- Obama Promises Direct Aid to Cities to El Nutter
- The "rolling closures" for this week
- Injustice in Housing is a Life or Death Matter
- The library: a recession sanctuary?
- Nutter should get credit where credit's due
- Thursday Counter-Protest at "We Stand with Israel" Rally
- This Saturday: hearing of Mayor's Task force on Ethics
- Why do we fund this?
- ABC debuts "Homeland Security USA"
- Library Closings: They Have Never Really Been About The Budget Crisis
Election Recap
Submitted by truthtold on Wed, 05/16/2007 - 4:19pm.
Since I was bold enough to make predictions, I figured I'd be bold enough to recap them.
For Mayor, I had:
1. Nutter
2. Knox
3. Fattah
4. Brady
5. Evans
Pretty easy call when the polls weren't moving. The undecideds didn't vote which is why the numbers remained the same. After Olivia Nutter's commercial, I was a believer -- a doubter before -- and his numbers skyrocketed up. The numbers stopped moving, which told me that the undecideds would drop out and the ranking would remain the same.
For District Council, I had:
1. DiCicco (I didn't think Vern had enough support.)
2. Verna (Easy call. I said that I didn't think Damon would crack 25%. Folks like Verna.)
4. I had McClure, and Curtis won. I could tell that the electorate turned against Campbell, and it was close, but I did not think that Curtis was going to have enough support to win, b/c of Fattah. I think that when Fattah's camp realized he was out of the money, folks began to focus on Curtis.
5. Clarke. (Easy call. With both paper's endorsements, and candidates from his base, he was a good shot to win.)
7. Leaning Savage. I didn't have enough information about the District. With a greater Northeast percentage, I thought Dan Savage had a chance, but momentum was all Maria. Also, with two Latino candidates at large, she also was helped.
8. Miller/Bass/Irv/Paulmier. Even though I liked all of the candidates, this was just historically how the district played in a multi-candidate race. Donna had enough support to win. I understand that a lot of folks on this blog are not big fans (more I think fans of Irv whom is well worth support.) But appreciate that people in Germantown do like Donna, b/c of the Dave Richardson thing, and her focus. It will take a single candidate to come close.
9. Tasco. Not a tough call.
Council At Large
1. Blondell/Kenney. Whoa, was I wrong. I thought Kenney would win first, but I vastly underestimated the loss in support that Blondell had for supporting Fattah over Brady and Curtis Jones over Carol Campbell. She was cut all over the city and barely won. I was very surprised about that.
3. Goode. He has very strong support in the African American community.
4. Greenlee. Every white and many black ward leaders were supporting him. His strength surprised me, but I thought he would win.
5. Street (Sharif) (Came in 6th, so I wasn't far off.)
6. Stier. I mentioned that he did not connect as well with voters as I thought. Unfortunately, that perception bore itself out.
7. Ramos. I meant Juan. I was shocked by Ben Ramos' success. Angel and Juan both had high 40s last time. So it should not have completely surprised me that Ben could do as well. (He has a good record.) I expected Juan to fall out, but I did not see Ben doing that well. That was a surprise to me.
8. Toy. He did much better than this number would indicate. He would have to be considered a winner. I said that he would not catch on outside of Center City and Chestnut Hill. I haven't seen the numbers, but that is incorrect. He was well, well respected and would have to be considered a contender next time.
9. Green. This was to me the second biggest shock of the night, (first to come). I did not see Green picking up that many votes. (I thought maybe he would get to fifth or sixth, but not storming past everyone else.) His campaign deserves congratulations.
The biggest shock of the night, for true political junkies, was Anthony Clark beating Edgard Howard. That is a complete shock. I had assumed that even though Anthony Clark beat him the first time, incumbency would fix that. I was wrong.
Other general points. While the City did not vote on race, generally speaking, white wards went for the white candidate (Knox) and black wards for Nutter. That pattern is substantially similar to voting patterns for decades in Philly.
South Philly is still impressive for candidates it supports, see Brady and Kenney.
Be careful about vilifying winners. There are reasons other than machine/ward/union support folks win. Sometimes, it is because the voters like them. (In fact, that's really the case most of the time.)
The City will have some new faces, but with Brady as party chair, and Fattah in congress, Evans in the State House, the playing field is pretty much the same.
Nutter with Evans and Fattah on the Appropriation Committees of their respective bodies and Brady's new clout in a Democratic Congress is perhaps the best outcome for the City -- aside from the fact that City Hall will experience some serious change.
