Fort Wayne City Elections 2011

The City elections are done and over.  I have to imagine the vast majority of us are glad that they are over.  The 2011 election was the nastiest local election I can remember.  Several Democrats ran negative campaigns as did Republican Paula Hughes.  The two major candidates for Mayor both ran despicable campaigns.

In an earlier post I discussed which six candidates would win of the six positions I could vote for.  I was right about all six winners and except for the Clerk’s race my breakdown of the votes was very close.

I voted for three of the six winning candidates.

There are several surprising takes from this election:

  1. I am still shocked that Mayor Henry ran a campaign that was so distasteful, negative and dishonest.
  2. I am also surprised that several Democrats ran negative ads.
  3. The most surprising take for me is turnout.  Up until the 2007 election turnout for City races has been between 36% and 42% which is terrible.  In 2007, at least partially due to the indictment of Matt Kelty, turnout was a dismal 33%.  This year turnout was only 26%.  This truly saddens me and means our elected officials are being selected by a smaller and smaller group of people.
  4. I was also surprised that Mr. Shoaff barely retained his at large seat.  He was almost beat by Friestroffer.  I truly thought Shoaff would come in second place fairly easily rather then barely in third place.

There are a couple of encouraging things from the 2011 City elections:

  1. They are over.
  2. The voting totals clearly show that a large number of voters did not vote entirely along party lines and I am glad to see it.  Further I hope this trend continues.  It is absurd to think that all of the members of any one party are always the best candidates in the race.
I hope that our elected officials start doing a better job for the citizens of Fort Wayne.
Mike

I voted early this afternoon at Precinct 299

I vote up at Agape Church on Lima Road.  I voted around 2:30 PM and the polls were empty; as expected. 2:30 PM is normally a time when the polls are empty.

The only person handing out literature was one person handing out literature for Paula Hughes…

In the primary Paula Hughes mobilized a lot of people and had a large number of volunteers…

Mike

Democrats locally using automated robocalls

I did some research on political robocalls today.  Indiana has a law that bans automated political robocalls unless there is an introduction by a live operator who gets permission to start the automated message.  There is a fine of up to $5000 for violating this rule.

Last year the three Indiana political parties agreed not to use automated political robocalls.

In September of 2011 Indiana’s ban on robocalls was overturned; basically the court said that Federal law trumps state law and so Indiana’s ban was overturned.  Indiana’s Attorney General is appealing the ruling.

Yesterday the Tom Henry campaign engaged in a large robocall campaign.  The robocalls that I heard were a recorded message from Mayor Henry supporting Karen Goldner and Sandy Kennedy.   

When I originally heard the robocall I thought that the robocall was illegal.  When I researched the matter today I found out about the Court case in late September of 2011 that overturned the Indiana law.

I dislike robocalls; however, based on today’s research I think they are now legal as long as they are done from out of state…

Mike

Get out and vote today!

I hope everyone who reads this blog and is eligible to vote goes out and votes today!  Voting is important and we need Americans to learn more about the myriad of problems that exist in this country and to select the best of the candidates that are available to represent them!

I will be voting this afternoon.

Please let us know what you see when you go to the polls today!

Mike

Who I am voting for on Tuesday and why

I have decided who I am voting for this coming Tuesday and why I am voting for them.

The race for Fort Wayne Mayor has been negative and dishonest from both major candidates.  In the race for Fort Wayne Mayor I will be voting against Mayor Tom Henry.  His recent onslaught of negative campaign ads has really turned me off, as has the fact that he now wants the City to buy the north river property.  Further he is allowing the Occupy Fort Wayne protesters to use city facilities in violation of the current rules and he is allowing them to stay for free when other groups have to pay. So I will be voting for Paula Hughes.  I predict Henry will win with 50%, Hughes with 48%, and the Independent with 2%.

