I have a simple rule for judicial races this year: I'm voting for incumbents at the appellate and supreme court level.

Whenever I've looked at judicial candidates (except the rare open seat -- we have one of those on our ballot this year), I've found that challengers usually have one or more of these characteristics:

• Far right-wing ideology (considering how long it's been since there has been a DFL governor, they are almost inevitably running against someone appointed by a Republican governor or else Jesse Ventura)
• Sectarian Christianist views (a belief that their brand of Christian theology should be the primary reference point for legal decisions, with the U.S. Constitution taking second place behind their personal reading of the Bible)
• A desire to increase partisanship in judicial races, and to have races focus more on specific litmus test issues rather than qualifications, experience, temperament, etc.
• Opposition to the judicial appointment and to proposals for a retention election system for judges (something I think would be a good idea)

I have no wish to see Minnesota become one of those states where big corporations can essentially buy judges to overturn court decisions against them (witness West Virginia), nor a theocracy of any kind.  So I am voting for Helen Meyer, Alan Page, Randolph Peterson, and Larry Stauber; and against Greg Wersal, Tim Tingelstad, Roxann Klugman, and Dan Griffith.

2nd District Court

Two seats in the 2nd District Court have contested elections.  In one case there is an incumbent and a challenger; in the other, it's an open seat.  The Pioneer Press endorsing editorial does a good job of describing the qualifications of all four candidates for the two seats. There's also a good article in the Twin Cities Daily Planet.

For the open seat, Judge 16, I support Gloria Bogen.  I am especially pleased to see her experience on St. Paul's zoning board, since as a city councilmember I appreciate judges who have experience with land use issues and perspective on the process of city decisions on those matters.

Sitting Judge William H. Leary is challenged by Connie S. Iversen, a public defender.  Unlike the appellate races, this challenge does not seem to be motivated by radical ideology.  Be that as it may, I have heard good things about the incumbent from attorneys who have been in his court, and in the absence of a good reason to get rid of a judge I would rather keep their experience on the court.  So Leary gets my nod for Judge 27.

Labels: campaign 2010

Posted by John Nephew on 11/02/2010 01:28:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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For Ramsey County, we vote on several offices and also two county charter amendment questions.  While political parties may have endorsed some candidates, these offices are all non-partisan, so no party affiliation is indicated on the ballot.

Sheriff

We need change in the office of sheriff.  The incumbent, Bob Fletcher, has been there a long time.  He has been tainted by association with scandals among his staff (a couple of whom went to prison) and the debacle of the Metro Gang Strike Force, for which he was the fiscal agent.  The disbanding of the Strike Force had a direct effect on Maplewood, since it funded one of our police officers -- a salary that is now is an expense for our property tax rolls instead.

Matt Bostrom is an officer of impeccable integrity and professionalism.  He would restore honor to the office, and I know he would work well with all of the law enforcement agencies in the county.  I have been struck by how people I know all across the political spectrum -- from extreme right to extreme left -- so strongly support Matt, because he has the character we need in a sheriff, giving us the confidence that he will enforce the law fairly and effectively.

County Attorney

This is an open seat, with two contenders on the ballot.  John Choi has had my support since early on in has campaign, when I had a chance to meet with him and learn about his vision for the office and his personal and professional background.  While I am impressed by the resume of his opponent, David Schultz, I think that Choi's administrative experience as Saint Paul City Attorney gives him the edge.

Charter Amendment Questions

I'm reluctant to mess with our county charter without a very good reason.  These two amendments appear designed to lower the threshold for putting issues in front of the voters, to undo decisions made by the elected county board.  I think the mess of the State of California gives us an idea where governance by referendum can take us, so I'm not enthusiastic about any steps to bring us closer to their model.  If an issue is so important and urgent that we need to appeal it by referendum rather than by choosing new elected representatives, it should be able to meet the existing thresholds in the charter.

