Meet Tacoma City Council candidate Kelly Blucher
Editor’s note: This is one in a series of interviews with candidates running for Tacoma City Council. In each interview, The News Tribune asked every candidate two questions: what they pay in rent or mortgage, and if they could correctly state the median home sale price in Pierce County, which is around $500,000 as of April 2021.
Kelly Blucher is running for Tacoma City Council District 2 seat in the 2021 election, which serves parts of downtown, the Port of Tacoma and Northeast Tacoma.
The seat is being vacated by current Council member Robert Thoms, who is term limited.
Blucher, 43, is a mom of three and works as the community engagement manager at Goodwill for the Olympics and Rainier region. As a member of the Tacoma-Pierce County Coalition to End Homelessness, Blucher co-founded Hire 253 in 2018, a job fair that helps connect people, including those experiencing homelessness, with employment.
In an interview with The News Tribune, Blucher said she decided to run for City Council to give voice to families like hers. Blucher said she’s experienced homelessness and has struggled to find a livable wage job in Tacoma.
“I think it’s really important that we talk a lot about lived experience,” Blucher said. “It’s time that families like mine are at the table.”
Blucher advocated for expanding access to resources like the first-time home buyers program, which she said is difficult to come by in her district, and to allow for more housing density and types of housing in Tacoma’s zoning codes. She wants to open up conversations about topics like rent control, to see if that could be an option for Tacoma.
Through her job, Blucher said she speaks often to people who are homeless or facing homelessness.
“I don’t think we’ve seen the worst of what it’s going to be coming out of this pandemic,” she said.
Blucher said creating more shelters is a temporary solution, and there needs to be more wraparound services and organizations that work together to help people find the housing and care they need. Blucher spoke to the homeless coalition and Pierce County’s bold goal to end street homelessness by Nov. 1.
“The more we bring these coalitions, collaborations, committees, organizations, politicians, businesses together — we will find solutions,” she said.
When asked if she supported bringing back the city’s law banning camping on public property, Blucher said it’s “ridiculous” to criminalize homelessness and wants to see Housing First options.
“Criminalizing homelessness is not the answer,” she said. “We have got to push options, such as these wraparound service programs, and not just shelter options, but housing options.”
Blucher said she supports police reform in Tacoma, including working to see which emergency calls can be diverted from armed police officers to community responders or mental health experts.
“We need to send out more community service workers and have people, again, with those lived experiences out there helping members in our community,” she said.
On climate change and the city’s efforts to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, Blucher said she supports more green infrastructure across Tacoma but wants to make sure it doesn’t come at the added expense to owners or tenants. She added that it’s important to her that the city partners with the Puyallup Tribe when working on environmental issues.
“We built an amazing light rail line that will hopefully open soon. That’s kind of near my house, so we’re super excited about that,” Blucher said. “Increasing access to public transportation is very important — not having so many vehicles on the road.”
Blucher has raised more than $6,500 for her campaign, with her top individual contributors being Gerrit Nyland, Norman Brickhouse, Mary Degagne and Amanda Westbrooke at $1,000 each, according to the Public Disclosure Commission.
How much do you pay in rent/mortgage?
Blucher said she pays $1,700 a month to rent her home.
What’s the median home sale price in Pierce County?
“I don’t have an exact number for you on what the median home sales price is, but I know it just went up again. So I don’t want to throw a number out there that I’m not completely aware of, but I do believe it’s close to 400,000.”
This story was originally published June 11, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
