Democrats Says No To Offshore Oil Drilling in the 24th District

October 19, 2010                                 

Contact: Press@KevinVanDeWege

Kessler, Van De Wege, Tharinger

Blast Republican Plans to Lift Offshore Oil Drilling Moratorium In Washington’s Coastal Waters

Sequim – State representatives Lynn Kessler and Kevin Van De Wege have joined with Clallam County Commissioner Steve Tharinger — who is running to succeed Kessler — to denounce Republican plans to lift the moratorium on offshore oil drilling off Washington’s coasts. All three 24^th District Democrats have come out strongly against proposals that they believe would jeopardize the ecological and economic health of the entire Olympic Peninsula.

“To be honest, I am pretty stunned to see Republican after Republican in Washington come out in favor of selling out the Strait of Juan De Fuca and Pacific coastline to the same multinational oil companies that have destroyed the Gulf of Mexico and all of the wildlife species and industries that rely on it,” says Representative Van De Wege.

Republican congressional candidate Doug Cloud was quoted in the Peninsula Daily News’ primary voters’ guide as saying, “Yes, the moratorium on off-shore oil drilling should be lifted.” Republican senatorial candidate Dino Rossi has signed the Republican “Contract with America” that endorses an “All-of-the-Above Energy Policy” that includes “exploration of proven energy reserves.” And Van De Wege’s opponent, Port Angeles businessman Dan Gase, was quoted by Grays Harbor County’s The Daily World newspaper as saying “With proper safeguards in place it is not unrealistic to participate in oil and gas drilling” on October 3 and “We have tremendous dependence on foreign sources of energy and I think this [offshore oil drilling] has to be looked at,” on October 12.

“I can’t believe how out of touch the Republicans’ ‘deregulate everything’ ideology is with the voters of the 24^th District on this issue,” says Van De Wege. “As long as I’m in office there is never any scenario, any scenario at all, whatsoever, that I would support oil drilling in the Strait of Juan De Fuca or off the Pacific coastline. All of the safeguards were in place in the Gulf of Mexico, and they had a catastrophic disaster there. I could not live with myself if I knowingly risked our coastal ecosystems and all of the industries that depend on them.”

Van De Wege’s stand against offshore oil drilling is supported by his fellow 24^th District Democratic state representative, the retiring House Majority Leader Lynn Kessler, and Clallam County Commissioner Steve Tharinger, who is running to succeed her.

“During eighteen years of service, I worked hard to protect our coastline for the environment and shellfish, crabbing, and salmon industries that rely on it,” says Representative Kessler. “The Olympic Peninsula contains some of the most pristine, stunning, and undisturbed coasts in the entire United States. I have worked hard to secure rescue tugboats, ensure shipping lanes are not overcrowded, and guarantee that ballast water coming here from the rest of the world is safe. 

“To know that there are candidates running in this district that would put all of the protections I have worked hard to accomplish in jeopardy by allowing oil drilling off our coast is disappointing,” continues Kessler. “We cannot allow this to happen. Our district stands to lose too much. I don’t support offshore oil drilling, and I know the people of the Olympic Peninsula don’t either. This election, it is more important than ever to choose candidates that will represent us and stand up for our values. Steve Tharinger and Kevin Van De Wege will do that for us in Olympia.”

“I stand with Representatives Kessler and Van De Wege against offshore oil drilling anywhere along Washington’s fragile, economically pivotal coastline,” says Tharinger. “It simply is against all common sense given what we’ve seen over the past few years from the oil industry. I take my job as an ecological steward of the 24^th District too seriously to wager countless lives and jobs on the business practices of companies like British Petroleum.”

“Judging by the outraged feedback I’ve been receiving from my constituents,” says Van De Wege, “the very first question any voters or journalist should be asking candidates for office in the 24^th District is if they would even entertain the idea placing offshore drilling platforms along our precious coastline. That will tell voters all they need to know about that candidates’ judgment and seriousness as a public servant.”

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HUGE News Update: Newspaper Endorsements, Oil Drilling in the Strait of Juan De Fuca, and New Jobs for the District

The Daily World's Choice

In the biggest news since the primary, Grays Harbor's newspaper of record, The Daily World, has announced its formal endorsement of Kevin Van De Wege and Steve Tharinger.

Grays Harbor is probably the most competitive and electorally pivotal county in the 24th District -- it is the swing community that determines many 24th District races. Arguably, no entity in Grays Harbor can compete with the influence of The Daily World, so that's why it's such great news to read quotes like the following:

Our best chances for retaining strong representation are with a pair of Democrats, Kevin Van De Wege, a Sequim firefighter with two terms in the Legislature, and with Steve Tharinger, a Clallam County commissioner with real-world local government experience, strong political instincts and a lot of experience dealing with regional natural resource issues.

         [...]

 Van De Wege's spending priorities are for public education and protecting those of us who can't protect themselves -- seniors in nursing homes and children in early childhood nutrition programs, for instance. That shows he must have learned something from being Kessler's seatmate for four years.

[...]

Tharinger, on the other hand, is bright and he's been in the trenches in Clallam County -- a local chemical dependency/mental health advisory board, Olympic Area Agency on Aging, economic development board, the United Way and a host of other local non-profit organizations that form the backbone of social services in communities like ours. ... Despite that, Tharinger's real-world local government experience is what the district needs in Olympia.

The momentum has never been greater than right now: if you'd like to volunteer, please contact campaign managers Larry "No Nickname Required" Clark and the always lovely Sam Gibboney. They're looking for people willing to make phone calls from the comfort of their homes at their own leisure, so this is a pretty easy sell!

