City of Salisbury – Page 5

One man’s opinion

I have all the respect in the world for Muir Boda, and once I read the letter he had published in the Daily Times yesterday I decided to reprint it here as well.

As a citizen of the City of Salisbury and one who has been actively involved in city politics for the past couple of years, I have grave concerns over the process with which the City Council handled the budget process this year. I do feel some good things came out of the budget, such as removing furlough days for Police Officers and reducing the number of furlough days for the remaining city employees.

My concern is solely on the process and what appears to be a lack of negotiation and communication between the Office of the Mayor and the City Council. I have an even greater concern with the fact that the Council did not schedule a work session between the public hearing and the vote on the budget that included their amendments. Many ideas and suggestions were brought forth in the hearing and should have been discussed and considered before final passage.

I am also concerned that the Council was so quick to schedule an emergency session to override the Mayor’s veto. This was not an emergency; June 30th would have been considered an emergency, not June 8th. There still would have been plenty of time to for the Council to reach out to the Mayor to work on getting the budget to where all could have agreed.

This is very disappointing and their actions as a council are in contrast to what some on the council campaigned against and have complained about concerning past councils.

Reaction to the letter in the Daily Times comment section has been limited but seems to consist of bashing his supposed alliance with SAPOA and praise for Laura Mitchell. It doesn’t address the letter itself, so I took these (anonymous) people to task:

Whether Muir Boda would have voted for or against the budget is irrelevant to the conversation. He is correct that the city’s budget process was acrimonious and didn’t need to be done in such haste – that was his point.

I happen to think more people should have voted for Muir Boda as I did, but we are stuck with the Council we have because the people spoke back in April based on campaign promises of sweetness and light among the Council if the Camden crew were elected. Well, looks like too many of us were fooled again.

Now I don’t expect the mayor and council of any community to get along 100 percent of the time; in fact, a little bit of tension and rivalry can be a good thing. And Lord knows I’m certainly no Jim Ireton cheerleader but the depths we’ve descended to in this town are ridiculous. Where Muir’s argument is strongest is where he contends there was no big hurry – although Mayor Ireton was quick to slap his veto on the budget as presented by Council, there still was plenty of time for the two sides to discuss a compromise before the override.

However, Muir is somewhat incorrect on one key point: to not have a budget by June 30th would have against the City Charter, which stipulates the budget must be passed by June 15th (SC7-21 here.) Otherwise, the mayor’s budget would have been the one in force. Still, there was some time to work things out but both sides instead made a public show of rejecting the other’s budgetary guidance.

On another subject, I’m sort of curious what led Laura Mitchell to override the veto. (Guess I could e-mail her and ask, or she may enlighten us with a comment here.) Considering that there were three votes in pocket coming from the Camden mob, hers was the swing vote between the mayor’s budget and Council’s proposal. On the other hand, Shanie Shields is definitely the odd person out in this edition of Council and it will be interesting to see how that District 1 race shakes out in 2013 since she won’t run again.

All in all, Boda is correct in pointing out this is another black eye in Salisbury politics. Between the veto override and his favorite watering hole closing, last week was a bad one for Mayor Ireton. While one can always find a new hangout, the budget setback makes me wonder whether he will have the desire for another term in 2013 himself?

‘Kids’ who care

I don’t use the term in my title to be condescending, but the young whippersnappers over at The Other Salisbury News have taken a break from bashing the Camden contingent on Salisbury City Council (not that they don’t deserve it from time to time) and decided to attempt to begin some constructive dialogue on the city’s future. By gosh, they would like to stay and make a go of it in this fair city of ours after they graduate from Salisbury University, and I commend that thought.

Dubbing their effort ‘Operation S.S.F.I.‘ the crew at TOSN are beginning a multiphase project of kicking around ideas for the city’s improvement. (Perhaps they should see about what would attract these young entrepreneurs to the city as their own project matures and grows.)

Step one is a discussion of downtown Salisbury, and while I don’t want to make this a particularly lengthy post (after all, they deserve the dialogue and the readership for bringing the idea to the fore) I think I should note that there’s already plans which have been made and discarded about renovating the area. After all, creating the pedestrian plaza was one remedy for a downtown which saw its fortunes decline after the Salisbury Mall opened in the late 1960s – just as happened in thousands of other downtowns, big and small. (In my hometown this happened about 10 years earlier, but it’s a bigger city.)

