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Six vie to represent the 7th District
08/22/2009 6:48 AM by John M
The RTD is reporting that we’ll have quite a decision to make come November:
Six candidates met yesterday’s filing deadline to qualify for a special election to fill the 7th District seat on Richmond City Council. Ronald L. Bond, Clarence Kenney, Deanna Lewis, Cynthia I. Newbille, Garry F. Powell and Robin D. Robinson submitted papers with the city registrar’s office to be listed on the Nov. 3 ballot.
Choice is good. I look forward to learning about the quality of our choices.
I suspect Cynthia Newbille is thrilled by the number of candidates running since as the Henry Marsh machine candidate she is a lock for about 45% of the vote.
With the other 5 candidates splitting up the remaining 55%, her election is all but certain now.
Sometimes having a number of “choices” on the ballot in an election really isn’t a good thing.
Hmm, well we can agree to disagree about choices on the ballot being a good thing. The nine years I’ve lived in this district it has nearly always been a clothespin vote for city council. I’d rather give my vote to the person I think will do the best job than to the one who is likely to win. I know nothing about Cynthia Newbille yet. I do know that I will with my conscience.
I agree with #1 and 3, choice is good. Although I do agree with #2 that the machine exists, but I’m not sure about those percentages.
Meanwhile, I’m looking forward to a forum of some sort, and I’m wondering if perhaps Mr. Murden could post a list of questions to all candidates to answer and post the answers here? All of the candidates had to list their mailing addresses and email addresses when they filed their paperwork at city hall, so a survey could be mailed or emailed to each, with a date by which they should respond. Anyone else like that idea?
As to questions to ask, I think a lot of people would like to hear something about how Echo Harbor should be addressed – how would the candidate vote if and when that project comes to council for a special use permit is a question that could be posed. Anyone else have any questions that they’d like to see addressed?
Most candidates address general things such as education and public safety. How should those be phrased so that they could be addressed in the context of how a council person would vote? The school board runs the schools, council just votes on a budget for schools, and the police dept. is run by the chief of police, so how would anyone else phrase questions to address issues like education and public safety? And what other issues should be addressed?
ray #2, would you please explain how you got your percentages? I’m actually now really interested. Did you pull the figures from the last council campaign? And have you also looked at a similar election for council, when we were also voting for governor, as we will be doing this fall?
crd –
My point about too many candidates being a bad thing this year is that there are times voters have so many “choices” that they in reality limit the real choice that matters — who becomes the next council representative.
I maintain that with so many candidates running, Newbille is a lock to win and that, thereby, we essentially have no real choice who our next council person will be. Admittedly, I’m approaching this whole discussion from a pragmatic posture rather than an idealistic one.
Now, to be fair, you are questioning the validity of my stated 45% of the vote that the support of the Marsh machine guarantees Newbille, and you may be right, though I don’t think so.
Why don’t we agree to re-visit the election results in November and see if my thesis holds any water?
crd –
We must have just been posting at the same time and I did not see your question until after I hit submit on my previous comment.
Anyway, in response to you question, let’s look at 3 recent COMPETITIVE elections:
2008 for Mayor: Marsh machine candidate Dwight Jones received 56% of the vote in the 7th in a 4 way race. Presidential, US Senate, other races on ballot.
2006 for Council: Marsh machine candidate Delores McQuinn got 57% in a 2 way race against Reggie Malone. US Senate, other races on ballot.
2002 for Council: Marsh machine candidiate Delores McQuinn got 55% against Al Thweatt. US Senate, other races on ballot.
So take away about 10% for those who voted for these candidates for reasons other than Marsh machine support and you get my 45%.
May not hold water in a statistical analysis class, but for our purposes I think it works!
Thanks, Ray! I appreciate the explanation, and agree that your numbers work for our purposes. We’re actually in agreement (esp. about the machine!), it’s just that I’m holding out hope that one of the other candidates can somehow consolidate votes in the precincts with the most votes. Maybe I’m too optimistic, we’ll see what happens in November.
Ray’s analysis is sound. It has been this way for years.
In the past when there was a suitable candidate to challenge a Marsh designee, the “machine” would simply add another candidate to the list that would closely match the Marsh opposition to split that vote.
When Burton ran for the seat, the “machine” added a moderate white female candidate from Chimborazo that pulled enough votes from the CHA and Chimbo areas to throw the election their way.
I doubt many of the also ran candidates will poll more than 50-125 votes each.
any chance they can all get together and endorse ONE anti-“machine” candidate?
