Spokane County Commissioner election: Marshall vs French

Molly Marshall (left) and Al French (right) are both running for the District 5 Spokane County Commissioner seat.

County Commissioner Al French, who’s been a fixture in Spokane County politics for more than two decades, is defending his seat from Latah Valley community organizer Molly Marshall this election. Both candidates are military veterans — the similarities end there.

At the center of the race is ongoing criticism about French’s handling of information about PFAS contamination on the West Plains and a heated debate over whether development, especially in the west parts of the county, should be reigned in so infrastructure can keep pace with it. French wants to incentivize development, arguing that’s what will pay for infrastructure. Marshall, citing dire circumstances for people living in places far from services where wildfires threaten homes, wants to allow infrastructure to catch up to it.

French told the Inlander that he will not seek another term if he wins this race. The seat in question is for district 5, which covers the west side of the county, including Airway Heights, Cheney, Spokane International Airport, the West Plains, northwest Spokane and the tip of South Hill.

French has not responded to our questions via email or phone call, but we did our best to answer some of the questions using publicly available information and by providing links to articles he did participate in. If he responds, we’ll add his answers.

*Boundaries of Spokane County’s 5th District in blue. Map courtesy of Spokane County.*

Molly Marshall

Molly Marshall has lived in Spokane for decades and co-founded Citizen Action for Latah Valley with her husband Adam Marshall and the environmental activist Kai Hushke to lobby the city of Spokane to impose a development moratorium in the Latah Valley, which the city council did earlier this year. A retired officer in the Air National Guard, Marshall believes that development has outpaced infrastructure in the Latah Valley, leading to a dangerous failure in road infrastructure for evacuations and emergency service vehicles. She wants to create an environment in which development slows so infrastructure creation can keep pace. She is also running on a five-part plan to restore clean water to people whose private drinking water wells were contaminated with “forever chemicals” from firefighting operations at Fairchild Air Force Base and Spokane International Airport.

Molly Marshall PDC
Molly Marshall campaign website
Jump to her responses to our questions here

Al French

Incumbent Al French, a Marine veteran, is a developer and architect and, as a county commissioner, an ardent advocate for development, especially on the West Plains. He is campaigning on a number of development projects he was instrumental in bringing to Spokane County, perhaps most notably the Amazon Fulfillment Center in Airway Heights. He also has a plan to bring clean water to West Plains well owners that entails getting funding to install filters on contaminated wells. He wants to establish a tax increment financing district to encourage developers to invest in the West Plains.

Al French PDC link
Al French campaign website
Jump to his section here.

Our questions, their responses

We asked both candidates for the open seat a different set of three questions, touching on key issues we’ve heard from our readers. Only Marshall responded. Her responses are posted verbatim — with light editing for grammar.

Molly Marshall

Development and its balance with infrastructure has emerged as a prominent campaign issue. If elected, what would you do to allow infrastructure to catch up to development?

Numerous areas in Spokane County lack adequate public services due to the significant growth in recent years. When infrastructure falls behind, public safety is at risk. To ensure our community thrives, infrastructure must keep pace with this growth, guided by our Comprehensive Plan.

As your Commissioner, I will prioritize responsible development by aligning land-use planning with public safety needs. This includes enforcing building codes for wildfire safety, improving emergency response and evacuation, advocating for necessary road improvements, and ensuring that water and sewage systems are sufficient before any new development is approved, which is not happening under current leadership.

There is a crucial opportunity to reshape our growth with the pending update to the Comprehensive Plan. This update will allow us to plan for smart growth by identifying areas where development can be supported and where investments are needed before growth can occur. This balanced approach is essential for the health and safety of our residents.

Unhoused folks from all over Eastern Washington and North Idaho come to Spokane for services. What is the role of the county in trying to alleviate the city’s burden and make sure resources aren’t overwhelmed?

Many different factors contribute to homelessness. It is clearly a complex challenge and requires multiple approaches to effectively address this issue. Key resources come from different agencies and municipalities, therefore a regional approach to homelessness is essential for success. Spokane County has an opportunity to expand investments created by the behavioral health tax fund and opioid settlement funds, but the County must be willing to engage. Collaboration going forward is essential to effectively make use of the widespread support services regionally available. A regional strategy will alleviate resource strain and promote positive outcomes for the entire region.

PFAS water contamination, often referred to as “forever chemicals,” has severely affected the lives and livelihoods of people on the West Plains. Contamination was first discovered at Fairchild Air Force Base in 2017, prompting the base to implement testing and filtration systems for local residents. The problem escalated in 2022 when a public records request revealed that the Spokane International Airport had also detected high levels of PFAS contamination in 2017 but had not properly informed the public or taken appropriate actions. As a result, hundreds of West Plain residents with private wells unknowingly continued to consume contaminated water and used the water for agriculture and livestock. Exposure is linked to disease including multiple forms of cancer, it has been detected in livestock, agricultural lands and threatens to diminish property values for the residents of the West Plains.

Clean water is essential. We cannot further delay working with state and federal agencies to mitigate contamination, complete testing, monitor drinking water, and hold polluters accountable. This will require transparent leadership focused on short and long-term solutions to include expanding water treatment capabilities and providing alternative water sources for affected communities immediately. To date, the county has not provided resources for water and well testing, blood testing, or filtration systems.

For the last seven years, PFAS contamination and exposure was a known threat and tragically, not acknowledged by our elected officials. The citizens of the West Plains deserve better and they deserve immediate action.

Additionally, wildfire mitigation is a critical issue in District 5, as much of the area falls within the Wildland Urban Interface and faces extreme wildfire risk. The devastating Grey and Oregon fires last year highlighted that we can do more to reduce wildfire hazards. Over ten other fires in the region raised concerns about evacuation and emergency response capabilities. This year, four insurance companies have canceled homeowners’ insurance in Medical Lake, Latah Valley, and Indian Trail. The risk is growing, but I have a plan to reduce wildfire risk.

To address these challenges, I partnered with the International Association of Fire Fighters to host a regional Wildfire Training certification for firefighter instructors this summer. This initiative is part of a comprehensive plan I’ve developed to tackle these issues using available resources.

Al French

French did not respond to the questions RANGE sent, so we’re using comments he has made publicly on the same topics during a debate with Marshall on October 16 and from his campaign website. On development, French wants to create a tax increment financing (TIF) district that will provide incentive for developers to come to the West Plains.

“You do not build more housing by instituting moratoriums,” French said during the debate.

On homelessness, French said the city of Spokane wants too much say in the region over homelessness response, and the county and other jurisdictions should have more control. Referencing a proposed regional homelessness authority, French said, Spokane Mayor Lisa Brown “wants to control the regional system, and based upon what they’ve achieved so far, I’d be opposed to that.”

Though he did not respond to our question about the most important issue facing Spokane County, the landing page of his website includes a prominent write-up titled “My Commitment to Public Safety,” which touts his work with the sheriff's department. It reads, in part: “This commitment to your safety extends to leading a regional effort to improve our criminal justice system to ensure that individuals that want to harm you are incarcerated and those that are in need of assistance, either social or medical are directed to the appropriate services. This will ensure that the appropriate justice is administered while at the same time driving down the cost of incarceration.”