Conservation District

Let me be honest, I know almost nothing about these candidates.  My main concern with offices like these is not to inadvertently elect a fringe nut-case.  Janelle Anderson and Carrie Wasley have the endorsement of the DFL, and when they were seeking that endorsement I heard good things about them from folks who pay closer attention to the Conservation District than I do.  I feel comfortable casting votes for them both.

Labels: campaign 2010

Posted by John Nephew on 11/02/2010 12:47:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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Well, it's election day, and the ballot is a big one.  While we've been bombarded with ads about the governor's race in particular, there are many more races on the ballot, and it's often hard to figure out who these people are and who I should vote for.  So for whatever it's worth, I thought I'd put up a couple of postings about the races in Maplewood Precinct 3 and how I'm planning to vote this afternoon.

Legislators

For the legislative offices, I'll vote for Betty McCollum for U.S. Congress, Chuck Wiger for Minnesota Senate, and Leon Lillie for Minnesota House.  All three have represented their districts well, and I've found them to be strong partners for local government, something I appreciate in my role as a councilmember.

Governor

For Governor and Lieutenant Governor, I'll be filling in the circle next to Mark Dayton and Yvonne Prettner Solon.

There's no way I would support a radical ideologue like Emmer.  Setting aside his basic philosophy of gutting government in order to maximize the short-term take-home pay of his rich backers, regardless of the cost to our whole state's quality of life, this is a guy who doesn't seem to care for the U.S. Constitution except when it suits him personally.  Consider the legislation he authored earlier this year, to amend the state constitution to decree that federal laws would apply to Minnesota only after being ratified by supermajorities of both houses of the legislature and being signed by the governor -- a direct assault on the supremacy clause, and the basic reason that we have a U.S. Constitution instead of the Articles of Confederation.

While there's a lot I like about Tom Horner -- including his choice of running mate (someone closely familiar with the issues faced by local government units), and his willingness to consider revenue increases as well as budget cuts to address the ongoing fiscal train wreck that Pawlenty is leaving to his successor -- Dayton is willing to put more options on the table, including income tax increases on top earners.  I grew up in Duluth and have family there, and have heard only great things about Sen. Solon.  Dayton's choice of running mate is a good indicator of his ability to build a great team to help Minnesota navigate the challenges of a coming year.

Secretary of State

Mark Ritchie's term in office has been more interesting than is usual for a Secretary of State.  Throughout the Franken/Coleman recount, he conducted himself in a way that made Minnesota proud.  He took the lessons of that experience and worked to change laws in ways to make the voting system better, and has worked hard to increase participation at the ballot box -- for example, with changes to help make sure Minnesotans serving in the military overseas have the ability to vote and be sure their vote is counted.

Ritchie's main opponent, Dan Severson, has served in the legislature.  His signature issue is requiring photo ID at the polls, something that would make it harder for many Minnesotans (especially seniors who no longer drive) to vote.  While there has been news recently about a small number felons voting when they shouldn't, Severson has voted against bills that would address this issue -- such as one that would have notified felons of their status with respect to voting rights, or another that would provide the Secretary of State with lists of deceased voters and felons not eligible to vote.

State Auditor

The office of State Auditor is another where the incumbent, Rebecca Otto, has done a fine job, executing her duties effectively and without partisanship.  When I was newly elected to the City Council, I one day walked into the offices of the State Auditor just because I had some questions and wanted to understand some of the issues I might face in office.  Much to my surprise, I found myself welcomed into the office of the State Auditor herself, where she spent more than an hour talking with me and educating me about her office and its relationship to city government.  The State Auditor is elected to be a watchdog (something Otto's many investigations demonstrate that she does well), but her role is also to be a helper to local governments.  Rebecca Otto has proven herself to me on both counts.