The success of ‘Third Friday’ has been mentioned in other venues, and many have wondered why that couldn’t be replicated on a more regular basis. But what is attractive about Third Friday is its uniqueness as a date – just because once a month works, that doesn’t necessarily mean you can do it every weekend or even twice a month. If you had it 52 times a year instead of 12, the concept would cease to work after perhaps a year or so.

The key is mixing uses and making downtown a place to live, work, and shop. Unfortunately, old buildings don’t lend themselves to becoming a Walmart and people desire that sort of convenience, so tradeoffs have to be made. We don’t have nearly the urban density to be an area where a car is unnecessary, but we could do a better job of creating residential space where cars can be placed out of sight, with access to parking off alleys. It’s not to say a convenience store couldn’t work, although the crime issue needs to be addressed as well.

It goes without saying there also needs to be a toolkit for job creation – not just downtown, but throughout the city. People who live downtown need a job, and if it happens to be downtown, great. (My newest advertiser just opened up a business there – hopefully it will create a job or two.) But it’s not necessary for downtown’s prosperity because there’s already plenty of jobs down there from 9 to 5. The harder part is livening the place up the other 16 hours a day.

Things which would tend to draw young, single people downtown as residents are affordable housing and a thriving after-hours entertainment district. Salisbury’s downtown already has elements of both, but not enough to be a critical mass. The trick is figuring out how to make it cool to live downtown and not risky (as in taking your life into your hands venturing home after a night at the club.)

Wow. I went over 500 words in placing my two cents into the kettle. While you’re free to comment here, perhaps the discussion should migrate to their site.

A tax day protest

While I have no idea who he or she is, the Pajamas Media contributor known as ‘Zombie’ always seems to have an ear to the ground when it comes to events in that other socialist paradise of northern California. Here is Zombie’s take (in pictures and text) on two recent protests – one by the TEA Party and the other by a left-wing group called US Uncut. Both occurred simultaneously last Friday out in San Francisco.

There’s a reason I bring this up, and it’s not because there were other tax day TEA Party protests around Maryland and all over the country.

Come July, the plan is to have another local TEA Party. Yes, we missed the traditional April 15th date for Salisbury but that would have been problematic anyway because of the monthly Third Friday celebration held downtown. Instead, one can think of it as a booster shot between elections and at a time when politics may not necessarily be at the top of the agenda. After all, being a TEA Partier activist is almost a full-time job in and of itself.

Needless to say, I’ll have more updates as they become available to me.

Oh, one more thing. I have a major sponsor coming onboard to my humble little site. Details soon.

Open season

The political ascendancy of Laura Mitchell continues, apparently.

Laura finished in third, 122 votes behind first-place winner Terry Cohen, in the city’s March 1 primary but made up all that and more as she zipped by both Cohen and Tim Spies to win a four-year term on City Council. While it’s possible that absentees could push Terry Cohen into the top slot (13 votes separate Mitchell and second-place Cohen) the fact is that a woman who hadn’t even raised enough money to need a financial report in the primary beat out a field that was by and large comprised of previous candidates and well-financed challengers.

Perhaps the main ingredient in her success was her independence. It was no secret that Terry Cohen and Tim Spies were running as a Camden tag team, with several joint appearances and fundraisers. On the other hand, Muir Boda and Orville Dryden had a number of common financial backers and while they weren’t overtly running as a slate those allied with Cohen and Spies created the perception that Boda and Dryden were. Mitchell seemed as though she was the compromise candidate between the two camps, although as I revealed in my look at the last financial reports Laura had some prominent Democratic elected officials bankrolling her.

Still, Laura overcame some rumors dogging her and a campaign that was a little bit short on specifics to win a seat on City Council as the lone political newcomer. Tim Spies was successful in his second try at the brass ring and Terry Cohen won another four-year term.

So the Council appears set for two years, and the Camden neighborhood will be calling the tune. Look for a renewed push to get Mayor Ireton’s neighborhood housing initiative passed and an all-out war on the $96 million business of rentals to begin, along with a deterioration in town-gown relations with Salisbury University. The question now becomes this: is this the end of the 3-2 Council? I think it is, but that doesn’t bode well for the City of Salisbury.

