The Times - Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley

DAYTON - Passersby in downtown Dayton may notice a new set of occupants on the corner of Main and Second streets across from the Bank of America.

Christy's Realty, a longtime Dayton real estate agency, has moved to the building where Columbia County Title continues to operate.

"We wanted to do business in our own building," said Christy's owner Garry Snyder.

Christy's opened in its downtown location at the end of January.

"It's the best location in Dayton, actually," Snyder said.

The real estate office was formerly housed with Columbia County Fire District #3 on the west end of Main Street.

Another new occupant in the same building is Dale Slack, Attorney at Law. Slack, formerly of Carman Law Office in Walla Walla, opened his own practice in downtown Dayton just this month.

Slack's work is primarily in criminal defense. He is one of the two attorney's the county has contracted with to provide indigent defense. In laymen's terms, he's a court-appointed attorney for Columbia County.

Through his work with Carman Law Office, Slack has represented indigent defendants in Columbia County for the last two years.

"I love the town, I love the clients, the prosecutor is extremely reasonable most of the time, and I like the judges," he said. What better place, then, to open his own office?

Slack is a small-town guy. "I grew up in a town with 400 people, so Dayton is a city to me."

He enjoys the "rural, agrarian setting, which is much like where I grew up only with wheat instead of onions."

In addition to criminal defense, which makes up about 75 percent of his case load, Slack also provides will services and some litigation in civil matters -- preferring to provide defense counsel in those cases.

He's "trying not to do divorces," preferring to convince people to retain him for writing pre-nuptial or pre-domestic partnership agreements.

"I did a lot of divorces with Carman Law Offices, and I think pre-nuptials prevent a lot of the problems you see in divorce cases. I know it's not the most romantic thing in the world, but I think it is important, and I would like to see more people do them."