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Only one county race develops for fall elections Clallam County, WA - 7/31/04 - No surprises at the beginning of candidate filing week, and no surprises at the end, as the annual period of filling the ballot for the fall election comes to an end. In fact, there will be only a single county race on the ballot; the contest for Clallam County sheriff. Incumbent Joe Martin will face challengers Soeren Poulsen of Sequim and Lonnie Steele of Joyce, with a runoff between the three in the September Primary. Then the top two candidates will advance to the final in November. However, all of the other races drew only filings from the incumbents. Incumbent Judges George Wood and Ken Williams and Clallam County PUD Commissioner Will Purser will automatically advance to another term. The same appears to be true for County Commissioner Mike Chapman, who saw filing close without either a GOP or Democratic challenger. Democrats still have an additional 5 days, through next week, to recruit a candidate. But at this point there have been no indications of anyone stepping forward to challenge Chapman’s bid for a second term. In races for the 24th District Legislative positions, both Senator Jim Hargrove and Representative Lynn Kessler saw no opponents emerge. Again, in both cases Republicans will have the additional 5 days to recruit a challenger to both incumbents. Representative Jim Buck’s re-election bid will be challenged by Sequim firefighter Kevin Van de Wege, who is running on the Democratic ticket. 6th District Congressman Norm Dicks also continued his amazing streak in office, drawing no opposition for re-election to another term in the seat he has held since the late 1970s.
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