Palmer woman joins House race

MAT-SU — Carl Gatto has picked up a third challenger in the Republican primary race.

“It’s looking a little crowded,” Gatto said of the race in House District 13, which includes three Republicans and two Democrats vying for their parties’ nomination.

Gatto is a three-term Republican seeking a fourth term. District 13 covers Palmer, Hatcher Pass and surrounding areas.

Florence Scott, a Palmer Republican, was the last to enter the race when she announced last week. She joins Gatto and David J. Parks in the race for the Republican nomination. On the Democratic side, according to the state’s Division of Elections Web site, Jim Wardman and David Cheezem are in the race.

Scott is running her first race for public office. She is a mother of three, an accountant and bookkeeper by trade, past treasurer of the Mat-Su Republican Women’s Club and a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution. She said now seems like the time for her to run, both because she’s had a lot of support from friends and family and because she thinks Palmer needs somebody better than Gatto.

“I don’t dislike Carl. I just think that I will be a better representative for Palmer,” Scott said in an interview.

“It is not that he doesn’t try hard, but he is just too goofy,” Scott said in a press release announcing her candidacy.

She explained “goofy” applied mostly to a statement Gatto made during hearings on the natural gas pipeline, which she said implied he believed oil companies don’t know how to build

pipelines.

“I was here during the pipeline days in the ’70s and I know that these oil companies know how to build pipelines,” Scott said.

In a phone interview between hearings on the natural gas pipeline Thursday, Gatto disagreed with this point in every respect save one — he might, in fact, be goofy.

“Goofy is a character that people like,” Gatto said. “OK, call me goofy if you want to.”

But, overall, he said, the statement she quoted was mischaracterized. He didn’t say the oil companies don’t know how to build pipelines. He said they don’t build a lot of pipelines. Pipeline companies do.

“If you want someone to teach a class, find a teacher,” Gatto said. “If you want someone to fix your plumbing, don’t go to an electrician.”

As to a broader critique of Gatto’s tenure, Scott said she doesn’t think he pushes enough serious legislation.

“I just expect more of our representatives,” she said.

Gatto, for his part, said that if Scott wanted to count number of bills passed, she just had to look at his Web site to find a stack of legislation with his name on it.

As to their quality, Gatto said he’s passed quite a few serious pieces of legislation. He singled out as particularly noteworthy the ignition interlock bill which, he feels, does even more than fines and jail time to keep drunks out of their vehicles.

But, Gatto said, legislation isn’t really a numbers game. Right now, he said, he and his colleagues are spending “148 percent” of their time on gas line hearings leading to a vote on whether to approve TransCanada Corp. to build a natural gas pipeline in the state.

That’s just one vote, Gatto said. But it’s a big one.

“Working on AGIA is the only future that the state has,” referring to the Alaska Gasline Inducement Act passed in the legislature this year.

Whatever the case, Scott said she plans to work hard leading up to the party primary in August, after which, she said, she hopes she’ll be facing the eventual Democratic nominee.

“I’m ready. I’ve got a treasurer. I’m going to be getting signs out there, and I’m going to be going door to door, and I’m going to be listening to people,” she said.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@

frontiersman.com or 352-2270.