Tales from the voting booth

A quick update…

First, I can almost guarantee that I won’t have the results from Salisbury’s election first tonight because I have a job to do. It pays better than this site, although if the advertisers from another somewhat disgraced site wished to invest in mine this enterprise may make me more coin than my job.

Anyway, I voted today around 3:00. There were two items I found worth mentioning.

First, I asked about turnout at my polling place (Wicomico Presbyterian) and I was the 375th voter. If this is relatively accurate then I think turnout isn’t going to be much greater than 15 to 17 percent, and that doesn’t bode (no pun intended) well for the challengers. It’s the faithful voters who showed up in the primary who are voting in this election, too – so the results will likely be similar. Had there been 500 voters at the precinct I believe the challengers had more of a chance. Let’s hope I’m wrong on that one for Muir Boda’s sake.

If it were up to people who read monoblogue and Two Sentz, though, Muir would be a shoo-in. Here’s the results of our joint poll:

Muir Boda, 34 votes (38.2%)
Laura Mitchell, 22 votes (24.7%)
Terry Cohen, 14 votes (15.7%)
Orville Dryden, 13 votes (14.6%)
Tim Spies, 5 votes (5.6%)
Bruce Ford, 1 vote (1.1%)

Of course, I think the influence of having an ad for Muir Boda on my site and Laura Mitchell on Two Sentz just might influence the poll. If nothing else, I suppose that proves blog advertising works (see first paragraph above.)

Finally, I had a nice complement from the young lady who’s running Laura Mitchell’s campaign, or at least I presume she does. She thanked me for my fair coverage of the race, and not jumping into the rumor mill about Laura’s living arrangement.

Now maybe there was something to the rumor, but since the protagonist seemed to backtrack from it I doubt it. And hers wasn’t all that important of an issue, just like who Jim Ireton sleeps with was but a sidebar to the real issues surrounding the mayoral race two years ago. It hasn’t affected his job performance, although I was pretty skeptical about that anyway.

So after tonight’s count we will probably have an idea of who will be representing District 2 for the next 4 1/2 years, since the next time these seats will be contested will be the fall of 2015. Unless it’s close enough to require an absentee count and we end up in a tie, I think the top three in the primary will prove to remain in those positions.

If so, beware – it’s open season on landlords and other small businessmen in Salisbury.

A final pitch

Today Muir Boda, candidate for Salisbury City Council, released his last argument for convincing voters to touch the screen for him Tuesday. It’s most important to Muir as he finished fourth in the primary and needs to leapfrog one other contender to grab one of the three available District 2 seats.

In December when I filed to run for Salisbury City Council I began this campaign with the following message and I feel it is only appropriate to make this my last message before Election Day.

Our campaign has been about ideas, solutions and action.

For too long our city has been embroiled in the politics of personal destruction and the clash of personalities. This has caused much embarrassment for the City of Salisbury and the wonderful people, who live, work and play here.

Meanwhile, businesses are struggling, crime has steadily risen, property rights are under attack and in the end our quality of life deteriorates. We must put aside our differences and come together to address the many issues we face.

I believe in having everyone at the table. All are stakeholders in this city whether you are a homeowner or business owner, landlord or renter, employer or employee, you have a right to be heard. We all have a stake in this community and passing it on to the next generation better than we received it is not just the right thing to do, it is our duty.

Join me as we bring forth a positive message of healing, reaching out to our neighborhoods that are disenfranchised and opening up our doors for business. We have so much work to do and it is going to take all of us putting aside our differences to do what is best for Salisbury.

It seems like a benign enough sort of message, but one problem Muir has faced is the public perception he’s in the pocket of landlords who play a significant role in city politics. Certainly Boda has a number of backers from the realty industry but as I noted last week he’s beginning to diversify his support base while other contenders remain neatly joined at the hip.

