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Three Unique Candidates in Council District One

City of Spokane

In Spokane there are three city council seats up for election. In City Council district one the race is between incumbent Mike Fagan and two newcomers to politics, Ben Krauss and Randy Ramos.

Mike Fagan is often a lone-dissenter on council issues, but he lists common issues among his priorities this election.

Fagan: “Law enforcement and criminal justice is always going to be job one. The second priority that I have is the street levy… We all are going to be jockeying for position and priority over what gets done in our respective districts… and I’m telling ya, if you take a look at my district, we’re talking about the face of the moon.”

Fagan is known for speaking out, even on topics that other members find consensus on. In his four years, he’s been critical of red light traffic cameras, the new foot bridge in the university district, and made comments against vaccines, which led other council members to (unsuccessfully) ask him to resign from the Board of Health.

Fagan advocates against too much government involvement. For example, he’s wary of the council’s paid sick leave proposal.

Fagan: “There are other social justice initiatives that are right behind this one. We’ve got a minimum wage discussion we’re going to be having… and medical technicians because somebody feels as if they’re seeing way to many patients a day. And they’re going to be looking at government to regulate how many patients they get to see.”

Fagan is a former criminal investigator for the Army, co-founded a political action committee against taxes, and hosts a radio show called the RIGHT Spokane perspective.

Ben Krauss
Credit Ben Krauss
Police Analyst Ben Krauss

One of his opponents, Ben Krauss, represents a very different perspective, and ran basically because of dissatisfaction with Fagan.

Krauss: “The incumbent had indicated that women did not have the requisite skills to work in police and fire. I absolutely disagree with that, I was a police officer for 12 years… It’s not acceptable to have a policy maker in municipal government make that comment about women.”

Krauss is an analyst for the police department, holds a PhD, and spent 12 years as a cop. Krauss is in a sticky situation – he discovered he would lose his high level police job if elected, but it’s too late to pull his name out. Even though he’s not campaigning, he has detailed ideas for his three campaign topics.

Krauss: “It’s going to be crime prevention, and public safety, equity and opportunity, so putting a plan in action to create the structural environment which attracts young, skilled, professional women to law enforcement and fire… and then a house-by-house, business-by-business, block-by-block revitalization.”

He says he would be honored to serve if elected, but instead of becoming a career politician he would go right back to his field of work.

Randy Ramos
Credit Facebook
Randy Ramos, recruiter for Spokane Tribal College.

Fagan’s other challenger, Randy Ramos, came to the race because of the economic problems he sees in his district. He’s a recruiter for the Spokane Tribal College.

Ramos: “There’s a lot of other issues out there preventing them from being able to go to school, anywhere from housing issues, to being able to find jobs, being able to find child care… but addressing all of these issues, I’d be able to do a lot more to help if I had a bigger platform to speak from.”

He says he would focus on creating better economic opportunities for his district, and encouraging residents to speak up about their needs. Fagan has criticized Ramos because he wasn’t registered to vote until the past year.

Ramos: “I was that dad who was working so hard on a day-to-day basis that to me local politics wasn’t a priority to me before… and I did take that for granted. And that’s something I hope everybody else will look at and say ‘you know what, we need to start doing that, we need to start getting out and voting’.”

Ramos advocates for a paid sick and safe leave policy in Spokane, and testified against a voter initiative that would allow police to solicit the immigration status of people they encounter or suspect of crimes.

Mike Fagan, Ben Krauss, and Randy Ramos each have different impetus for running, differing qualifications, and different setbacks in the race.

Ballots are due by mail or in an official drop-box by August 4th for this primary election.

Copyright 2015 Spokane Public Radio