Biggest loser, I think, would have to be Mayor Street. With Fattah and Brady holding their seats, and Nutter winning the Mayor's Race, I don't suspect there will be a lot of influence immediately after the election. Time heals all wounds, so I expect he will continue to be a voice in Philly politics, but it will take a couple of years I think.
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Edgar Howard was not a
Edgar Howard was not a shocker. I’m pretty sure that he got cut all over the city because he supported Evans. At least I heard through the Grape vine that that was going to happen. I don’t know if it did or not.
Also, there was bad press about him about back taxes or something of that nature.
It wasn't that he lost, it
It wasn't that he lost, it was that he lost to Anthony Clark. That shocked me. I knew Edgar was getting cut all across the City, but Anthony Clark.
Bizarre. Truly bizarre. (Knowing Anthony Clark may help understand my surprise.)
Can you explain in more
Can you explain in more detail for those of us who don't know him?
Yeah
I was surprised that Howard lost, but I don't know anything about the guy who won.
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Check out my blog!
I am currently working for Marc Stier and Ellen Green-Ceisler.
That's kinda my point. I
That's kinda my point. I don't think many folks know who he is.
Anthony Clark started out working for Andrew Carn, a longtime North Philadelphia state representative from Strawberry Mansion. (Think South of East Falls. 33rd and Lehigh Area.)
He later fell out with Andrew, as many have done, over some issue which escapes me now. He ran for ward leader against Maurice Floyd is my recollection. (I could have that wrong, it was like 15 years ago. Maurice was also a City Commissioner.)
He works either in the Recorder of Deeds or Wills or some such department of City Hall.
So there are two things about his victory that surprised me. One, he is a North Philly ward leader, that usually does not translate into a broad Citywide base of support.
Andrew Carn decided to run against Brady and said many derogatory things about Brady (plantation politics, etc.) That sealed the end of his career. Brady won overwhelmingly and there was a push -- not as much from Brady but others -- to get rid of Andrew Carn. (He had some other issues which are more gossipy in nature, which I'll leave out, but were well known.)
Jewel Williams was the candidate picked to run against Andrew and Anthony runs against both. (Nearly wins, or prevents Jewel from winning.) But people in the Party did not forget that.
Two, and you will have to confirm this, I thought he was one of the ward leaders indicted with Carol Campbell on the failure of ward leaders to file financial reports. (I could have that wrong, but I think I am right on that.)
That makes him an odd choice for election commissioner -- which is where you must file certain reports.
So, he is just an odd pick to me, which is why I was suprised that he won. (Other folks I know were surprised that he won, not that Edgar lost, which seems odd to me as well.)
But maybe that is too parochial a view.
Anthony Clark Won Four Years Ago
beating Edgar. And then through some machination I never quite understood and that probably was illegal got a court to agree to allow him to withdraw after the election.
Perhaps Edgar ran into trouble with ward leaders because of their previous history of dealing with him.
This is what happened
Four years ago Anthony Clark ran for City Commissioner. The day before the primary he filed the requisite paperwork with the Board of Elections to remove his name from the ballot. There were many theories as to why, conspiracy theorist would love them, but the fact was he filed them.
His name was to have been covered, but due to the short notice and small timeframe to make that a reality most voters were not informed of the change. Marge Tartaglione received the most votes, Anthony Clark came in second, Edgar Howard was third and Sandra Mills was fourth.
The day after the primary Anthony Clark filed a motion to have his withdrawal from the primary declared null and void and to restore his victory. I was retained to represent Sandra Mills during the hearing.
The Judge ruled that his withdrawal was willful and without duress. Edgar Howard was ruled the second place finisher and as such the majority party's second nominee.
Anthony ran again this year, and spent very little money on his campaign. He will be the first to tell you the value of drawing ballot position number 1!
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."
— Margaret Mead
Seth
Blondell
Just one additional thought on this. It's no surprise she got cut by ward leaders, but she also had a terrible ballot position. And on a ballot as long and complicated as this one, I think that's a significant factor, even though she is well known and generally liked.
Connecitng With Voterrs
Look Truthtold, if you saw any events in this campaign, you would see that what you are saying about my not connecting with voters is just nonsense.
I haven't seen the numbers but the difference between my vote and Derek Green's will come down to ward leader support especially in 10 and 50, two huge wards that backed Derek and not me.
There are a lot of reasons I didn't do better but most of them have to do with the difficulty challengers have in getting voters to know who we are let alone hearing what we have to say.
