4 run for 3 seats on Beach City Council

• Election

Election

Talk about it

Newcomer Maria Marman is vying for one of three seats on the Beach City Council along with incumbents Jeanne Larson, Mark Benes and Wade Walworth.

Marman, 33, grew up in the Litchville area and moved to Beach about a year and a half ago. She is an office assistant at James J. Wosepka PC and she and her husband own Marman Earth Construction LLC.

“I thought that a fresh mind and being a little bit younger might be a little bit of an advantage,” she said. “There’s a lot of younger people moving back.”

Larson, 66, has lived all over the country, graduated high school in Bismarck and has resided in Beach full time since 2006. She is a substitute teacher running for a second term on the city council.

“I enjoy it because you get to meet people of course and I try to make Beach a good place to live,” she said. “Because the bulk of our people are not young, we’re working on services for the elderly.”

Benes, 48, is a Winifred, Mont., native who moved to Beach in 1998. He is a parts manager at West Plains Inc. and has been on the city council for six years.

“I feel I’ve always been a person to voice my opinion and I think that I can do good for the city with common sense,” Benes said. “I’m a firm believer in if you’re going to complain about something, do something about it instead of just sit and complain about it.”

Walworth, 45, has called Beach home his entire life. He owns Cedar Liquors in Beach and has been on the council for 12 years.

“I enjoy doing it,” he said. “I just like the way things are going in our city and I’d like to see them keep going in that direction.”

Walworth said housing and infrastructure such as sewer and water are the biggest issues in Beach.

“We’ve got a few housing projects going on and I’d like to pursue that even more because as with all of North Dakota, housing is an issue,” he said.

Benes and Larson agreed.

“I don’t believe the city should own housing, but I believe that we could do things to encourage housing to come in,” Benes said. “I think that we need to have a strong council to keep our town a little bit in check and organized so it doesn’t just become a free-for-all for everything.”

Larson said council members are bracing for oil activity to push further their way.

“So we’ve been working on zoning to try to get everything zoned properly,” she said. “It’s a challenge and it’s really a lot of fun to see things develop and come to fruition.”

Marman, who is expecting her first baby in July, wants to bring “new and different ideas” to the council. She wants to do the “best that I can do for the community and the city of Beach.”

Tags: city council, marian marman, jeanne larson, mark benes, wade walworth, news, election, beach