Astoria City Councilor Andy Davis has officially entered the mayoral race.
Davis, who represents Ward 1, announced he would not seek re-election because he was moving away from his ward after his term ends this December. He had told KMUN he wasn’t sure if he would run for any office. He held off filing for the mayoral race until just days before the filing deadline.
Now his entry brings the total number of people trying for the position up to four. Also in the running are former Astoria City Councilor Tom Brownson, Laura Parker, a juvenile probation counselor, and Sean Davis, a combat veteran and the co-founder of the nonprofit Rogue Cell.
Current Mayor Sean Fitzpatrick is not seeking re-election. He ran unopposed for his seat in 2022, succeeding Mayor Bruce Jones who had decided not to try for a second four-year term.
Andy Davis is a research analyst for the Oregon Health Department and has represented Astoria’s Uniontown area since he was elected to the seat in 2022.
“The big reason I’m running for mayor is that I believe in the work that the current (City Council) and city administration has been working toward and I want to be in a position to keep doing that work,” he told KMUN in a statement.
During his time on the City Council, Davis pushed for a cap on short-term rentals and was involved in the long and difficult discussions about the city’s approach to issues related to homelessness downtown, a topic that often dominated meetings late last year and this year. He opposed a proposal to create exclusion zones downtown, a policy that would have temporarily banned people from the downtown area if they faced certain charges or repeatedly broke the city’s camping rules.
Davis strongly pushed for the City Council to reexamine and update Astoria’s camping ordinance.
He was also an advocate for a measure expected to be on the ballot in November that, if passed, would expand the number of city councilors from five to seven. The additional positions would not be tied to any one ward, opening the door for even more representation, Davis argued during City Council discussions.
In his bid for mayor, Davis says he wants to be part of the effort to get several initiatives across the finish line including 130 units of workforce and market rate housing that are in process, major development code revisions and an update to the comprehensive plan and economic development partnerships.
He says he would also like to push for changes to how the City Council interacts with the community, specifically how it approaches decision-making, takes public comment and how it receives feedback from the public. As part of that, Davis says he would like to see more advisory groups to gather feedback as well as explore the use of different voting techniques for city elections.
“Astoria is a great city that also has lots of challenges, and I think that the current work is trying to advance the city in an effective and compassionate way,” Davis said. “We have a (City Council) now that is thoughtful and collaborative. We work through making changes in the city in a deliberate way that I think is making good progress.”
He said they aren’t afraid to learn and make changes to policies, even ones they themselves passed.
Elisabeth Adams, the Ward 3 incumbent representing the downtown Astoria area, is running again for her seat and will face challenger Justin Grafton.