Rep. Suzanne Schmidt seeks re-election against Spokane Valley software engineer, small business owner

If primary election results are any indication, Rep. Suzanne Schmidt could be headed back to Olympia next session.

The Republican state representative is seeking re-election in Washington’s 4th Legislative District, which stretches from Spokane Valley in the south, Elk to the north and from the Idaho state line to the Newport Highway.

Schmidt led the field in the August primary by a wide margin, receiving 68% of the vote to advance to the general election. Independent candidate Kris Pockell, a software engineer who co-owns the hot sauce company Elixir Sauce Co., received 21.5% of the vote to earn his spot on the November ballot.

Schmidt took the primary night results as an indication she can start working on legislation to bring forward next year, but she’s not taking her re-election campaign for granted. She said she wants the voters of the district to know she wants the job, and it would be unfair to her constituents to rest on her laurels.

“It just doesn’t look good if I think, ‘Well, I came out of the primary with pretty good numbers, I can coast into the general,’ ” Schmidt said. “That’s just not me. I’m not going to do that.”

Still, Schmidt said she’s already laying out her schedule and meeting with industry leaders, constituents and fellow legislators so she’s ready to hit the ground running if she’s elected to a second term.

Pockell has no misgivings about the uphill battle he faces, but said he would feel successful in his campaign if his message of civil reciprocity and leaving partisan politics behind has a lasting impact in the district.

“What I really selfishly want people to do is to just try and get along with their neighbors,” Pockell said. “I think that the political divide in this country is one of the most insidious things, and it’s going to be super hard to fix.”

Pockell said he’s looking forward to ramping up his campaign in the weeks to come. He got through the primary with only 10 yard signs and $200 in campaign funds he loaned himself, according to the Public Disclosure Commission.

Around a hundred signs and a handful of large banners bearing his name will start popping up around the district any day now, he said.

“You know, with the response we’ve gotten out of just having 10 signs up, I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like when we have 100,” Pockell said.

On housing

Housing continues to be one of the top issues statewide, as well as in the district Schmidt and Pockell hope to serve.

Both Schmidt and Pockell have identified housing as an area of focus if elected and would like to see the state’s housing inventory bolstered beyond just apartments.

The candidates differ, however, on their thoughts on recent efforts to protect renters and the future of property taxes in the state.

The shortfall in the state’s housing inventory is something Schmidt has kept a close eye on as the former president and chief executive officer of the Associated Builders and Contractors Inland Pacific Chapter. She said her district and the state at large needs more townhouses, duplexes and condominiums, in addition to single-family homes, to provide more accessible avenues to home ownership.

Pockell agrees the region needs more alternatives to home ownership than just single family homes.

He supports efforts to encourage more mixed-use neighborhoods, like a bill intended to make it easier to open small cafes and shops in residential neighborhoods. The state House passed the legislation bill unanimously, but it was later amended by the Senate to add restrictions for noise, traffic and signage, as well as alcohol sales.

“In Liberty Lake, they’re starting to make these more diverse housing and mixed-use neighborhoods, which I really am a big fan of,” Pockell said. “We need to do what we can to encourage developers to continue to develop those kinds of properties.”

As cities and counties across the state grapple with financial challenges, there’s been a growing movement to raise the state’s cap on how much a city can raise property taxes each year. Cities are not allowed to raise property taxes by more than 1% annually, but a recent proposal that died in the legislature last session would have raised that cap to 3%.

Schmidt said she did not support the bill when it came before the house, and she would not support another iteration if it came up again because property owners are already being “taxed out” of their homes. She said the most vulnerable, like the elderly, are the one’s most impacted by property tax increases and she would like to advocate for a way to provide them with relief.

She would be interested in pursuing a waiver program for low-income residents, as well as an age cap on property taxes that would excuse the elderly from paying them. She floated 65 as a tentative age.

“More property tax is something that I don’t think that the citizens of the 4th District can afford, nor do they want to see,” Schmidt said.

Pockell said he would need to learn more about why cities are pushing for the change before weighing in. He would be supportive if the majority of the towns and residents in the district leant the increase their support.

“I want to be able to find middle ground with everybody and kind of work together,” Pockell said. “I wouldn’t mind working with people to raise taxes, if we can all agree on that. But I think in this climate, that’s going to be a really difficult thing to try and make happen.”

Last session, the Legislature shot down a rent -control measure that would have capped annual rent increases at 7%. Schmidt voted against the bill because she believes the legislation would have had an adverse effect on the renters it aimed to protect.