I'm going to elaborate on this a great deal in the ensuing days and weeks. But as I have been talkign with all sorts of people today about where we fell short, few people have called into question the message of our campaign and no one called into question my ability to deliver it to people in ways that inspired them. With the exception of one or two wards, committee people all over the city loved what I had to say. And they were not an easy audience for a speech that began with the words "politics in philadelphia is broken."
Aren’t the 10th and the
Aren’t the 10th and the 50th Derek’s base though? I mean, don’t they know him pretty well there?
Marc,
Marc,
I wish you the best of luck. I am a little surprised by your tone, I assume that it just the cumulative toll of a lot of hard campaigning.
Let me say this point, that it is the perception, not reality, not what you see every day. I have spoken to a lot of committeepeople/ward leaders and I heard that myself. Doesn't make you a bad person, just what I heard. I am not everywhere. I don't speak to every committeeperson, but I do speak to a lot of ward leaders/officials and that it what I heard. Take it for what its worth or ignore it. (I also debated with Jim Kenney as to whether he would come in first or third at one point, and he only came in first by 30 thousand votes. Lots of folks voted for other mayoral candidates and also voted for Jim Kenney. So I am capable of misperceptions. I did not think Bill Green would win, and I was way wrong.)
It is a function of a lot of good candidates in the race. I am not saying people/committeepeople did not buy into the message, its just that they did not buy into your candidacy as much as others. It's a crowded field of very good candidates and you showed very well.
However, Bill Green (who had a lot of advantages) and Andy Toy (who didn't win, but ran well) did have a message/campaign that did catch on. A lot of politics is timing -- see Blondell nearly lose as an example, though she is well liked.
The threshold was for this election about 50,000 votes in the at large category and it is difficult to get close. I wish you the best of luck and hope to continue to hear about ways in which you hope to improve the City.
More on Connecting to Voters
Andy did a very good job on teh campaign trail. He did catch on with people.
Bill Green was pretty horrible as a campaigner. He never settled on a decent stump speech--partly because he said very different things in different parts of the city--and pretty much stumbled through his speeches. He alienated more people than he won over in one on one interaction. Last week at BVU I started talking to a group of people who Bill had just left. After a few minutes of intense discussion of sustainability issues, of them said to me, "who is that awful guy'?
If you are as big an expert as you claim to be, you should know that winning an at large race is only partly a matter of connecting to voters personally. Bill Green won because of his money and his father's connections (which is where he got his money.) He spent a fortune buying ward leaders, paying 3 to 4x the going rate and he spent a great deal on direct mail and newspaper advertsising. None of us progressive could come close to matching his money.
Andy ran a great race by focusing on the core progressive areas and mobilizing the Asian American communities.
That was the original strategy I had when I entered the race. But I quickly concluded that I could not win that way simply because the core progressive vote as no more than 30 to 40,000 and I was sure I would need 50,000 to win. So I spent a great deal of time talkign to voters and ward leaders in North Philly and the Northeast and a great deal of money on TV. When the money ran out, we intensified our efforts with ward leadrs in those areas.
I got some ward support but not enough and, as i came to learn, there is a big difference between being on a ward ballot and having committee people really push for me.
I also got some support from community activists, but we didn't have the resources to help them mobilize people in their community.
But as far as my own connection to voters was concerned, it was very strong. I was everywhere I spoke and usually a member of my staff was there, too. They were not shy about telling me when I had screwed up. But the one thing that they never questioned me about was my ability to connect with voters in a speech or a small group setting. In fact, one reason we became very optimistic at one point was that the reception to my campaigning was so extremely positive on the whole.
I practically got standing ovations in a few ward and community meetings and my speech was received very enthusiastically in progressive and black areas and, depending upon how good I was any particular night, well to very well very well in less progressive white areas. Enthusiasim was weakest in a couple of white wards, including my own and 66. But in, for example, the 53rd ward, I got a very enthusiasitc support which one over the ward leader.
Some folks did not like my message precisely because it contained such a radical challenge to the way we do politics in Philadelphia. That kind of message can offend in two ways. The first is if you are part of the system and feel my attack on it personally. And the second is that saying politics in philadelphia is broken can seem arrogant to folks.
But, in ways I'm going to explain soon, I tried to frame this message in a way that went down easier, especially with ward leaders and committee people. If you would have seen them laughing at the end of my speech, you wouldn't be reporting that i didn't connect well to voters.
And you know what is
And you know what is funny?
Everyone was worried about Knox buying an election, when in reality, it was pretty much Bill Green who did.
