Winlock Mayor Don Bradshaw speaks during a Winlock City Council meeting in January.
The Winlock City Council filled its vacant council seat to replace former city councilor Dennis Korpi on Monday evening.
The council unanimously voted to appoint Andrew Maloney to council position 1. The position has been vacant for nearly a month, after Korpi resigned in August for health reasons.
“When I first came to this community, I could see it was kind of stagnant, for a lack of better terminology,” Maloney said. “It was an election year, my first year here. There’s a new administration and I can see things are progressing and it’s positive.”
Wendy Rader and Delina Cline also applied for the position. Cline said during her interview that she believed the city council should help eliminate rumors on the Facebook forums for Winlock, that she would like to have town hall meetings for issues that affect citizens, and see downtown cleaned up.
“I was hoping I could be a voice of reason,” said Cline, when the council went into executive session. “I think some of this stuff deserves town hall meetings. Mayor Bradshaw says 90-some percent of the people he spoke to wanted our old police force back. Nobody I can find, they actually talked to when they went to their house. They just handed (them) a flyer or chit chatted.”
The council asked each candidate the same questions, such as why they thought they would be a good city council member, three things they would like to help the city implement and how they would handle criticism from citizens in their personal life.
Maloney said he was not sure what he would like to help the city implement, but noted he handles criticism well.
“I can handle the criticism,” Maloney said. “I just won’t participate in the negativism. … I’ll listen, I don’t have to respond.”
Maloney has not previously held a public political office. He said that he was a business agent, financial secretary and on several executive boards and committees for Millwright Local 1607 in Los Angeles. According to its website, Millwright Local 1607 is a union that services petrochemical, food processing, material handling, turbines and renewable energy.
The council went into executive session for 15 minutes before it appointed Maloney.
“This is a very, very small community,” Maloney said. “I’m from a major metropolitan area, Los Angeles, so when you see the little things that are transpiring, you know that there is a positive mindset and I like that. I’m retired, this could be something that I could possibly get a little more involved with, just to help out.”