Schmidt said she does not support rent -control measures because it may cause rents to increase. Landlords, she added, would increase rent to the absolute limit when they otherwise wouldn’t.

She’s also heard from developers and contractors who say they would not build in the state if a rent -control measure was passed and would instead focus their efforts in neighboring Idaho. That would be counter to her goal of increasing the housing stock in the state and driving down the cost of living, she said.

“Coeur d’Alene, Post Falls will be able to outbuild us and outsell us because they don’t have those regulations and those caps on their rent,” Schmidt said.

Pockell said he would be supportive of a “reasonable” rent -control measure, but thinks the 7% previously floated might be too restrictive. He would like to find a middle ground that satisfies both renters and the property owners. He pointed to vacation rentals as a possible driver in the rising cost of rent.

“If we have a situation where inflation runs rampant and landlords are capped at 7%, well, that’s going to be a big problem for them as well,” Pockell said. “I think finding some equitable solutions, and a solution that is flexible enough to work in unforeseen circumstances, is really key for something like that.”

On public safety

The Washington Legislature passed a broad range of police reform bills in 2021 on the heels of nationwide racial justice protests sparked by the death of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers.

The dozen bills restricted what tactics officers can use in the field to restrain a suspect, added additional review measures for deadly force investigations and ensured law enforcement agencies are notified of an officer’s past problematic behavior.

The bills also required law enforcement agencies to record interrogations of minors, as well as adults facing felony charges. Minors must also be given access to an attorney before they waive their rights or agree to be interviewed as part of an investigation.

Schmidt said in a June interview that the legislation has made it easier for people to commit crimes without facing much consequence and has prevented officers from fulfilling their duties to the best of their ability. The restrictions placed on police pursuits in 2021, which were removed this year, are just one example, she said.

She said she would like to see more stringent punishments and would work toward repealing some of the police reform bills to “restore some of the tools to our law enforcement officers.”

Spokane Valley is bolstering their policing, provided by the Spokane County Sheriff’s Office, after a consultant’s report last December recommended hiring more than two dozen deputies.

It is unclear how those positions will be funded.

Schmidt said she’s evaluating options at the state level to provide more funding to local jurisdictions to assist with recruiting, hiring and retaining law enforcement officers. She thinks more proceeds from cannabis sales tax should be redirected back to local jurisdictions for public safety efforts.

“There’s a couple of things that I’m looking at, but it’s very, very complex how our tax system is set up,” Schmidt said.

Pockell believes there needs to be more supportive agencies or professionals to assist law enforcement, like co-response programs that pair mental health professionals with an officer for calls involving someone in a crisis. He said creating more programs like that would free officers to focus more on crime.

“There’s a million things that the police do that aren’t really policing, but we as a society, we don’t really have anyone else to rely on, right?” Pockell said. “So one of the things that I would like to look at is relieving that burden by funding some adjacent services.”

On education and economic development

Pockell said in a June interview that Washington students still need help getting back up to speed after the COVID-19 pandemic, whether it be improving their social skills or in their studies.

He is disappointed local schools have become a battleground for larger cultural discourse. He would like to see more civility between those with differing views not only on education, but in every other aspect of life.

“There’s a real strong sense of demonization from both sides of the aisle, where it’s like, ‘These guys are trying to destroy this country,’ ” Pockell said. “And I don’t think that that’s true. I think that everybody, whether they are a politician or just everyday people, we all kind of want the same thing. We want what’s best for us; we want what’s best for our families, and then we want what’s best for our communities.”

Both he and Schmdit said they would be interested in re-evaluating how the state disperses funding for public schools, as many are struggling to pass bonds. They’d like to lift that burden off of property owners and place more of it on the state’s coffers.

“How we disperse that tax money throughout the state, those calculations are old, and I think we need to look at them and see how we can do a better job of providing money to the schools,” Schmidt said. “And I don’t know that that necessarily means that we have to have a tax increase.”

Schmidt supports establishing more pipelines for students interested in careers in the trades or science, technology, engineering and math careers. That would play into her workforce development goals, supporting small businesses and reducing the red tape involved with doing business in the state.

She said she wants to make sure the region remains an attractive place for businesses, using a pair of her own bills that became law as an example. One increased incentives for injured workers to return to work, and another aimed at streamlining the process related to unemployment insurance benefit charging.

“That’s what I had said when I went to Olympia, is certainly I was going to fight for small businesses, and I was going to protect them and help them and their workers to be successful,” Schmidt said. “So, I’ve really focused my energy on doing that.”