To address Ray’s concern, this problem can be fixed by instituting Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) — it ensures an elected candidate receives over 50% of the vote, gives people the power to vote their conscience without wasting their vote, and it does away with “spoiler” candidates.
Point counter point: Can you give more details (names)? I am trying to better recall that election.
If my census data is correct, the District is 85.6% African American, and the median income is $20K. You don’t need a “machine” to anticipate that a candidate, to win, needs to appeal to that demographic.
Echo Harbor is one of main issues for this election. I can only support a candidate that is against that project.
I think the census data in 2010 is going to show some interesting surprises in the district and downtown generally.
Edg, Point Counter Point is referring to the time when Marsh moved Lee Young into the District to run. I believe there were 7 candidates. Also a write-in candidate was used to dilute Burton’s votes. The machine has more control now than ever. Local elected offices have now been made partisan. Newbill will be placed on a Democratic ballot and voted on by many who will not even know her issues or that she will be part of the establishment.
Crd#8 is correct in that the only way to break the machine is that voters in some precincts consolidate to give one candidate an advantage.
David #13, does the 85.6% represent voters only? What are the percentages of voters by demographics? (race, age, precincts, etc.) Once a candidate knows this information, then he/she can appeal to that group. The machine has identified it’s group/s and keeps them solid.
I don’t have data by precinct. You can get from census, data by census tract.
2008 Seventh District Total pop. 20,635
White 11.1
Black 86.5
Am. Indian .2
Asian/Pacific .04
Hispanic orginia (may be any race) 1.3
Population by age.
Over 65 13%
Over 18 73.4%
Males 45.6
Females 54.4
Education 40% over 25 years withy less than HS diploma
In 2000, 43.9% not in labor force.
I am reminded of the white, upper income retiree from CH, who said in the spring…”Some friends and I are going to meet soon, and select the city council member.” I sure wish he could count.
#16 Jefferson, your comment about Newbille being on the Democratic (sample) ballot is probably correct. I’ve even heard that Deeds will be backing her in some way. All of which means exactly what you just posted, that people who don’t know her issues will vote for her.
#17 David – interesting figures, but they are nearly ten years old if they’re from 2000. I think the demographics have changed, but I’m not sure they’ve changed enough to beat the machine and the precincts it controls.
Jefferson, Lee Young is black and CPC said it was a moderate white female.
Unless noted, the data is 2008.
David, what is the source of the census data since there was no census in 2008?
David, sorry, I saw the figure at the bottom which says “In 2000, 43.9% not in labor force.” Assumed that applied to all the figures. So, I’ll agree with neighbor #22, since there was no census in 2008 that I’m aware of – what’s the source? Just curious, thanks.
Chamber of Commerce booklet, based on census extrapolations.
I only have this in hard copy. I don’t mind faxing it, if somebody really wants it. About 5 pages.
David, I’ll take your word for it, don’t need to see the booklet. I just wonder about the demographics, and if perhaps the Chamber of Commerce did not, could not, have imagined what’s happened in the east end over the past ten years. In other words, if perhaps they based their data on previous years numbers. I may be wrong, perhaps things have not changed as much as I tend to think.
It will be interesting to see what results the new census comes up with.
I think Point counter Point was referring to Jenny Knapp. And the idea that she was stuck on the ballot by the “Marsh Machine” is ridiculous. I personally know this women and she was not running as a spoiler candidate for the “Marsh Machine”.
PCP makes an unsupportable and inflammatory statement and then refuses to respond to any questions regarding it, as PCP has done in other posts in the pasts.
CRD,
It would be interesting to compare voter registration by precinct since the last census. Not a perfect measure, but it might show some trends about population growth and change. Richmond has increased in population over the past few years. Where are those new people? Are there enough residents in the apartments/condos to make a demographic difference? Don’t know. The really interesting thing from the new census will be when Henrico supervisors discover that the county is now majority minority. Will the Justice Department require redistricting as it did for Richmond to create majority minority districts? Could be a tectonic shift for the good old boys.
Has anyone heard of Robin D. Robinson running against Newbille for the 7th district city council seat? The candidate’s campaign slogan was enough to interest me in trying to find out more – “No more hand-me down politics”
Anyway, a representative of Robinson came to my door on Monday evening & introduced her/himself to my boyfriend. He took her flyer with her contact information and when asked for the top issues/concerns he had for the 7th District he expressed our shared interest in electing a candidate to work outside of the “Marsh-Machine” and the political agenda of past council representatives.
I haven’t researched this candidate any further but have the phone number and email address for anyone that wants to contact him/her – 804-649-3219 or 804-437-5360 email: rdr.4.7district@gmail.com