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"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource."
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Pierce County, epicenter of statewide elections
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| Contributor | Ralphie |
| Last Edited | Ralphie May 28, 2005 09:40am |
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| Category | Opinion |
| Media | Newspaper - Seattle Times |
| News Date | Thursday, May 26, 2005 03:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | The construction cranes and backhoes all but bump into the ubiquitous gravel trucks. Everywhere you look in this fast-growing neighborhood southeast of Tacoma, it seems they can't build mega-clusters of Northwest beige and gray homes fast enough.
An area that used to be woodlands, Christmas-tree farms and horse pastures is giving way to rapid development. Up on the hillsides, across the crest of the hill, you see the fast-food restaurant that popped up overnight, a half-finished house in a huddle of dozens of other new, unoccupied houses, real-estate signs bedecked with balloons urging passersby to "rent" or "buy now!"
Welcome to bustling Pierce County, epicenter of current and future statewide elections.
The county long has been a Democratic stronghold, home base of former Pierce County executive and governor Booth Gardner, Congressman Norm Dicks, current County Executive John Ladenburg and many others.
But the county is changing, becoming perhaps the most important swing county in the state because of its size and voter volatility. While most politicos in the state are focusing on the election challenge of the governor's race in a courtroom across the mountains in Wenatchee, real forward thinkers ought to be contemplating Pierce County.
"This is now a swing county and you can't win statewide without paying attention to Pierce County," said Ladenburg.
Increasingly, elections in our state are decided in the suburbs and exurbs of King, Pierce and Snohomish counties, places with a lot of independent and swing voters.
With a population of 744,000, Pierce County is larger than Snohomish County by almost 100,000 people. More and more, its voters are swing, independent or conservative. This year, for only the second time in several decades, Republicans have a 4-3 edge on the Pierce County Council — and it has everything to do with rapid growth. |
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