APB Archives

THE MAYORAL CONTEST (Feb 16, 04)

THE CANDIDATES (Jan 8, 04)

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The electoral primary will be held in early-March for mayor and for council
districts 1, 3, 5, and 7. There will be four mayoral candidates including the
present mayor, Dick Murphy; county supervisor and past city council member,
Ron Roberts; chair of the Port Commission and past Chair of the Center City Development Corporation (redevelopment agency for downtown), Peter Q. Davis; and Jim Bell, an environmentalist who has run for mayor before.
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I don't know whether we can arrange a mayoral debate in City Heights, but I'll
try. Usually mayoral candidates like to make appearances where they can raise
money, which makes it tough for poor communities to attract candidates. We've known that all along.
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You should pay attention to this campaign and these candidates. You should hear their past claims and future promises. You should wonder whether to believe much (any?) of what they say. More importantly, you should wonder what each of them has done for the city over the past several years. You should also wonder what exactly has Peter Q. Davis or Dick Murphy or Ron
Roberts done for City Heights or done TO us. I'll offer some thoughts on the
website later, as the campaign progresses.
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Separately from that, we HAVE gotten the City Attorney candidates for a forum
on February 11 (See "City Attorney Race" on this website). I think City
Attorney candidates SHOULD come to the poor communities to talk with us. We
should ask why there are so few prosecutions of code compliance violators and so much time spent on the ballpark. We should ask whether any money for domestic violence prevention is being spent in City Heights and where. We should ask which way juvenile crime and tagging and wannabe gangs are headed since the Community Court opened, so we can know whether Community Court is worth continuing. We should ask how each candidate will suppress adult gang activity and street crimes. All good questions.
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The election season is a good time for getting in touch with the present and
future leaders of the city to ask hard questions and demand straight answers.
I hope you will REGISTER, and follow the campaigns, and VOTE. Our future, the city's future, depends on you and your involvement.
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THE STATUS (Jan 8, 04)

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Mr. Bell's campaign accepted our invitation first, and was followed in short order by Mr. Davis's campaign. The other two finally confirmed that they did get my e-mail invitation, but then they stalled about accepting. You know how that is. When politicians don't want to come see you, a million things get in the way. I prompted them several times, with no reasonable result.
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I'll take the bull by the horns in a couple days, choose a date, and tell them when the forum is scheduled. They can decide whether to come or not. If they don't come, I'll set up an empty chair for them, tape a picture of their face to the back of the chair, mount a namecard under their chin like a mug shot, and call the television stations to tell them about it.
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You know I'll do that, don't you.
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STATUS (Feb 16, 04)

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Well, despite nagging and threatening and cajoling and everything else I could
think of, short of bribery, Mayor Murphy and Supervisor Roberts refused to
come to a forum. Their campaign managers either wrote back refusing or else just ignored us. Sorry, guys. We gave it a good try.
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