Day: May 19, 2010

Ollinger enters Wicomico County Executive race

This afternoon I found out that the someone on the Republican side has stepped up to challenge Rick Pollitt for the task of being our County Executive.

There is a little more on my Examiner page, but the reason I came back here to expand on this story was some of the background I uncovered simply by looking through my own archives.

In many cases, Joe Ollinger was the surrogate for Ron Alessi, who ran and lost the 2006 campaign for County Executive. For example, he spoke on Alessi’s behalf during the Pittsville forum and October 2006 Wicomico County Republican Club meeting. (You can tell it’s an old post by who comments.)

It’s my hope that Ollinger learned some lessons from Alessi’s failed campaign. Truth be told, it’s probably fortunate that the 2006 primary election didn’t occur much later because Alessi’s closest opponent, B.J. Corbin, got into the contest late but had serious momentum when September came. But the worst mistake made by Alessi is something that Ollinger doesn’t seem to have an issue with – Alessi trashed the local blogs in a memorable tirade. (That piece is also worth reading for my description of the state of the Maryland GOP expressed in the last three paragraphs. Mind you, I hadn’t been elected yet.)

Over the last four years – for the most part – the local blogosphere has evolved and grown, with just a few of us old-timers being joined by a host of young whippersnappers. Joe Ollinger and all the other GOP candidates should embrace the opportunity to have a friendly media outlet because the Daily Times is rarely on their side, WBOC spends a lot of time covering Delaware events, and WMDT political coverage is spotty at best.

Just some advice from an old hand at this.

Top of the evening (meetings)

Originally I was going to make this a simple comment to Julie’s post but figured I’d rather have the forum to myself – she can feel free to link to my reaction.

I look at it this way, as a logical manner. The County Council meets twice a month and we have five months remaining until the general election – in other words, ten meetings.

Under the rules in place, two of these meetings (July 6 and October 5) would be held at night, with the other eight being morning meetings.

With the compromise measure, five meetings would be night meetings and five would be daytime. Right now, the difference is three meetings. Certainly that would be a better situation for some, but for me it wouldn’t be the ideal hill to die on. Even Prettyman is quoted as saying she has nothing against night meetings despite the fact she voted against the latest effort, which lost in a 3-3 tie because John Cannon was away tending to family matters.

My point is that we have a ready-made issue for the next election, and the dynamics are interesting.

The loudest opponents of going to a totally evening schedule have been Bill McCain and David MacLeod, both Democrats. We already know McCain isn’t running again, so presumably we can pick up a vote there.

Meanwhile, the Republicans on County Council have generally favored the switch. We all know Stevie Prettyman is running again as is Gail Bartkovich and presumably Joe Holloway. It leaves John Cannon and Sheree Sample-Hughes as swing votes; however, Sheree’s affirmative vote on the last proposal may be in some part because she is the first County Council member to draw an opponent in Dave Goslee, Jr.

Former Councilman Ed Taylor and newcomer Ryan Hohman are in the race for at-large County Council positions (one of which will open up with McCain’s departure) and their stance on the night meetings can be made into an issue as well.

So, I suppose my thought is not to sweat the small stuff but make it into an issue of good government where leadership on the concept can be rewarded this November at the ballot box.