Race for safely red 7th Legislative District pits two Republicans against each other

Northeastern Washington is deeply Republican, so much so that three Republicans and no Democrats competed to fill one of the open House seats in the 7th Legislative District.

Andrew Engell and Soo Ing-Moody advanced in the primary to the November ballot for House Position 1 in their quest to replace Rep. Jaqueline Maycumber, who stepped down in an unsuccessful run for Congress.

Engell finished first in the August election, amassing 48% of the vote. Ing-Moody came in second with 25% of the vote, although she was only about 200 votes ahead of the third challenger, Teagan Levine. Levine has since endorsed Engell.

Ing-Moody, who served as the mayor of Twisp for 13 years, is a regional engagement and outreach specialist for the Washington State Department of Commerce. Engell is a former farmer who is currently the deputy district director for U.S. Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers.

Here’s where each of the candidates stands on a variety of issues affecting the 7th district:

Health care

Engell said it can be hard to get doctors, particularly specialists, to live and work in small towns because of problems with housing or the quality of education for their children.

“I’ve talked to a lot of health care workers and CEOs about these issues,” he said. “The challenge is that health care is so expensive. It’s hard to recruit doctors.”

Health care access solutions that work in cities often won’t work in rural areas or small towns, Engell said. The lack of maternal health care is one important issue that needs to be addressed, he said. Rural ambulances are also struggling.

“We have a hard time in rural areas just maintaining emergency services,” he said.

He’d like to ease regulations in rural areas so access to health care can be improved.

“I certainly see some opportunities for legislative reform in improving access, but it’s not a silver bullet,” he said. “I wish I had a great legislative fix for this.”

Work could also be done to improve access to telehealth in rural areas, Engell said.

“They use it extensively for psychology, because it’s almost impossible to find a rural psychologist,” he said. “There probably is more that we can do with it.”

Ing-Moody, whose husband is a paramedic, is particularly concerned about volunteer emergency services in rural areas. Costs are rising, and the number of trained volunteers has been dropping, she said.

“Rural EMS is one of the issues we want to address,” she said.

Health care facilities, including hospitals, have been closing in rural areas, Ing-Moody said. She agrees with Engell that housing and a shortage of providers have been an ongoing issue that has been getting worse.

“This is a very complex topic,” she said. “It is not just one simple fix.”

Ing-Moody agrees that telehealth can help play an important role in improving rural access to health care. Transportation can also be an important health care issue, as poor or declining health often forces people to get rides from family or friends to doctor appointments in a nearby city.

“We need to overcome those gaps and barriers with support,” she said. “They’re not one-size-fits-all solutions.”

Broadband internet

Ing-Moody said she launched a broadband access team in Okanogan County and has been advocating for increased high-speed internet access in rural areas for years.

“We need broadband that is reliable and accessible,” she said. “There has been some recent progress. To be honest, not enough.”

One partial solution is to bring high-speed internet to rural libraries so people can use their local library as an internet hub, Ing-Moody said.

It’s difficult to make it financially feasible for private companies to bring high-speed internet to rural areas with low populations, Ing-Moody said, which is why she favors private-public partnerships as well as satellite internet access.

“In our rural areas, it’s going to need private and public support,” she said.

Work is ongoing to bring broadband internet to rural areas and small towns, Engell said, and he also believes satellite internet is part of the solution. He said the work needs to happen now while there is government money available to fund the improvements.

“There’s probably record amounts of money,” he said. “We have a number of broadband projects happening in our district right now.”

High-speed internet is crucial for many things, Engell said.

“Broadband is becoming essential infrastructure,” he said. “We need good fiber backbones.”

Toxic politics

Both candidates have pledged to work across the aisle to get things done for their constituents, particularly since Republicans are in the minority at the state government level.

“Government has become less functional,” Engell said. “Politics has become really toxic. The only way I can get anything done is I need to get 10 Democrats, the speaker, the Senate and the governor to agree with me.”

Both sides agree on more than they realize, Engell said, and he said he’ll work to represent all his constituents, even the ones who aren’t in his party.

“It’s easiest to ignore them, but it’s not the right thing to do, and that’s not what I’m going to do,” he said.

Engell said he is open-minded and willing to listen so he can get the job done.

“I’ve got a lot of experience working with diverse people,” he said.

“I’ve built a lot of respect and relationships. I think people generally trust me to listen. I talk to people about whatever they want to talk about.”

Ing-Moody said that as a former small-town politician, she’s used to working across the political aisle.

“We need to get past those partisan divides,” she said. “It’s not the problems we disagree on, it’s the solutions. We’re in the minority. We need to work together to move the needle.”

She wants to be a strong voice for her constituents, Ing-Moody said.

“I am about getting it done,” she said. “I’m a very pragmatic, solutions-focused person. I have a successful track record to fight for issues important to the people I serve. I will be focused on the people and the issues that matter to them. I want to be a champion for rural Eastern Washington.”