The Local Republican Party's New Mascot: Slick the Oil Smothered River Otter

Yes, believe it or not, 24th District Republican candidate for state representative "British Petroleum" Dan Gase has endorsed deep sea oil drilling in the Strait of Juan De Fuca and Washington's Pacific coast. This borders on the definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results. The Olympic Peninsula has a few Louisiana expatriates who you can feel free to ask about the wonderful side-effects, ecologically and politically, of selling your community's future to multinational oil conglomerates has.

I know it's hard to comprehend that a candidate running in 2010 would actually endorse such a destructive policy, so don't take my word for it:

"We have tremendous dependence on foreign sources of energy and I think this has to be looked at," Gase said. "Certainly we shouldn't go out there with a barge and just start drilling by any stretch of the imagination, especially with a lot of the problems that have happened in other areas throughout the years. It would have to be looked at very carefully with proper safeguards, but I don't think you can just automatically rule everything out. ... I think we always have to be open to new innovative ideas that, quite frankly, create jobs."

Van De Wege said that about the only jobs that would be created from coastal drilling would be in "cleaning up the oil" that could spill.

"I don't view oil drilling as a new creative idea," Van De Wege said. "I think that's more of the same. I think this is just a stark contrast between the two of us. As long as I'm in office there is never any scenario, any scenario at all, whatsoever, that I would support oil drilling off the coast of Washington. All of the safeguards were in place in the Gulf of Mexico and they had an absolute disaster there. I do not want to see that happen off the coast of Washington."

There's Kevin Van De Wege being Kevin Van De Wege: a no-BS, straightforward, vigorous defender of the 24th District's interests. That's also Dan "Trickle Down" Gase and the local Republican Party in a nutshell: promoting obsolete and irresponsible policies that have repeatedly been proven extremely counterproductive and destructive, all out of a blind ideological faith. Gase, you may remember, is no ecological steward: he wants to cut the Department of Ecology's budget by 30%, no doubt motivated less by "fiscal responsibility" than his Exxon-style contempt for the health of the local environment when Big Business interests are concerned.

Anyone care to ask Tharinger's opponent, Jim McEntire, if he supports off-shore oil drilling as well?

The Great Lynn Kessler at the Ribbon Cutting in Forks

More jobs have come to the 24th District thanks to the hard work of committed Democratic legislators like Kevin Van De Wege and the retiring Lynn Kessler. Through the hard work of Kessler, state senator Jim Hargrove, and Van De Wege, a state-of-the-art biomass heating system has been installed at Forks High School that will act as a pilot project for many schools around the world and a model for Clallam Bay Prison. The 24th District Democratic contingent in Olympia has been working on this project for five years and secured $1 million in funding for it from the state.

Yet more evidence that government actually works for our communities ... if you have representatives who believe in the need for a working government!

One final note: Kevin and Steve will both be making appearances tomorrow afternoon at a fundraiser for OlyCAP Senior Nutrition at Suncrest Retirement Village at 251 S. 5th Ave. in Sequim. The fundraiser has a Oktoberfest theme and will be amply stocked with delicious German food. Come by from 3 to 6pm!

Van De Wege & Tharinger Q&A : Day 3

Steve Tharinger with supporters.

 

James asked: I do not consider myself to be a Democrat or Republican. I vote for whoever I think will do the best job. I am very concerned about the future of jobs in our area let alone our whole country. So many people are unemployed, and I want to know what have you done and what do you plan on doing for our district when it comes to helping people get back to work?

Steve Tharinger:

As a County Commissioner, I have never let the economic livelihood of my constituents in the 24th District stray far from my mind. I have a proven record of far-sighted, long-term fiscal responsibility, and the foundation of that record has been my respect for maintaining the sustainability of our local natural resources-driven economy. I have fought to preserve our agricultural economy by protecting farmland. I have made it a personal mission on the local and state level to restore our salmon population, both to re-balance our local environment and  to sustain jobs in recreation, tourism, commercial fishing, and sport fishing.  

Just as importantly, I have reached out to local businesses and succeeded in developing numerous local public/private partnerships that are the best of both worlds: deals that result in stimulus and new jobs for local business and much-needed improvements in local infrastructure. The Elwha Bridge project is a perfect example: a major infrastructure project that was completed in a cost-effective manner, with multiple private and public partners, an enterprise that also stimulated the local economy. The role I played in   providing funding to help open Peninsula Plywood is another great example.

Kevin Van De Wege

Unlike Steve and I's opponents, who both cling to a nonsensical ideology that government cannot create jobs despite the available evidence, I believe strongly in my ability and my responsibility as a legislator to provide assistance to our local communities through this devastating recession. Instead offering my suffering constituents a selfish "every man for himself" ideology, I prefer to look at results, and my record proves that I have been effective in creating family-wage jobs for our local communities through my efforts in Olympia.

During the past two terms, I have crafted legislation that funded alternative energy and created capital projects at Nippon Paper in Port Angeles and PT Paper in Port Townsend. In both cases, these new initiatives both created new family-wage jobs and protected ones that were in danger of being downsized. In Grays Harbor, I secured the contracts for the construction work on the 520 Pontoon Project to be handled in Aberdeen. I also interceded on Peninsula Plywood's behalf and helped them obtain capital improvements and an operating loan on behalf of the state, leading to scores of new jobs for my hardworking constituents. Finally, I led the effort to streamline reporting requirements for small businesses, which eased the burden on local enterprise and likely saved many jobs.

And I'm not finished. Everyday I look for new opportunities to help my hardworking constituents weather this economic storm. I'm currently working on legislation which will improve our local schools and create much needed local contracting and construction jobs. I've also pledged to protect our coastal shellfish industry and local timber industry, ensuring that they are both handled sustainably to maintain the long-term economic and environmental viability of the 24th District. Finally, I will fight reckless budget cuts currently being proposed to our state infrastructure, which will save and even create countless jobs in Carlsborg, Port Hadlock, and Sequim.