Labels: campaign 2010

Posted by John Nephew on 11/02/2010 12:42:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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The Minnesota Independent has an article worth reading on the topic of judicial races.  A pattern I've noticed in the past seems to hold true: With the exception of open seats, where there is no incumbent, the challengers in judicial races are usually fringe ideologues.  This year is no exception, with a number of candidates (many of which have run before) who want to politicize the judiciary, make the Constitution subordinate to their personal or sectarian interpretation of the Bible, etc.

Labels: campaign 2010, media

Posted by John Nephew on 10/30/2010 03:46:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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I was pleased to hear that the Star Tribune chose to endorse two local candidates whom I enthusiastically support: Matt Bostrom for Ramsey County Sheriff and John Choi for Ramsey County Attorney.  The endorsing editorial is well worth reading, since it does a good job of describing the strengths of these two fine candidates and why they are the best choices in their races.  Check it out if you haven't already.

Labels: campaign 2010, media

Posted by John Nephew on 10/22/2010 07:39:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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Last week I linked to the League of Minnesota Cities online Q&A with Independence Party gubernatorial candidate Tom Horner.  As I mentioned at the time, DFL candidate Mark Dayton had indicated that he would participate in that format as well, and that event is now available online as well.

On a related note, the LMC has similar webinars scheduled with the candidates for State Auditor, DFL incumbent Rebecca Otto and Republican nominee Pat Anderson.

Labels: campaign 2010, media

Posted by John Nephew on 10/21/2010 07:44:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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The Pioneer Press has announced its endorsements for Senate District 55, House District 55A and House District 55B, the districts that cover the city of Maplewood.  Congratulations to endorsees Chuck Wiger, Leon Lillie, and Nora Slawik.  I am proud to support all three of them as well.

Labels: campaign 2010, media

Posted by John Nephew on 10/19/2010 04:07:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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The League of Minnesota Cities is doing something interesting this election season: hosting online Q&As with gubernatorial candidates, to give city officials a chance to ask them city-related questions.  This seems like a good idea, not only to have a chance to learn where the candidates stand on issues of concern to cities in Minnesota, but to let the candidates know what issues concern us local elected officials when it comes to our relationship with the state government.

A recording of the first one, with Independence Party candidate Tom Horner, is online now.  (I should note, I had trouble trying to listen to it with Firefox on a PC -- it would jump ahead at random times -- but it works fine with Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player.  I haven't tried getting at it with Mac or Linux yet, but those platforms may have similar issues.)

Democratic candidate Mark Dayton has agreed to participate as well, but no date has been set, while Republican Tom Emmer's campaign has unfortunately declined to participate.

Labels: campaign 2010, media

Posted by John Nephew on 10/12/2010 12:49:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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I saw a couple of fliers at City Hall this week about upcoming debates sponsored by the Roseville-Maplewood-Falcon Heights League of Women Voters.

District 622 School Board Debate: School Board Room, District Education Center, 2520 12th Ave E, North St Paul, at 7 PM on Tuesday, October 12th

Senate District 55 and House Districts 55A and 55B: Maplewood City Council Chambers, City Hall, 1830 County Road B East, at 6:30 PM on October 28th

The fliers state that both forums will be broadcast on cable, in case you are unable to attend in person.

Labels: campaign 2010, events

Posted by John Nephew on 10/08/2010 03:01:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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If you live in the North St. Paul-Maplewood-Oakdale school district (which is most of Maplewood, though not the part where I live; we're in the Roseville district over here), you may be interested in the today's Pioneer Press.  It includes the profiles of the candidates running for the three school board seats on the ballot for District 622 this fall.

Labels: campaign 2010, media

Posted by John Nephew on 10/06/2010 08:00:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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Tonight I am one of the co-hosts for the McCollum Mancini Mixer, an annual fundraising event for Congresswoman Betty McCollum. You can find details on the McCollum campaign's Facebook page. I'm looking forward to the event, which is always a good opportunity to socialize with an assortment of elected officials, party officers, and DFL activists.