I noticed the dig at “neighborhoods that are disenfranchised,” which is an obvious reference to the fact the Camden neighborhood could have three Council members while large swaths of Salisbury are unrepresented, including the Doverdale area where Boda lives. Certainly many problems occur citywide, but it seems the biggest push for cracking down on perceived rental abuses and those who blame Salisbury University students for the city’s decline come from those live in Camden. Never mind that we’re talking about a $96 million industry (according to one of Boda’s opponents who lives in Camden) and an economic force of 8,000 students, most of whom live off-campus, who have plenty of other college choices both in and out of Maryland.

Meanwhile, many in the rest of the city make their living from the rental industry and college students, and we want to welcome both with open arms. After all, there’s a number of entrepreneurs who own just one or two houses in order to create a little extra income for themselves – only a small portion can be considered ‘slumlords.’

We need people on City Council who aren’t antagonistic to these important groups, and Muir Boda fits that bill. Camden would be more than adequately represented with Debbie Campbell and Terry Cohen on City Council, so let’s give the rest of the city a voice as well. Remember, there is life in Salisbury east of Division Street, even though none who are on City Council currently hail from there. We can help correct that oversight on Tuesday by electing Muir Boda.

And today’s Daily Times agrees with my original thoughts on the matter – for the most part, anyway – including their own endorsement of Muir Boda.

Updated City Council financials

With less than a week to go until the General Election on April 5th, the candidates are trying to raise money for the final push. My analysis of the latest report will be broken into two parts: total money raised, and money raised since the initial reports were completed on February 23rd.

Total contributions to date:

Muir Boda – $3,250
Tim Spies – $3,010
Terry Cohen – $2,836
Orville Dryden – $2,750
Laura Mitchell – $1,970
Bruce Ford – $310

Since the first report – this shows contribution trends:

Laura Mitchell – $1,820 from 31 contributors
Muir Boda – $1,615 from 16 contributors
Terry Cohen – $681 from 15 contributors
Tim Spies – $650 from 13 contributors
Orville Dryden – $650 from 6 contributors
Bruce Ford – no contributions, aside from a loan to himself

Once again we have two groups of contributors giving to two separate candidates. Terry Cohen and Tim Spies are now the largest beneficiaries of this trend since eight of Spies’ 13 donors also gave to Cohen. Some key donors among them were Dana Kennan ($100 apiece), Scot Disharoon ($100 to Cohen), P.E. Bolte ($100 to Cohen), S.J. Disharoon ($100 to Spies), and Todd Smith ($100 to Spies). All are listed as a Salisbury address.

On the other hand, Muir Boda has broken away from Orville Dryden to some extent. While they were nearly joined at the hip on the first report, only five of Boda’s 16 contributors also gave to Dryden. Largest among them was the Maryland Realtors PAC, which gave the maximum $250 to both. Also maximizing their contributions to Boda were Deborah Anderson of Salisbury (Boda’s treasurer), Jonathan Boda of Santa Monica, California, and John Cannon of Salisbury. Jeffrey Benner of Salisbury also gave Boda $100.

Dryden received a major contribution from F.M. Young of Salisbury, who donated $150.

Perhaps the most “independent” candidate was Laura Mitchell, whose contribution list didn’t feature a single person who gave to another candidate. However, there were some well-known Democratic elected officials on the list – Trudy Andersen and Harry Basehart from the Wicomico County Democratic Central Committee, Delegate Rudy Cane, and Salisbury Mayor Jim Ireton. Andersen and Basehart gave $115 and $140, respectively, so I would consider them “major” contributors. Others who fall into that category include Lynda Donaldson of Selbyville, Delaware ($125), Michael Weisner of Salisbury ($140), Sharon Barto of Parsonsburg ($100), R. Neill Carey of Salisbury ($100), and Patrick Bostian of Salisbury ($250).

This report also revealed that Mitchell had made $150 from 4 contributors prior to the last report, so she was correct in stating she didn’t meet the $600 threshold at that time.

Apparently Bruce Ford is self-financing his campaign at the moment, loaning his coffers the $494 in expenses he paid in the last reporting period. He reported no other contributions.

But Laura Mitchell seems to be the political flavor of the month – even opponent Muir Boda gave Mitchell a total of $45. Whether that will haunt him in the end remains to be seen, but the biggest money seems to be moving to the race between Mitchell and Boda for that number three slot – Cohen and Spies could be considered shoo-ins, while Dryden and Ford may be too far in arrears to have a good chance at leapfrogging two or three spots, respectively. The contributions seem to reflect that reality.

