Following his first few months in office as Tenino’s new mayor, Dave Watterson recently talked with The Chronicle about his background and his time leading Stone City government thus far.
Though he spent the majority of his firefighting career in Lacey, Watterson was born in Centralia.
“I was born at the old hospital in Centralia, and I actually grew up two blocks from the newspaper there on Maple,” Watterson said.
His family moved to Olympia when he was 5, and while he was raised mostly there, he returned to study forestry technology at Centralia College before himself moving to Grand Mound near the South Sound Speedway and eventually settling in Tenino.
“I’ve lived in Tenino for 20 years now … I’ve been in south county for 30 years,” he added.
While he studied forestry, that education ended up funneling him into firefighting. Following his graduation, he started working for the U.S. Forest Service in Shelton doing wildland fire suppression.
“From there, I had a friend who was a volunteer at the Lacey fire department,” Watterson said. “I started there, being a volunteer for three years, and eventually got hired and worked there 27 years as a career firefighter. Pretty much my whole life has been in firefighting.”
He was glad he got his start in wildland firefighting as that experience helped him throughout his career at Lacey Fire District 3.
“Even at a municipal fire department, you’ll still end up doing some wildland stuff,” Watterson added.
Watterson is the father of two sons, with the youngest preparing to graduate from Tenino High School. His older son already graduated from the same school.
“Both of my sons went all the way through school here,” Watterson added.
His younger son is also considering following in Watterson’s footsteps by pursuing a career as a firefighter.
Now that he’s 63, Watterson has shifted his focus from service as a firefighter to service as an elected official. Prior to narrowly winning the race for Tenino mayor over fellow candidate Linda Gotovac last November, he had spent eight years as a Tenino city councilor along with working on the city’s planning commission. The position of mayor opened when former mayor Wayne Fournier successfully pursued a seat on the Board of Thurston County Commissioners.
Despite his familiarity with the city, the first few months as mayor have still been intense, he said.
“Being mayor, the administrative side of it is quite a bit different than being on the council or planning commission, so it’s been a bit of learning curve to catch up on all the things that are going on,” Watterson said.
Since he is retired, Watterson has plenty of time to devote to being mayor and is trying to be as available as possible. He added he has already met with many Tenino residents to talk about issues they want addressed.
“I spend a lot of time in the office, and I even put out an invitation if you want to talk to go ahead and come in,” Watterson said.
Improvements to Sussex Avenue, the main street running through Tenino, is the issue residents have brought up to Watterson the most.
“There’s so much traffic and sometimes a lot of cars speed through,” he added.
Being that Sussex Avenue is a part of state Route 507 — which intersects Tenino — any improvements to Sussex require Washington State Department of Transportation approval.
“It’s not like you can just say, ‘Hey we want to fix this and do it ourselves.’ You have to go through a process to make any changes,” Watterson said.
One potential project he talked about during his mayoral campaign last year was getting overnight lodging for visitors in Tenino if possible. While Tenino offers residents and visitors alike access to Tenino City Park and the city’s famous Quarry Swimming Pool, the lack of lodging means visitors are often driving back up to Olympia, Tumwater or Rochester to spend the night.
The goal is to get them staying in Tenino so visitors end up eating dinner and breakfast in the city along with possibly shopping more, helping fuel the local economy.
Working with Experience Olympia and Beyond. which has access to tracking software, he’s learned Tenino is ready for its own hotel or motel.
“They can track where people come from, how much time they spend here. The amount of information they have access to, without a doubt, if someone wanted to build a hotel there’s enough traffic to support it,” Watterson said. “... If (visitors) had some place to stay, I think they would tend to support our businesses more.”
And while potholes in the city’s streets are another big issue Tenino residents have brought up to him, Watterson said they are waiting until the rainy season ends.
“With the weather, even if you fix them (the repair) ends up getting destroyed again,” he added.
Overall, his goal is to continue improving Tenino where he can while fostering an open government and building Tenino’s community.
“I want people to know I’m open to hearing about what they think our successes are, and their concerns,” Watterson said. “... I’ll probably make mistakes. I’m new to this. But my thing is if I make mistakes, I’m going to be very open about it.”
Watterson’s office is in Tenino City Hall, located at 149 Hodgden St. S. in downtown Tenino, is open Tuesday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.
To contact Watterson to discuss an issue or to set up a meeting, email him at DWatterson@cityoftenino.org. For more information, visit https://www.cityoftenino.us/.