Marc, I am not sure why you
Marc, I am not sure why you choose to pick on my post, or comment about connecting well with voters, given how I couched the fact that I had heard it, and others commented on it, but it was just a perception. I like you and your candidacy and said as much. Let me be very clear about what I am saying, which should not be controversial, that as compared to other candidates, you did not connect with enough voters to have them pick you over others. (Dwight Evans has that problem in this race in spades.)
I have tried to be gracious in responding to your posts, and am not sure why you added "if you are the expert you claim to be" in your post.
Let me keep it completely real, you got 24,000 votes, and came in 10th, and Blondell got 50,000 and took the 5th place spot. Steve Nesmith, whom very few on this site can remember got 40,000 votes in 99. Who was Steve? Exactly. No one can remember. (He is a Republican now who worked for the Bush Administration.) Harry Massele, whom most folks couldn't point out in a photo lineup, got 16,000. (His prior run surely did not count for name recognition.) So, the fact that I say that the PERCEPTION that you did not communicate with voters is something I heard, is backed up by some empirical data.
The electorate is about half African American and half white voters. There are four incumbents who won in the prior election and Bill Greenlee was popular as all get out amongst ward leaders. He was also well liked, people respected his long work for Cohen, and he is a nice guy. That does count for something. So there is a strong field of incumbents, one of which lost.
So there is some stiff competition, which is my larger point, THERE ARE A LOT OF GOOD AT LARGE CANDIDATES. So to say that people didn't like you, which is not what I am saying, I am saying that you did not break through enough. No great passion for you as opposed to other well qualified candidates. Dwight Evans, Bob Brady, and Chaka Fattah all have the same issue. Great folks, just not great candidates in this election cycle.
Two sons of Mayors, a former State Representative, were among the non-incumbent challengers. Philly has had a Latino candidate at large for almost two decades, and both candidates lost. It is a very difficult race to win the first time out. Many who have run and succeeded lost the first time.
Connecting with voters is a small part of winning, but voters are smart enough to see who they liked. It's not just ward support and mailers. It is demeaning to suggest that the at large candidates who did win did not work very hard to do so or were the puppets of the machine. Remember lots of folks voted for Nutter citywide and then someother non-reform candidate for Council (either at the District or at large level.)
Also, Andy Toy, who a non-incumbent endorsed by both papers, he caught on. He was a reformer, who had a boat load of ideas, and folks I talked to, who had no reason to support him, he had no union connections, no ward connections that I was aware of, no large support in any large constituency, people just thought he was smart and they liked him. Somehow that translated into 40,000 votes.
There is this sense -- and I have worked on and run campaigns that have lost against incumbents -- to blame the voters for not garnering support. (Ten thousand people did vote for Milton Street, so there is some credence to this argument.) But sometimes we have to face the fact that the campaign we run does not match up to what voters want. That is the difficult part of running a campaign based on change. Also, convincing donors to fund your campaign is a part of that support.
As to Bill Green, I have to say that my self proclaimed "expert" status, as you put it, would have to be in danger. I did not see Bill Green winning. No one I spoke to heard that he set fire on the campaign trail, but 60,000 votes doesn't come easily.
Part of winning at large is getting a lot of folks in a lot of places to support you. Some of that support is financial. Philly has a long history of folks running against the Party, machine, w/o money and sometimes winning. (Philly has a long history of folks running with all of those things and losing.)
Again, I wish you the best and look forward to hearing about ideas you have for changing the City. I would only offer the advice that if you run for public office, and someone makes a less than stellar endorsment of your candidacy, ignore it. Life is too short to throw stones at every barking dog. I am sure you will agree that in Philadelphia politics, you will hear far worse than "I don't think he connected with enough voters to win".
Good luck.
It's the message I care about not me
My campaign was the most radical, pro-reform campaign of any person running for City Council at Large. I presented an analysis of why the system doesn't work and some proposals about how to fix it.
My concern is that when you say I didn't connect with voters, you are feeding into the myth that people dont' care about reform but only about bread and buter issues. My experience showed me that this is simply not true. Not only did people care about reform, they understood the connection between reform and bread and butter issues.
I can't tell you how many times, after a speech particularly before a black audience, I went around the room shaking hands while people said to me, "thank you so much for telling the truth about politics in philly."
We progressives need to recognize that our message can and does connect with voters and not only voters who live in our core areas. If we forget this....if we focus all our attention on NW and CC we will not create the broad based movement we need to change the city.
The problem in my race was not that I didn't connect with voters but that I couldn't speak to enough voters. As I have posted elsewhere, none of us talked to much more than 8 to 10,000 people.