And what of the two who didn’t make it? Michael Taylor didn’t file a report, as presumably he didn’t raise or spend any money after the primary. But Joel Dixon spent the remaining $715.81 after paying his bills on a good cause, as he donated the remainder of his campaign account to the St. Baldrick’s Foundation.

As was the case before the primary, I should also send kudos to Brenda Colegrove, the Salisbury City Clerk, for making these reports available in a timely manner. It’s nice to get this information before the election to assist in this important decision.

And a note to Tim Spies: this time when you cite my information, print the whole thing.

Boda wins Council poll again

Perhaps this is more reflective of the preferences of my readership than of the actual future election, but Muir Boda was the choice of those who responded to my Salisbury City Council poll. In the real vote earlier this month, Boda finished fourth.

The conservative lean of my readership is also reflected in who the bottom three finishers were, as they all tied.

There were just 62 votes cast, with the lower number expected when I changed the poll rules a little bit to discourage frequent repeat voting. I may relent on this slightly for the next version, but the results were pretty much what I figured they would be.

Here’s the order of finish:

Muir Boda – 18 votes (29.03%)
Orville Dryden – 15 votes (24.19%)
Terry Cohen – 8 votes (12.9%)
Bruce Ford, Laura Mitchell, and Tim Spies – 7 votes apiece (11.29%)

Truthfully, when I advertise Boda and have been critical of Tim Spies in this space, I got the results I figured I would. But I’m going to do one more poll before the election, tweaking things a little bit more and perhaps utilizing Two Sentz’s blog to help weigh results more to the center.

Salisbury Council field set

After all the absentees and provisional ballots have been counted, the six contestants who presumably advanced by last Tuesday’s initial results indeed held on. The battle for the sixth and final spot went to Bruce Ford over Joel Dixon by a 307-302 count, his largest margin.

The sole change in the order was Terry Cohen moving ahead of Tim Spies to become the top vote-getter.

Here is the final order of finish:

Terry Cohen, 608 (18.63%)
Tim Spies, 604 (18.5%)
Laura Mitchell, 486 (14.89%)
Muir Boda, 446 (13.66%)
Orville Dryden, 343 (10.51%)
Bruce Ford, 307 (9.41%)
Joel Dixon, 302 (9.25%)
Michael Taylor, 168 (5.15%)

The remaining field now has just less than a month to either hold their top-3 position or try and move up. As it stands, the key battle is between third-place Laura Mitchell and fourth-place Muir Boda – either of the other contenders need to pick up well over 100 votes on April 5th to pass Mitchell and grab the last spot.

Final turnout was 1,226 voters, or 10.64% of eligible voters. This compares to 13.7% in the last similar election (2007.)

Hopefully Dixon and Taylor, who were both worthy candidates, will consider another run in 2013 or 2015. A 2013 run would place them against incumbent Debbie Campbell should she choose to run for a third term, while 2015 would see this same situation of three seats open.

A couple upcoming events:

Tomorrow (March 10): East Main Street Neighborhood Association Forum, 6:30 p.m. (Epilepsy Center, 688 East Main Street.)
Sunday, March 13: All-You-Can-Eat Chicken and Dumpling Fundraiser for Laura Mitchell, 4-7 p.m. at Sage Diner (917 S. Salisbury Blvd.) – $20. Advance registration required.

As I find out more I’ll share.

Unofficial Salisbury City Council results have Dixon, Taylor out

Update: absentee ballots are counted Friday – the only rankings where that could prove a difference are Spies/Cohen and, more importantly, Ford/Dixon.

And then there were two…

If the unofficial results hold up, one of the monoblogue-endorsed candidates will be knocked out in the primary while another finished out of the top three.

According to the Daily Times, here is the unofficial order of finish – I believe this does NOT include absentee ballots since they only had to be postmarked by today.

