Ridgefield City Council Position 5, Aichele vs Wertz

Hi this is Chris Dudley and the Ridgefield News and Views Podcast.

With this podcast I hope to create a regular forum for news, opinion, and interviews about the people, happenings, and other important goings on in Ridgefield Washington. 

And just as a side note, my wife and I are not exactly the Kelly Ann Conway and George Conway of Ridgefield politics, but at least know that my wife is not in lockstep with me on the opinions I’m sharing. She’s much more a get along with everyone community member, whereas I don’t mind a neighborly dust up here and there.

I hope you’ll follow along at crisis cycling dot com, where this and other podcasts will be posted and where you can comment.

On Wednesday night, October 16th, 2019,  I attended the candidate forum hosted by the League of Women voters held at the Clark County Fire Station at Dollar’s Corner in Battle Ground. 

The following recording is of the candidates vying for Ridgefield City Council Position Five which features incumbent Darren Wertz and challenger Rob Aichele.

After the recorded forum I will add more information and my opinions and recommendations, so stick around if you’re interested and or go to crisiscycling.com if you’d like to comment.

But please be warned, I give my opinion after the candidates’ final statements.

You can also find my podcast facebook page, crisis cycling, or, and these are on facebook as well, The Ridgefield Community Group, which is an advocacy group we put together, and Meaningful Movies in Ridgefield. We show documentary films at The Old Liberty theater on the fourth Wednesday of every month. We hold a panel discussion after the screening and it’s always free to the public.

Now to the recorded forum. The first voice you will hear is that of the moderator.

So this is an interesting race for me and the first time I have to waid into politics where I don’t really want to, and only because I like both these guys. 

Wertz is diligent and detail oriented. He has attended a couple of our screenings at Meaningful Movies. And he’s always willing to discuss ideas that are outside the box.

For instance, I’m a big fan of locally produced food, agro-ecological approaches to food production, permaculture, that sort of thing, and I figured I knew all the buzzwords, but Wertz was the one who told me about the concept of an agrihood, or homes built around a small farm.

Wertz has spoken out about limiting low employment development that would degrade our community, and he knows the law around development. He hopes to get some high quality signage on the highway to attract people and businesses to Ridgefield.

I even voted for Wertz in his last election. So, I speak with integrity on this race when I endorse Rob Aichele. 

But, Aichele is also very detail oriented, he’s heavily involved in the community, he sits on the planning commission, is an active member of the Lion’s Club, and has a lifetime’s experience in construction so he knows how to deal with unscrupulous developers.

As I said, I like both these guys but I endorse Rob Aichele for City Council Position 5. He’s knocked on almost 3000 doors in his bid to meet the citizens of Ridgefield. He can cite chapter and verse the bylaws of City, and discuss in great detail the Growth Management Act. 

Seriously, like mind numbingly boring detail.

I believe he would make a great addition to the council.

One reason I believe Aichele would make a better city councilor than Wertz, among a number is that Wertz showed questionable judgement when he voted against a basic issue of, for lack of a better term, looking forward when it came to one technically and symbolicaly important resolution. 

Now I’m going to deep dive, and then even go a little tangential, so hang on.

In what might be a much more impactful vote than any of us realize for it’s economic implications, let alone the inherent racist overtones, since the last election Wertz voted against the City of Ridgefield weighing in on a controversy surrounding those abhorrent confederate flags that fly just south of the Pioneer, I-5 on-ramp. 

Wertz voted against the city penning a letter to the Clark County Historic Preservation Commission saying The City of Ridgefield supported de-listing the confederate monument on an official government website. This gets a little wonky, so bare with me. 

Its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the Negro is not equal to the white man.

A few years ago the Clark County Historic Preservation Commission under rather ideological  leadership had erroneously erred in listing as an official historic sight a confederate monument that had been moved to private property and was, and is still, displayed with large confederate flags as well as a fawning display dedicated to Jefferson Davis.

Just over a year ago there was a community outcry about the official recognition and listing of that monument. Activists asked cities in Clark County to send letters to the Clark County Historic Preservation Commission asking the board to de-list the monument.

So this can be confusing, but suffice to say that the vote was about whether or not it was appropriate for a government entity to officially sanction and, importantly, promote a confederate monument that was not in it’s original place, had little if any genuine historical cause to be in Ridgefield to begin with, and was displayed with garrish, over the top celebrations of the confederacy.

I made the point, during public comments at a September 28th, 2017 city council meeting, that there were numerous technical issues that required the monument to be de-listed regardless of the subject matter of the monument and that any other arguments were overcome by the Historic Preservation Commission’s own rules and regulations. 

In a subsequent ruling, members of the HIstoric Preservation Commission cited exactly these same technical issues as reason to delist the monument, which they rightly did.

But, before the de-listing, and much to my disappointment, Councilor Wertz joined with Councilor Lee Wells to vote against sending the letter from the City of Ridgefield asking the Historic Preservation Commission to de-list the monument. It was Five to two, and the letter was sent.

After the vote Wertz came up to me to say that he appreciated my points but that the confederate display was “part of our heritage”. Though I don’t agree with him on that in this case, and my roots go back on both sides deep, deep into the south (like 1590 Louisiana. The civil war veterans in the family are youngin’s), Heritage was not part of my argument, nor was a negation of that idea of heritage subsequently cited as a reason to de-list the monument.

What this shows is a penchant on the part of Wertz to ignore the rules in the benefit of a belief. And that does bother me. I know he and I don’t share the same beliefs as regards economics, but in the context of a City Council seat that doesn’t necessarily bother me such that I would refuse to vote for him.