The race for City Clerk has also been painful to watch.  The Democrat incumbent Sandy Kennedy has been in office for 28 years.  She does not seem to like new technology and she promised to step down from the office four years ago at a public event.  She has recently sent some very negative campaign mailers as well.  On the other side is Zach Bonahoom.  Zach is inexperienced and has made two very ill advised statements.  I will be voting against Sandy Kennedy; she has been in office far too long and we need a fresh face.  I will be voting for Zach Bonahoom.  I think Kennedy will win with 60% of the vote.

The 2nd District Council Race is an easy one to analyze.  I voted for Karen Goldner four years ago because I wanted to see a long term incumbent unseated and because I like Karen Goldner.  Karen is running a negative campaign and that really saddens me.  On the other hand I have met Russ Jehl and I even contributed $100 to his campaign.  I think Russ will do a better job than Karen and I truly think Russ will be a good member of City Council.  I will vote for Russ Jehl.  I predict Russ Jehl will win 53% to 47%.

The at-large race has been painful to watch.  The quality of the candidates is sub-par.  My main desire is to see Marty Bender defeated.  He has proved to be a very poor member of City Council.  He votes on his own pay raises and refuses to recuse himself from votes he clearly should recuse himself from.

My first vote goes to John Shoaff.  He is a good member of City Council and I personally feel that he is one of the best Democrats around.  My second vote goes to John Crawford.  John Crawford is smart and often votes for smaller government.  I was very disappointed with his votes on the smoking ban, Harrison Square, and the Public Safety Academy.  My third vote will go to Friestroffer.  I am voting for him and hoping he can beat Marty Bender.  So I am voting for Shoaff, Crawford, and Friestroffer.  I predict Shoaff, Crawford, and Bender will win this race.

So I am voting for a higher percentage of Republicans this year than last year.  I am voting for five Republicans and one Democrat.

I think turnout will be poor; I predict 36%…  I think the negative campaigning by Hughes and several Democrats will turn some voters off…

Who are you voting for and what are your predictions?

Mike

Paula Hughes and the Wheel tax

Based on a disagreement John Kalb and are are having about Paula Hughes and her position on the wheel tax I thought I would post a summary of what I think happened in regards to the Wheel Tax.  This all happened a couple of years ago and after some research here is what I think happened:

While Paula Hughes was a member of our County Government:

  1. Allen County decided to stop maintaining the Bridges in Allen County as a way to save some money.
  2. Allen County Government (Paula Hughes herself) went to the Fort Wayne City Council and asked the Fort Wayne City Council to agree to allow Allen County to keep 65% of the revenue generated by the increase in the wheel tax.  Fort Wayne would keep the remaining 35%.
  3. The Republican Fort Wayne City Council and the Democratic Mayor agreed to allow 65% of the additional revenue to go to the County.
  4. The Republican Allen County Council in a 4:3 vote then agreed to raise the wheel tax.  They likely would NOT have agreed to raise the wheel tax if the County would not have gotten the increased revenue in order to maintain the bridges.
  5. Paula Hughes voted AGAINST raising the wheel tax in this 4:3 vote.
So Paula Hughes is now trying to convince the voters that Mayor Tom Henry championed the increase in the wheel tax?
Seriously?
What really happened is the County needed to save money and so they decided to stop maintaining the bridges UNLESS the City of Fort Wayne agreed to raise the wheel tax and in turn promise the County that the County would get 65% of the increased revenues.
In other words the Republican County Council wanted to raise taxes to meet their budget shortfall.
Paula Hughes was in the middle of this and she specifically told Mitch Harper, on video, that the County wanted to City to promise a large portion of the increased revenues to the County if the County in fact did raise the wheel tax.
In truth when it came up to a vote on County Council Paula Hughes did vote against the increase in the wheel tax.
So she asked the City to raise it and promise the County 65% of the increased revenue.  Then after the City did this she voted against the bill to increase the wheel tax.
The position of Paula Hughes on this matter is CONFUSED to say the least.
Now the State Republican Party sent out a direct mail piece stating that:
“Paula Hughes said NO to Tom Henry and the massive Wheel tax scheme in 2009.”
The only reason the wheel tax was increased is because the Republican County Council voted to increase the wheel tax.
John if any of my facts are wrong in this post please let me know…  I do not understand your thinking on this at all!
Mike

Russ Jehl for Fort Wayne City Council, 2nd District

I live in Fort Wayne’s 2nd City Council District.  I spent some time with Russ Jehl yesterday.  He impressed me and I will definately be voting for him in the upcoming City Election.

