VIENNA — Two independent candidates are running to succeed Maries County Western District Commissioner Ed Fagre after the incumbent announced in June his intention to retire at the end of his current term.

When Fagre made his announcement, it led to questions about what would happen to his seat. The deadline to remove his name from the ballot had passed. If he won the seat and retired, it would be up to the next governor to consider suggestions from the local political parties before making an appointment.

Missouri allows independent candidates to file for elections after filing for party primaries has ended. Independent candidates must collect signatures from registered voters to get their names on the ballot.

Patrick Kleffner and Ryan Davis both filed paperwork to appear on the ballot. Although Fagre’s name will appear alongside them, he declined to participate in a candidate interview.

Patrick Kleffner

Kleffner, a farmer and customer technical service representative for a software company, said his top priorities for the county include repairing and/or replacing any bridges in poor condition, ensuring that county roads are kept in good condition and ensuring taxpayer money is spent well.

The Western District Commissioner oversees Road One, the larger of the two county road districts. Growing up in the western part of the county means Kleffner knows a lot about the roads in the area.

“I still go up and down them a lot,” he said. “I have brothers that have farms on the western side. I still go down and help them on the farm, so I’m up and down (the roads). A lot of times on Sunday afternoons, me and my wife will go drive around, look at the leaves on the trees. I’ve traveled all the county roads on the western side.”

Roads are the main concern county residents shared with Kleffner while he was out campaigning.

“They’ve had issues with the brush growing up on the side of the road,” he said. “When they have heavy rains, it washes the road. There’s really no way to prepare a road for that; sometimes its just going to happen.”

Kleffner said his experience with road maintenance goes back to growing up working on his family’s farms.

“We were always maintaining the roads on the farms,” he said. “Hauling gravel, dumping it, trucking it, grading it, controlling it after high rain waters, basically fixing the roads. I lived down a gravel road for almost 30 years, a mile-and-a-half county road. I know when it needs to be fixed.”

On Kleffner’s property, he maintains the roads with his own truck and tractors.

“I fix my own road,” he said. “I make my own roads. I repair my own equipment, so I have an understanding of how that stuff works.”

Kleffner’s experience managing a budget comes from his work on his farm.

“I currently do a monthly budget for farm expenses for feed, machinery repair, machinery replacement and purchasing replacement bulls and cows,” he said.

In recent years, the county commission has been in contact with companies about commercial solar energy projects in the area. The conversations have prompted the commission to research steps other counties have taken to regulate such projects though the commission has not taken any action toward regulations.

Kleffner said his familiarity with the topic came mostly from The Advocate’s coverage of county commission meetings. Although he said he did not like the idea of farmland being used for solar projects, he was curious to hear feedback about solar projects from people in the community.

When asked about the uncertain direction of the sheriff’s office heading into the election to decide its next leader, Kleffner said the staffing issues seemed normal for an administrative change.

“Hopefully you get a good sheriff in there who stays for a long time and all these people stay with him,” he said.

Kleffner said he would like to see the jail reopen soon after it temporarily closed due to staffing issues. Law enforcement making arrests in Maries County transport their detainees to Osage County or Phelps County.

“We don’t have to have a jailer, but it’s a cost running back and forth (transporting inmates),” he said. “It’s a cost every day to have them (in other jails). I think it’d be best to have it opened back up and have our own jail here.”

County officials have discussed the long-term future of the Maries County Jail. In March 2023, the county commissioners and representatives from the sheriff’s offices of Gasconade, Maries and Osage counties met to discuss the possibility of building a regional jail though no plans have been made since that meeting.

Kleffner said he liked the idea of a regional jail though he questioned the cost of paying for such a project.

“I think it would be hard to obtain something like that with that kind of money, not unless you could get some grants from the federal government.”

Kleffner said he wants to lead by understanding the perspectives of all parties.

“I am willing to work with anybody to solve problems,” he said. “Generally, if there’s a problem, there are two sides of it. I want to see both sides of it. As a county commissioner, you would have to make decisions the way they would want you to make decisions.”

Kleffner plans to rely on his 18 years in customer support to meet Maries County’s needs.

“I work with customers every day with the issues they’re having with their software or state reporting,” he said. “If they’re calling, they have an issue, so that’s basically what I do: solve issues. My job is working with people and solving problems every day.”

Ryan Davis

Davis, a realtor and owner of Argyle Catering, said his top priorities for the county include growing the community, maintaining infrastructure such as county roads and balancing the budget.

As Davis campaigned, residents mostly focused their feedback on county roads. However, Davis said some potential voters told him they wanted to see more focus put on county growth.

“I think they go hand-in-hand; infrastructure and growth,” he said. “You can’t grow a community without having good infrastructure. Our community’s economy is so driven by farmers that we have to have good infrastructure on the county roads where the farms are.”

Davis said the growth he would like to see includes attracting both businesses and their employees into the county to stimulate spending and tax revenue.

“I think that would be the main thing, trying to draw new, upcoming businesses, whether it’s a factory or even something like my business,” he said. “Any restaurants or anything like that really does help.”

Davis’s experience with road maintenance includes taking care of his own roads or those in the Moreland’s Homeowners Association, an organization in which he serves as president. He said that though he had limited experience with large-scale maintenance, most of the infrastructure already exists, and his goal would be to keep it in good condition.

“Most of that is knowing how the water flows and common sense on banking and where the drains need to be and fixing culverts,” he said.

Davis has previous government experience serving for nearly 15 years on the Village of Argyle Board of Trustees, but he said he believes his business experience is what prepares him most for the associate commissioner role.

“I think that, even on a national level, if we ran things more like a business with a budget and not an infinite budget, then you would be better off,” he said. “My experience on a town council would probably help, too, but running a business is probably the best attribute I’d have to running the county commission.”

Regarding commercial solar projects, Davis said he likes the idea of solar farms, but he would not want them overtaking agricultural farming within the county.

“I think that the solar farms are good, but it would be nice if there would be a good balance between farming and solar farming,” he said. “I don’t think they’ve figured that out yet. I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing if that’s what the farmer chooses to do, but I don’t know if it affects the neighboring farms or not.”

Davis said he expected the sheriff’s office would be fine once the new administration takes over. His main concern with the sheriff’s office was reopening the jail.

“If it doesn’t reopen, it’s going to end up costing the county a lot of money over the course of the years,” he said. “I think it’d be nice to have a central jail or community jail that multiple counties could come together and run. I don’t know if that’s feasible or not, but it seems like it would be beneficial to the counties that don’t have their own jails.”

Davis said he would take an outside approach to handling issues and disputes with or between residents.

“You can’t take an individual’s complaint at face value,” he said. “You have to do what’s best for the county and not what’s necessarily always best for the individual who has a complaint. If that complaint is a valid complaint that is affecting multiple residents, then it can be addressed to fix that problem. Sometimes people put their blinders on, and then they don’t look at what one small thing could affect the whole county, so if you look at it as a whole county, not what’s best for the individual, or yourself or anybody. It’s what’s best for the community.”

Within the county government, Davis said he would lean on his experience with his employees at Argyle Catering to inform his role as a leader.

“I’ve been my own boss and lead several people every weekend pretty seamlessly,” he said. “I’m pretty good at delegating, and I definitely don’t mind getting in there and doing it myself either.”