Had I focused those 8 to 10,000 people in the NW and CC, where it is easier to get a message through, then my vote total would have been higher. But I still would have lost, as Andy did.
Instead I tried to work areas of the city where people have not heard our message. I'm glad I did that because, in the long run, it will create the connections between white middle class activists and the black and white neighborhoods that simply never hear a reform message.
I didn't win a lot of votes there, for reasons I've explained, but I made a lot of connections to activists who I will work to engage in progressive politics in the future.
Your point is well made. I
Your point is well made. I don't mean to suggest, and also agree that folks should not pigeonhole African American voters, or voters who are poor of all races, into caring solely about bread and butter issues like constituent services.
If you live in North Philly (as an example I can speak from), you are well aware that the City is screwed up. Abandoned buildings sitting for years, drug corners that are more active than grocery stores (I was hurt to see in the Inky that saying "you buy weed on 15th, crack on 16th and pancake and syrup on 17th Street from North Central Philly still holds true.) Schools with crazy violence, murders going unsolved, potholes everywhere, abandoned lots strewn with trash, few job opportunities. You get the picture.
I am not surprised to hear, and did hear, that people would agree that finally someone is talking about how the system does not address them. There is a great mobilizing opportunity for progressives. Many of the African American elected officials started out community organizing about issues around how screwed up the City was.
John Street started his council career complaining about Abscam.
So reform is a message that I think will play very well in all communities.
Let me say this about what I think -- again my perception, not a poll -- some African Americans are feeling. That City government and the folks with City jobs have forgotten about them and they are pissed. They want a greater sense of accountability of all elected officials.
If you make the argument, that in order to get a government that is responsive to their needs, you need to have major reform to get big business, the law firms, lobbyists out of City Hall, you will find a captive audience. There is no doubt about that.
Unfortunately, that kind of message is not the kind of message that the status quo, the party, community organizations who are tied into the status quo for their grants, unions, etc., want to support. So I would have to applaud you for doing so. (And is why I have said I like your message and your campaign and hope to hear more.)
Thanks for responding. I apologize if I took your response to personally.
I'm sorry if my responses seemed personal
What you said in the last few paragraphs is exactly what I found. I mean, I went right into the ward meetings and talked about how if you live in a black, poor, or unconnected neighborhood you don't get what you need from the government and, instead, get pushed around and thrown out of your neighborhood. And in front of groups like Al Alston's AABRA, I gave a pretty radical speech about gentrification. I practically got a standing ovation. Speeches I gave in Strawberry Mansion and Nicetown were received in the same way.
And while the response was a little less feelingful, people in the far Northeast responded as well when I pointed out how they were shortchanged by a government that is unfair. I spoke at the Morrell Park Civic Association right after someone had pointed out that in order to get their recreation center rebuilt, they would have to moblize their council members and state reps. I simply said, "what kind of city do we live in when it takes a special deal to get what every community should have, a decent recreation center." People applauded strongly.
I am sure that we can mobilize people in every part of the city behind the idea of radical political reform especially if there were black and white leaders working together.
But how do we find the resources to do it?
Right now, I don't know. I think it would take years of patient organizing. But who is going to do it? The main reason I wanted to be in Council was to have a paycheck, position, and staff to do that kind of organzing as well as the capacity to raise funds for progressive organizations to do it as well. I simply don't have the energy to continue to do 30 hours a week of unpaid political work on the side and I've got a big debt I've got to remove. Ray Murphy, Ben Waxman and I have talked about the difficult of building careers in progressive politics because no one is willing to pay people to do it.
So I'm not discouraged at all about my campaign message but I'm concerned about finding the resources to build progressive organizations outside our core areas. My campaign will help. But it is just a drop in the bucket.
I didn't get money from the legal community and the more people here about
And in front of groups like
Not exactly a ringing endorsement.
"yes adam gave some informative comments but he also seems to sprinkle a little adam dust on it." - merkin
Undervotes
I help tabulate the results for my ward, 18th, after each election. As others have stated above and other places here, the ballot was absolutely ridiculous. In some of our divisions, City Council At-Large had 200 undervotes or more, because of its position on the ballot. District Council had similar or worse numbers in some places. Someone can do a study on it, but I'm sure mayor suffered a small drop-off as well. My bet is that this was a common occurrence throughout the city.
Council and the Mayor should have been further up the ballot.
Any candidate on the far right had side of the ballot had an uphill climb from the beginning. I believe that fact explains some of the results where some city-committee-endorsed candidats did not win, including at-large.
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