 years was a post office box.

McDaniel also conceded to county Auditor Shelly Johnston that he didn’t live in the southern Spokane County town of Waverly during part of the time he was mayor there. He said he moved to Odessa in 1989 and remained mayor of Waverly even when he was elected mayor of Odessa in 1990.

Shepherd, Johnston and County Commissioner Ted Hopkins compose the county election canvassing board that must decide whether McDaniel’s Odessa voter registration is valid.

Three of five Town Council members and another Odessa resident challenged the mayor’s voter registration as an inexpensive first step in showing McDaniel isn’t qualified to remain in office. Although revocation of his voter registration wouldn’t automatically remove McDaniel from office, he has said he would resign.

The canvassing board did not announce a decision Wednesday, but promised a written ruling.

Board members must wrestle with several issues. Not the least is the fact that McDaniel failed to transfer his registration as required by state law when he left his first house in Odessa and moved to a different Odessa voter precinct in 1994.

It shouldn’t matter, McDaniel said, because he now rents a house in the original precinct, kitty-corner from his original home. Odessa resident Ron Costlow and Town Councilmen Tony Williams, Chip Hunt and Sam Braun contended state law requires challengers such as them to show only that McDaniel doesn’t live where he is registered. But they said evidence is overwhelming that McDaniel abandoned his Lincoln County residency by moving to Spokane County.

McDaniel acknowledged he lived exclusively at his new $157,000 Airway Heights house from May 1996 through July 1997. He still owns a $40,100 house in Odessa, which he rented out this spring after an unsuccessful attempt to sell it.

The mayor said he needed a place to stay near Medical Lake because his new grocery store there was taking more of his time than he anticipated. He contended the Airway Heights house is just a temporary business arrangement even though it is much nicer than any of the homes he has had in Odessa.

McDaniel’s attorney, Rob Magnuson, insisted the only thing that matters is whether McDaniel was an Odessa resident when his registration was challenged on Nov. 3.

“He’s come back to Odessa in time to vote, and I think that’s really the only issue here,” Magnuson said.

McDaniel offered utility bills and similar documents to support his claim to be living in Odessa now, but said he didn’t know whether his bills in Airway Heights are larger. He also said he doesn’t know where he tells the IRS he lives.

The challengers charged that McDaniel’s homecoming - by parking a travel trailer there on July 30 and renting a modest house in late September - is a sham. Braun and Williams said they almost never see anyone in the rented house when they drive by, and they seldom see McDaniel or his pickup truck anywhere else in town.

“I don’t need to drive by,” Hunt said. “My mom lives next door.”

He said his retired mother is “pretty nosy” and “keeps track of a lot of stuff,” including her neighbors.

“In her best estimate, the mayor has spent three nights in that residence since he rented it,” Hunt said.

, DataTimes