PORT ANGELES — There’s not much LaTrisha Suggs and James Taylor agree on.
The two candidates for Port Angeles City Council position 1 debated each other during the Port Angeles Business Association’s meeting Tuesday at Jazzy Joshua’s restaurant.
When asked what specific policies they would champion to stimulate small business, Suggs, the incumbent, said one tool the city can use is tax incremental funding to finance infrastructure.
“I really want to work with the community,” she said. “What areas do we want to see grow? Where can this happen? Our job as a city council is to look at infrastructure. Growth happens slowly over time.”
Taylor said the city already has businesses that are under attack.
“We’ve got to fight like heck to keep what we’ve got,” he said. “There’s a lot of property in Port Angeles that doesn’t have access to sewer. There is a demand for single-family housing. You want to promote business? Bring in people who can buy a single-family house. I think the city needs to stay out of a bunch of stuff. The city needs to support the community.”
It was stated that the city has a no-new-debt policy and asked whether a better policy might be strategic debt. Taylor said strategic debt should only be used on things that benefit the city while Suggs mentioned that the city also is paying down a lot of debt.
When asked when it’s appropriate to take up an issue of state or national importance, Suggs said outside issues on the state and federal levels affect the city.
“I think it’s always important for the city to look at state and federal actions,” she said.
“We have to pay attention because it eventually trickles down to us. If we don’t, things will come out of left field.”
Taylor said he thinks it’s never appropriate to address state or federal issues at the city council.
“The city is a utility; fix the streets, provide sewer,” he said. “Whether or not you support Israel or Palestine is not city business.”
The candidates also were asked what two quantifiable metrics they would use to measure how the city is doing.
Taylor said the city loves to spend money and does not know where it’s at.
“As far as metrics, I don’t see metrics coming out of the city,” he said. “Pass no ordinance that does harm. We’re gonna need to set up a sub-committee to go through these numbers.”
Suggs said tracking business growth and retail sales tax growth.
“It’s just identifying what are the key indicators that show growth,” she said. “I don’t think we are an outlier to what’s happening across the nation.”
The city’s housing policy is to incentivize multihousing units while raising permit fees for single-family homes, one PABA member said while asking if the candidates think that policy is moving in the right direction.
“Our plan was developed in 2019, and that was the focus of the plan,” Suggs said. “We need to get units on the market. The focus was getting people into housing. I agree with our current emphasis.”
Taylor said if single-family housing is built, the people who can afford them will move to Port Angeles.
“Jacking the fees on single-family housing was a bad idea,” he said.
One area where Suggs and Taylor found common ground was on whether there should be performance standards included in contracts when the city sells land, to which they both said yes.
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Reporter Emily Hanson can be reached by email at emily.hanson@peninsuladailynews.com.
