Posted: Saturday, February 16, 2008 12:00 am
In case you hadn't noticed, the political season that has enveloped the country for several months is about to blossom in the mid-valley as well.
The filing deadline for the Oregon primary election is coming up in less than a month, on March 11. The primary itself will end on May 20.
In state House District 17, which includes Sweet Home and Lebanon, we've reported a couple of announcements this week. Bruce Cuff, a real estate broker from Mehama, filed for the Republican nomination, and Sherrie Sprenger, the Lebanon School Board member just appointed to the seat, said she would try to keep it. She'll have to file in the primary in order to win her party's nomination.
The story that reported those developments Wednesday didn't mention, but should have, the Democratic candidates. Our excuse is that they filed long ago.
Dan Thackaberry, the Lebanon farmer and former councilman who ran in 2006, is making another run. He filed way back last October.
Another Democrat also filed. He is Steven H. Frank, a retired postal employee who lives in Stayton. He put in his paperwork last Sept. 13, even earlier than Thackaberry.
According to the online records of the state Elections Division, House District 15, centered on Albany, has only one official candidate so far in Republican Rep. Andy Olson, who is running for re-election and also filed last Sept. 13.
Another mid-valley district is House District 23, the crazily drawn territory that reminds everyone who looks at it of the botched job of redistricting done by the secretary of state after the 2000 census.
The district takes in Jefferson and nearby parts of Marion County, then describes a large C around Albany and Corvallis, taking in parts of Polk, Yamhill, Benton and Linn counties including the cities of Dallas, Falls City, Monroe, Halsey and Harrisburg.
Because of the shape of the district, it's not convenient for whoever holds the seat to stay in touch with constituents.
The same is true of some of the other legislative districts. Senate District 9, for example, now represented by former Rep. Fred Girod of Lyons, stretches from Donald and Aurora in the north to the Linn-Lane county line in the south. This may be one reason that voters in Lebanon and the southern part of the district didn't see all that much of Roger Beyer, the former senator for the district, who lives in Molalla.
But House District 23 is worse. The incumbent representative, Brian Boquist, is from Dallas. And if he ever took much interest in the part of his district between Tangent and Harrisburg, he sure didn't let the paper covering that area know. (That would be us, by the way.)
Now in District 23, the pattern may be repeated, The candidates as of Thursday were Democrat Wesley West of Sheridan in Yamhill County, and Democrat Jason Brown and Republican James L. Thompson, both of Dallas in Polk County.
We'll have to wait until 2011 for the map to be redrawn. We can only hope that the districts then will come out a little more compact.
You can reach the D-H editor by e-mail at hhering@dhonline.com.