Three candidates file for Longview city council seats that will become vacant

First day of candidate filings dominated by incumbents; filing continues all week

Long-time Longview doctor P.J. Peterson and a former local radio personality Josh Carter filed Monday for the Longview Council seat that incumbent MaryAlice Wallis will vacate in December.

In addition, Longview investment advisor Chris Bryant filed for Longview Council seat No. 6, which member Angie Wean will leave at the end of the year.

Monday marked the first day of filing week for elected office, with a host of local city council, port commission, school board, and fire, water, and cemetery district offices up for grabs. As of 3 p.m. Monday, 27 candidates — most of them incumbents — had filed for 26 offices.

Three Longview City Council positions are up for election, and the outcome of those races could affect the council’s 4-3 balance of power, now slanted toward a MAGA-tending right coalition.

Wallis, though a conservative, has generally voted with the moderate bloc of councilwomen Wean and Ruth Kendall.

Wallis and Wean are not seeking re-election when their four-year terms expire in December. Councilman /Mayor Spencer Boudreau’s seat also is up for re-election.

Boudreau had not filed by Monday but months ago filed campaign finance documents for the 2025 election cycle. Wayne Nichols has filed campaign documents for a run at Longview City Council, but he has yet to formally file for office and it was not clear which council seat he seeks.

Peterson, 76, grew up locally and practiced medicine here 37 years before retiring as associate medical director for internal medicine at PeaceHealth Medical Group. She’d also served as chief medical director for the group.

Carter, 32, formerly worked at at KLOG radio for seven years and owned a marketing company — Carter Venture Solutions — that he sold to a national firm that he works for but which he said he is contractually prohibited from naming.

Peterson said she’s running “because I care about Longview thriving” and making it better able to attract and keep young professionals here. She’s seen too many new doctors who work here end up moving south because “we don’t have the apartments or condos for young people.”

The council has spent “too much time on issues that should not even be addressed,” such as Councilman Erik Halvorson’s so far failed attempt to eliminate fluoride from city drinking water, Peterson said.

The council majority’ s decision to fire City Manager Kris Swanson in March 2024, “was premature and not well thought out. … It certainly seemed that new council members may not have known enough before they made the decision. It was a knee-jerk reaction to something.”

Peterson considers herself a very conservative, life-long Republican. Her father was a rural mail carrier in Kalama who once brought home a stray dog and named it “Eisenhower,” after the 34th U.S President.

“I grew up with conservative values,” she said, but adds that she never votes a straight ticket.

“I don’t like pettiness. I am a straightforward person. My mantra has always been ‘joy through integrity.’ ”

She supports Hope Village and the council’s new attempt to make it more self supporting by seeking a behavioral health agency to run it and bill Medicaid for services provided to the homeless.

Peterson said her MO as a council woman would be to identify what “80 percent of the people in the middle support.”

“I am a good listener. I spent 37 years listening to patients. … I will follow what I believe is the will of the majority of the people.”

Peterson enjoys playing the piano, tap dancing and writing mysteries. She earned her medical degree from the University of Utah College of Medicine in Salt Lake. She has served on Longview’s sister city committee, but this is her first foray into elective politics.

The same is true for Carter, 32, who has lived in Longview for about 10 years.

“I chose to live in Longview. I moved here on purpose and I love living here.”

He stressed in a phone interview Monday that he does not consider Peterson or anyone else who runs for the position “an opponent,” preferring to call other challengers “co-contenders.”

“‘We have to bring class back to how we operate,” he said.

Despite the contention that has marked council affairs over the last 18 months, “I don’t think the council lacks class. At their last meeting they were having very deep and nuanced conversations. There was no rubber stamping. You could tell everyone was using their brains. I want to be part of that.”

He declined to discuss the Swanson firing. “ I don’t want to weigh in on what already has happened.” He did, however, say “fluoride is at the very bottom of city concerns” given the naturally occurring mineral’s long track record of fighting tooth decay and support from medical community.

Carter is an avid supporter of Hope Village. He recalled that he was homeless “for an extended period of time in Austin, Texas,” and ended up living in a men’s shelter even though he was employed full time and was not drug-addicted. The experience, he said, gave him an understanding of the nuances that make it hard for the homeless to rebuild their lives.

Trying to make Hope Village more self -supporting “Makes perfect sense,” he said, but he “absolutely” supports continuing it even if the city’s latest initiative falls short of that goal.

The city-sponsored, 50-unit pallet home community has found permanent housing for 110 people since it opened in December 2022. “That may not sound like a lot, but the reality of it is that those people are not using tons of (public) resources that they would if they had continued to live like they were before” entering Hope Village, he said.

Beyond calling for fiscal restraint, scrutiny of even relatively minor expenses and encouraging develop[ment, neither he nor Peterson had any special insights in how to tackle the city’s looming financial crisis. (The city eliminated 13 positions last fall and projects that it will deplete its cash reserves by 2029 due to inflation and voter-approved tax limits, according to city officials.)

Carter considers himself a moderate. He dislikes the policies of President Donald Trump. He says he is “very pro business” and wants to help avoid overregulation that might stifle business expansion.

If additional candidates enter the race for Wallis’s seat, they will face Carter and Peterson in the August primary election to determine which two move on to the November General Election. If no other candidates emerge, Carter and Peterson would square off in November.

Bryant could not be reached for comment Monday afternoon.

I will report any further Longview filings Tuesday.

The list of all local filings can be found at https://voter.votewa.gov/CandidateList.aspx?e=893&c=08.