Myers announces candidacy for 13th District House position

MOSES LAKE — Don Myers, Moses Lake deputy mayor, has announced his candidacy for the Washington House of Representatives. Myers will be running for the position left vacant when current Representative Alex Ybarra announced he would run for the 13th District Washington Senate position.

Myers will be the third candidate in the race. Ellensburg business owner Jeff Leichleiter and former Moses Lake City Council member Deanna Martinez announced their candidacies April 3.

Myers said he’s been on the Moses Lake council about 10 years, and his experience there influenced his decision to run for the legislative seat.

“When I first ran for council I was fairly young, had a lot of ideas, things that I wanted to change, and got told constantly, ’No, you can’t do that. No, you can’t do this, because of legislation passed down from the state.’ And (ideas) that were passed on to me, community members want to change this or change that, and now I have to tell them, ‘No, we can’t do it. We can’t do that,’” Myers said. “That world that the city is allowed to live in is getting smaller every year, so it’s getting harder and harder to be able to make impactful changes at the local level, just because of things being passed in Olympia.

Collaboration and cooperation are the keys to legislative success, he said.

“I’m pretty good at collaborating. How can we both win? I think the biggest impact, you know, that I’ve had, at least on council, is working within committees and small groups. Let’s get into the details, let’s figure this out,” he said.

The 13th District includes Grant and Kittitas counties and small sections of Adams and Douglas counties. Myers said in his experience residents throughout the district face the same issues, starting with water availability and water use.

“I’ve been studying that as a council member for the last couple of years and understanding how that works. I’m trying to see what we can do to help,” he said. “Obviously, it’s going to take working with the (federal government), the tribes – there’s a lot of moving pieces in that one.”

He’s interested in revising some of the tax structure for small businesses, he said, citing his own experience as an example.

“We’ve seen the taxes being passed; it trickles down and it hits the small businesses first. I see the squeeze – I see it working in our business, the effects that new legislation has, and how much increase we have. It’s crazy,” Myers said. “There’s so much, and it’s getting harder and harder to be a small business. I’d like to do what I can to minimize the increases and if possible, lower them when I can. If I see opportunities, of course I’m going to take them.”

Myers said he’s concerned about the impact on law enforcement of legislation passed during the last few sessions. He said he does not support a law signed by Gov. Bob Ferguson earlier this month that creates an appointed committee that would have the ability to decertify, and possibly remove, elected sheriffs.

“That is extremely concerning, that an unelected body could remove an elected (official).  That’s probably not even constitutional,” he said.