But when belief in more fungible areas, like whether or not a rebel flag is appropriate to officially sanction in the Pacific Northwest, when that type of belief overcomes extant and clearly written regulations, I’m given pause.

So setting aside the technical issues now, I saw this as an important vote because those flags and monument are anachronisms to this area, and the monument itself is not anywhere near its original location--Nevermind that it was placed during a revisionist period in US history when the South was, yet again, trying to rewrite its own history and glorify the more wretched aspects of its past. 

But, there’s more. And it’s important to consider Wertz’s hope for some good signage attracting people to Ridgefield on the highway, because those flags are probably costing our City thousands upon thousands of dollars as people who would otherwise stop for goods or recreation avoid our area simply because of those flags.

Setting aside the inherent racist attack on our African American brothers and sisters, we should ask, 'How much is that display costing the City of Ridgefield?'

I have driven all over this country, and walked a fair bit of it. And when possible, I avoid towns where displays of this nature are near the highway off-ramp. I will even turn around and get back on the highway if I see this type of display. I've asked a number of people about this issue and I can assure you that there are many, many people who won't stop where a Confederate flag is displayed.

Nothing says that a community is unsafe for minority families more than a flag that is now a calling card for violent white nationalists.

Over the years probably thousands upon thousands of people have kept driving rather than stop in Ridgefield. How much has that flag display cost our community? And is there a welcoming sign large enough to overcome it? 

How would someone know that we are a forward looking community committed to inclusion and kindness when the biggest, most obvious sign on the freeway is a proverbial welcome mat that says 'You Don't Belong!'

The cost of missed sales and taxes must be enormous. But, think of the other missed opportunities. If all I knew of Ridgefield was that giant confederate display, I would never start a business here. If you were in clean, high tech and needing to attract millennial whiz kid employees, would you see past the message in those flags? I doubt it.

So, I guess I just see it as a bit disingenuous to want a welcoming highway presence at the same time you won’t take steps to lessen the impact of a racist, hateful symbol that’s already on our doorstep.

Sorry, the tenth amendment arguments defy the words of the leaders of the Confederacy. Now I’m really going tangential and only because the idea that the Civil War was not primarily about slavery is simply, knowably ahistorical.

This from the January 2nd, 2011 Hartfourd Courant newspaper, 

“When the war started, leaders of the Southern rebellion were entirely straightforward about (slavery being the central issue of the Civil War). On March 21, 1861, Alexander Stephens, the Confederacy's vice president, gave what came to be known as the "Cornerstone speech" in which he declared that the "proper status of the Negro in our form of civilization" was "the immediate cause of the late rupture."

Thomas Jefferson, Stephens said, had been wrong in believing "that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature."

"Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea," Stephens insisted. "Its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the Negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical and moral truth."

So when you here someone say something other than that slavery was the primary cause of the civil war at least now you can simply quote the actual leaders of the confederacy who said that slavery was the primary cause of the Civil War.

Anyway,  you can see why I need to podcast. I probably need my own 3 hour daily talk show, to be honest.

That’s it, though, I like Aichele. I think he’ll be great on the council. And if Wertz wins Aichele will continue to serve our community and I’ll have another chance to convince Wertz of the error s of his ways, just kidding. I listen and learn from him, too, and I hope we can continue to have a cordial friendship.

Catch this and my other podcast, Crisis Cycling where I dig into larger, more esoteric subjects, at crisiscycling dot com. Or find us on facebook at Ridgefield Community Group.

Darren Wertz

, 

Chris I objected to Nextdoor about your "opinion" on your above linked blog "Ridgefield.PodBean.com" but have not received any response so I will correspond directly here. Chris, My first reaction to your “blog” was that your opinion of yourself is exceeded only by your lack of intellectual integrity and your “penchant” for parroting neo-socialist fall back slander. But it seems you are wrestling with your own personal demons and a few facts might help adjust your perceptions. So in the interest of a “cordial friendship”: 1. The issue of the monument letter was one of jurisdiction. “Activists” shopping a letter to council regarding a property not in Ridgefield that is in violation of the rules of another jurisdiction and asking us to overstep our authority and issue a meaningless dictum binding the name of every Ridgefield citizen to a letter they have not read or had a chance to discuss, - that “friend” is wrong in so many ways and I still feel the letter should not have been signed by the Mayor. Different parts of government have different authorities. Slander for example is handled by the courts. If you want to propose the City annex the subject parcel and then address permitted uses and appropriate zoning then you move into the authority vested in the legislative body that is the City Council. If you want to discuss property security, vandalism, trespass and safety issues we have municipal enforcement and protection authority for those properties in the City Limits. 2. Yes I admit to being responsible for caring about the attractiveness of our City. From arguing for additional streetscape requirements on Pioneer, 45th, Hillhurst -because these entry corridors are the gateway to our home. I also am guilty of instituting the concept of Freewayscape where development along the freeway but in city limits has additional requirements on developers to enhance and not mar the face of our city. But even here our authority/jurisdiction ends at the city limits and the boundary between Ridgefield and the Department of Transportation I-5 Right of Way. 3. With respect to your endorsement of my opponent, I as others have paid a price for your freedom. If you prefer a leader who can recite what has been written over one who has authored and is able to see the need for and author new regulations, then go for it. I am interested more in people and their progress than I am in being tied to unquestioned traditions. Finally Chris, I do not appreciate the insinuation of any character flaws to me. Thousands of years of justice have required at least two believable witnesses to raise a claim Attack on my character is more than “a little dust up.”