Helen Sommers: An Oral History

Dean Foster
by this time had never been in the majority. Helen
had been, but most hadn’t. The Democrat’s leader
was Frank Chopp and he asked me to come back
because I had been there previously. I agreed to
come back as long as the agreement was to start
looking for someone to replace me as soon as possible.
So, I was there for one year.
Frank and I had conversations about how to
proceed. Because it was most convenient, people
were pushing to adopt the same model that was
used in the first tie. But the situation was quite a
bit different! The players were different; the political
atmosphere was different! In the 1999 tie,
there just wasn’t the cooperation between the two
political parties and their leaders that there was
in the 1979 tie.
Monahan: You worked for Governor Booth Gardner
for eight years (1985-1993). How did Gardner
compare to other governors you’d worked with
during your career in the House? And, what was
your position in his administration.
Chief Clerk Foster: Well, Booth defeated Spellman
in 1984. Spellman lost because they got into such
fiscal trouble. The Legislature was tied in knots in
his first two years. Booth was a sort of a shining
light! He added a positive attitude to state government
and its employees, whereas the Spellman years
were very difficult. When Booth came in things
were starting to get better, so the fiscal side didn’t
have anything to do with Booth being governor; it
had to do with time.
But the attitude toward state government got
better and that did happen because of Booth. People
really liked him and had confidence in him. He
brought in new people in his administration that
started doing some real positive things for him and
for the state. It was a good time for the state.
I started out as Chief of Staff and then we did
some reorganization, and I had a variety of other
titles: Director of Internal Operations; Deputy Chief
of Staff. I was there all eight years, and probably
would have stayed with Booth had he run for a third
term. At one time there was consideration that Booth
might run for U.S. Senate. I think he chatted with
Dan Evans about that. Booth got bored when he
served in the state Senate, and Booth thought he’d
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probably get bored in the U.S. Senate too. Booth
served just two years of a four-year term (1971-73)
in the state Senate. He really was a CEO type.
Monahan: Did you have any dealings with Helen
during the period you were in Gov. Gardner’s office.
Chief Clerk Foster: Oh, Helen was heavily involved
with budget stuff in the House. She and I’d been
friends for years and so there may have been some
things. Helen wasn’t the kind of legislator who would
come into your office and complain about things.
She just always was a hard worker and knew where
she was going. She was intense most of the time,
heavy into policy, and honest as you could get!
She sometimes lacked political acumen to back
away a little bit when it was pretty obvious that there
had to be some movement toward the center. But, I
don’t believe she ever did that out of spite, but just
simply because she believed in something and thought
it was the right thing to do. I think she brought
professionalism to the budgeting process and forced
people to understand policy choices as opposed to
political choices. I think that is what she brought.
Monahan: The one thing that I learned doing interviews
with people who worked with Helen, is
that higher education was what she really looked
out for and responded to. She was the ‘protector’
of higher ed. for all of her career.
Now, she’s gone from the Legislature. And I
think the colleges and universities must be looking
for someone to follow the lead Helen had set, to
fill her shoes for higher ed.
Chief Clerk Foster: I presume they are. What Helen
has done over the years is continue her bent toward
higher education by involving it in her budget. I
don’t know that we’re ever going to see somebody
who has that ability because, while she had the
University of Washington in her backyard, it wasn’t
in her district. Now days most legislators have a
university, college or community college in their
district, and that’s what they look at. They don’t
have the big higher education policy and money
picture that Helen did! I’m sure they’re looking for
somebody like that, and I doubt they’re going to
find anybody. Helen always had a long-term vision
for higher education.