Tim Spies – 540 (18.4%)
Terry Cohen – 532 (18.1%)
Laura Mitchell – 451 (15.4%)
Muir Boda – 409 (13.9%)
Orville Dryden – 304 (10.3%)
Bruce Ford – 277 (9.4%)
Joel Dixon – 275 (9.4%)
Michael Taylor – 150 (5.1%)

Even with the two-vote margin between sixth and seventh, it’s pretty clear that the real race right now is between two people – Laura Mitchell and Muir Boda. Any of the trio of Orville Dryden, Bruce Ford, or Joel Dixon would have to increase their voter base by half again to have a legitimate shot. On the other side of the coin, it’s clear that Terry Cohen and Tim Spies have worked together to corner a large percentage of the electorate.

What I would be most curious about insofar as the voter breakdown is which precincts were well-represented. I suspect the Camden area turned out well as always, which boosted the totals of Cohen and Spies. And just as it was in the last election the aspect of teams or slates may be introduced: in 2007 the sides generally were considered as Terry Cohen, Tim Spies, and Louise Smith against Gary Comegys, John Atkins, and Don Ewalt. In that case the Camden bunch had the upper hand, getting two of three elected against those candidates considered to be in the pocket of the Salisbury Area Property Owners Association, best known as SAPOA. However, we all know how the 3-2 votes tended to turn out in the last term.

Obviously Cohen and Spies are back, and Laura Mitchell may end up being considered as part of a tag-team against Boda, Dryden, and Dixon (if he can snatch sixth place over Bruce Ford.) Based on tonight’s results Camden could get the clean sweep, which would certainly elevate either Debbie Campbell or Terry Cohen to Council president and likely kill any effort for sanity in Council districts since three members – a majority – would live in the Camden neighborhood.

And now a note on my polling. I was almost vindicated on my prediction of Ford and Taylor being out, and absentees could still hold that true. Obviously Laura Mitchell polled much better once I added the Progressive Delmarva crowd and that aspect held true in the actual election, while Tim Spies also outperformed.

On the other hand, Boda and Dixon did worse in reality than my polling would have suggested, but it pegged Orville Dryden pretty well. I figured Terry Cohen would make it easily and I was right on that one.

So the next step is for the remaining six, five of whom are pretty obvious now, to catch their breath and try to claim a portion of the expanded voter universe – many more voters will partake in the April 5th election. But as it stands the next two years may be open season on the rental industry in Salisbury, and while some would consider this a good thing turning your back on a large segment of business activity may hurt the city in the long run.

A couple scenes from the campaign trail

Just after 3:00 I went to remind myself where my polling place was, for I haven’t voted in a city election since 2005. Along the way I decided to stop by both polling locations to see what was going on outside.

This is across from the Wicomico Presbyterian Church on Broad Street. As you can see, candidate Tim Spies (left, in the hat) is among those out campaigning. It was nice to see supporters of Laura Mitchell and Michael Taylor out there – also covering the scene (but outside camera range) was local blogger Joe Albero.

Over on South Avenue in front of Harvest Baptist Church, several other candidates and supporters gathered. Back along the street is Laura Mitchell in front of Muir Boda (and behind the bearded Spies backer.) Another local blogger, Jonathan Taylor, was on the scene – he’s leaning on the car to the right of the picture.

It should get more interesting as the evening wears on, as peak voting time tends to be after work.

Salisbury primary election today

Step two of the three-step election process for Salisbury City Council hopefuls occurs today.

After filing to get on the ballot in December and January, the six-week primary campaign comes to a climax today with results probably known before 9 p.m. The top six of eight candidates move on to the April 5th general election (in other words, a five-week sprint to the finish.)

Obviously there are any number of ways the voting could turn out, with my hunch being that the veteran candidates will occupy the top three spots and three newcomers will lag somewhat behind.

But the results also allow everyone to know just how well their campaigns are running. Since primaries always have had a fraction of the general election turnout, candidates can see where they are performing best and can concentrate their efforts accordingly. There should be about 1,500 people voting today but the number will likely increase about 50% for the general election.

Having said that, though, the chances of the fourth, fifth, and sixth place candidates tonight will likely hinge on just how close they ran to the top three. Making up 100 votes is a lot easier than coming up with 300 or 500 (remember, each voter can have three choices so the actual number of votes cast should be around 4,000 for the primary and 6,000 for the general election.) Nor should the top three rest on their laurels.

Once the results are out, we can see how the remainder of the campaign could shake out.