I do not often give money to political candidates.  That being said I liked Russ and think he will be a great member of City Council.  I contributed $100 to his campaign yesterday.

Mike Sylvester

Permitting Process

There has been a lot of talk about the recently approved proposal to improve the permitting process by spending 1.4 million dollars.   I have several observations about this process:

  1. This is not a Republican problem nor is it a Democratic problem.  It was a problem created by bureaucrats overseen by both Democrats and Republicans.
  2. The permitting process has been broken for at least ten years.
  3. Our local politicians decided it needed fixed due valid complaints from the business community.
I think the three observations listed above are indisputable facts.  In my opinion there are several things wrong with the current proposal:
  1. Our Deputy Mayor from Chicago admits that there is a problem and further seems to acknowledge that the attitude of some of the City and/or County employees needs improvement and that they need to understand they are providing a service rather than acting as a justified hindrance.  I would like to see our local leaders FIRE any employees who are not doing their jobs correctly and who do not realize that they need to facilitate the permitting process rather than hindering it.
  2. It is hard to imagine that the taxpayers will spend $500,000 in legal fees to change various ordinances associated with the permitting process.    If we have this many ordinances that need to be changed I think it would be far cheaper to hire an employee who is an attorney rather than to pay large legal fees to various law firms.
  3. I think the $380,000 that will be spent on software is likely justified.  It would be best if the various departments use the same software.
  4. I am not sure about the large amounts of money that would be spent on a project manager and an expediter.  I think this expenditure will make sense if it is truly a temporary expense and the need for these new positions is temporary (two years or less).

Mike Sylvester

Squabbling over a new “permitting process” for Fort Wayne and Allen County

Local politics in this area is generally relatively relatively non partisan; at least when compared to National Politics.  That has not been the case for the last couple of days…

The truth of the matter is that the “land permitting” process locally has been a serious impediment to business development for decades.  Pretty much everyone knows that this process has been broken for a long, long time.

The business community finally convinced our local politicians that the process needed to be changed and this was a valid campaign issue brought up by all three major Republican candidates for Mayor.

Read more

Tommy Schrader, Democrat, City Council at Large

As I have previously mentioned on this blog the Republican slate of at-large candidates was comically weak this year.  The truth of the matter is the Democratic slate was significantly weaker.

Consider the results on the Democratic side:

  1. John Shoaff, 29%
  2. Gordon Anthony, 25%
  3. Tommy Schrader, 20%
  4. George Guido 14%
  5. Nic Tash, 12%

Tommy Schrader is a “perennial” candidate of sorts who has ran for office several times.  He raised and spent no money in this primary race. 

Tommy Schrader somehow won the Democratic Primary; he in fact received the 3rd highest vote total.  This indicates the weakness of the Democratic slate of candidates. 

Kevin Knuth file a challenge with the election board and claimed that Tommy Schrader did not meet the residency requirements. 

The local newspapers have covered this story and according the the local newspapers:

  1. His only income is from Social Security Disability payments
  2. He takes medication to assist him with various mental ailments
  3. He went to Green Bay Wisconsin in March and stayed in a hotel for three weeks and then a homeless shelter for four weeks. 
  4. He changed his voter registration in April and voted in the Green Bay Mayoral Election.

So last Friday the Allen County election board met and heard testimony from Mr. Schrader.  Since Mr. Schrader openly admitted he changed his voter registration and vote in Wisconsin in April the Election Board unanimously decided to remove him from the ballot since he had not lived here for the last year.

Determining residency is very difficult (Look at the new Mayor of Chicago…). 

I personally think the Allen County Election Board clearly made the right decision by removing Mr. Schrader from the ballot.

Mike Sylvester

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