State House candidates discuss economic, livability challenges at election forum

Economic questions and concerns about livability dominated an election forum Tuesday night for state House District 32.

State Rep. Cyrus Javadi shared a table with Glenn Gaither, his challenger in the Republican primary in May, and Logan Laity, who is running unopposed in the Democratic primary, in a forum hosted by the American Association of University Women and held at Clatsop Community College in Astoria.

Election 2024

The GOP primary is a rematch of the 2022 election, when Javadi, a dentist from Tillamook, won against Gaither. Javadi narrowly defeated Laity in the November election.

The candidates answered questions from former Astoria Mayor Arline LaMear, the moderator, about the impact of the state’s habitat conservation plan on the region’s economy and spoke to broader issues of affordability and livability on the North Coast.

“We need jobs, we need family-supporting wages, and in order to do that, we need timber jobs,” said Gaither, a retired corrections officer who lives in Seaside. “We need the industries that have always traditionally brought Oregon its wealth: fishing, lumber, construction. These are things that need to happen in Oregon, but we’ve got an HCP that is crippling that.”

State Rep. Cyrus Javadi

State Rep. Cyrus Javadi is a Tillamook Republican.

Unlike Gaither, who has argued to undo the habitat conservation plan, Javadi emphasized the need to consider solutions to make up for projected revenue shortfalls from a decline in timber harvests on state forestland.

“We need a solution that’s going to fix this,” he said. “I’m looking at tourism dollars, specifically the transient lodging tax, and how we can use that to benefit our community in the short term to offset some of the shortfalls that we’re going to have as a result of the HCP.”

Glenn Gaither

Glenn Gaither, a retired corrections officer, is a Republican who lives in Seaside.

Laity, a Tillamook small-business owner who is vocal on environmental issues, echoed Javadi’s support for redirecting tourism funds. Generally, under state law, 70% of lodging tax revenue goes toward tourism promotion.

“We are doing OK on tourism right now,” Laity said. “We don’t need more marketing into tourism in Clatsop and Tillamook counties, which is where this district is. What we need to see is that flipped, so that 70% of that (lodging tax revenue) goes back into our communities, providing the resources that support tourism to begin with.”

Logan Laity

Logan Laity, a Democrat, is a small-business owner in Tillamook.

All three candidates highlighted the lack of housing availability in the region and the difficulty in retaining workers because of high costs.

“We need teachers out here, we need doctors, we need people who run our restaurants and work in law enforcement, and there’s just not the housing to do it,” Javadi said. “So we need to get our act together. We need to make all of our policy sync up so that we can get homes out here, and I plan to do that in the upcoming session.”

The candidates also tackled livability and affordability concerns in response to a question about child care. Javadi emphasized the need for policy flexibility in order to create affordable child care options.

“Part of the problem is red tape,” he said. “We’ve made it very difficult for people to have a day care business, and we’ve made it very expensive to run a day care business, and they have to charge rates that most families can’t afford.”

Gaither argued that child care demands would be lessened with higher wages.

“If we have a strong economy, a wealthier state, we’re not going to need as many resources for day care because not as many people will have to go to work,” he said. “Now there are women actually out there in the community that would rather stay home and be the parent, because that is the hard job out there.”

Gaither, who cites education as his primary focus, also raised concerns about child care “indoctrinating” children at a younger age. In response to a question about school choice, he argued that the public education system has failed Oregon’s youth.

“I believe in supporting the child, not the broken government system,” he said.

Asked about voting by mail, which has been in place in Oregon for decades, Javadi and Laity supported the process, while Gaither claimed that the mail was not secure. A report by the Legislative Fiscal Office in 2020 that looked at two decades of vote-by-mail elections in Oregon found that voter fraud was extremely rare.

They also clashed over differences in legislative and political style. Javadi has described himself as a legislator who can work across the aisle to find pragmatic solutions, and criticized Laity and Gaither for taking “extremist” positions.

“I think (the job) takes somebody level-headed, somebody who can put partisan politics aside, somebody who’s wanting to work with either side,” Javadi said. “Some of my greatest partners in the Legislature are people who think slightly different than I, and we complement each other that way. I’ve built those relationships and those will continue to serve me well.”

Gaither and Laity both criticized Javadi for missing House votes during his first term and stressed that they would show up in Salem if elected.

“I will be there every day for every vote that I can possibly get into,” Gaither said. “I’m not going to be off doing something else, taking care of business. I’m going to be right there on the floor every single day, ensuring that your rights are protected, that our educational system gets fixed or replaced, and that we have an economy that supports families in the state of Oregon.”

The forum was hosted by the Astoria branch of the AAUW in collaboration with The Astorian and Coast Community Radio.

The election will be held on May 21.