Three face off in primary for county commissioner’s seat

In Yamhill County, the top elected positions are the three people who sit upon the Board of Commissioners and are responsible for guiding a $150 million annual budget, some 600 employees, and the welfare of the county’s more than 107,000 residents.

It’s a nonpartisan post, though partisan politics often surface among the commissioners, who are elected to four-year terms. This year, one new commissioner will be chosen from among three candidates: Lindsay Berschauer, Barbara Boyer and David Wall.

The winning candidate will join Casey Kulla, the commission’s chair, who was elected in 2018, and Mary Starrett, the commission’s vice-chair, who was elected in 2014 and re-elected in 2018.

Rick Olson, who has spent more than 40 years in public service and four years on the commission, announced in March that he would not seek re-election, citing “the divisiveness of government which now is prevalent over our entire political spectrum.”

Olson claimed it had caused “friends to be pitted against friends, neighbors against neighbors and family member against family member,” and he found it “agonizing and difficult to make decisions and build a consensus among citizens.”

That will be among the major challenges of the new commissioner.

At stake is the future of the county: how it will grow, how it will manage competing demands, how it will employ its resources, and, most importantly, how it will respond to the coronavirus pandemic that has gutted budgets, eliminated jobs and thrown the economy into a tailspin.

Election rules state a winner will be declared if one of the candidates receives 50 percent plus one vote. If not, the top two advance to a November runoff.