Labels: campaign 2010, events

Posted by John Nephew on 9/08/2010 08:35:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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Last week's Maplewood Review included stories on the local results of the primary and Maplewood's special election, with one article covering Mark Koppen's victory, and another on the Republican primary between Nathan Hansen and Bob Zick to determine who will face incumbent Democrat Leon Lillie in the November election for Minnesota House District 55A (which covers northern Maplewood and the entire city of North Saint Paul).

While Hansen's 57%-to-43% margin of victory seems quite strong, some folks have asked me how perennial fringe candidate and local cable access TV goofball Zick could come even that close to upsetting Hansen, who had after all been endorsed by the local Republican party unit. (Last election cycle, Zick ran as an Independence Party candidate for the same office. Since no one else filed under that party for that office, this allowed him to automatically get public campaign financing from the taxpayers, which he apparently spent promoting Diana Longrie's DFL primary campaign against Lillie.)

Consider the raw vote totals: 558 to 416. In comparison, Lillie — who appeared on the Democratic column of the ballot without any opponent — received 3,138 votes. This district leans DFL, but not by that much. Even the last-place finisher in the Maplewood special election received more than twice as many votes as Zick — but that includes all of Maplewood, not just the portion in 55A. Republican voters (especially those in North Saint Paul, without a special city council election) didn't have a lot of motivation to show up at the polls, and I don't know how much their party bothered investing in GOTV efforts. Republican-leaning and independent voters had little reason to vote in the Republican column when there were real contests on the top of the ticket in the IP and DFL columns.

End result: a low turnout, where a fringe candidate can look better on a percentage basis with a tiny number of raw votes.

Labels: campaign 2010, media

Posted by John Nephew on 8/25/2010 10:59:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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Besides the Maplewood Special Election, you may have noticed there was a primary in Minnesota for many other offices this past Tuesday.

According to an e-mail sent to supporters from the campaign of Rep. Betty McCollum's campaign, she received the largest winning percentage of any Congressional candidate, in her landslide victory over Diana Longrie. Politics in Minnesota has the breakdown for all the Minnesota Congressional primaries. It's interesting that, even losing by such an enormous margin, Longrie actually received more votes than the winner of the Republican primary in the 4th Congressional District. (The endorsed Republican candidate a bit more than twice as many votes in that race as the suspected-felon-dentist-expatriate candidate.) Given that there was no doubt about the Republican gubernatorial primary, I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of those Longrie votes came from non-Democrats who oppose McCollum and simply took the opportunity to participate in "Operation Chaos."

Labels: campaign 2010

Posted by John Nephew on 8/14/2010 04:34:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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Maplewood's City Clerk compiled an unaudited election results report for the special election, on a precinct-by-precinct basis, and e-mailed it to various folks including the candidates and the City Council. I've uploaded it for anyone curious.

Not suprisingly, given the different levels of attention people often pay to city versus higher level elections, more than 600 voters cast ballots but did not mark a choice in the city race.

For those who like to slice and dice the numbers, here's one spreadsheet I did for analysis -- looking at each candidate's percentage of the city council vote in each precinct. It's interesting to see where the candidates demonstrated strength or weakness, indicating where they have strong ties in the community or perhaps where they focused their campaigning.

Koppen's best precinct was 10 (58%), which I believe is his home precinct; it was also the worst for Sletten (10%). Even in his worst precinct (P13), Koppen still earned a respectable 46% of the vote.

One of Sletten's best precincts was P2, home to former mayor Diana Longrie (who was also on the ballot as a primary candidate, there to be mauled by Rep. McCollum), where she earned 24% of the ballots. In the seventh precinct, where she lives, Sletten only received her city-wide average of 19%. Perhaps familiarity has bred something there?

Two of Cave's three strongest precincts, all at around 34%, were Gladstone's P4, which was arguably the engine for her 2006 special election win (following up on all the neighborhood fears drummed in in the regular election the fall before), and her home Precinct 9. On the other hand, the 25% she got in Precinct 3 (where I live, as does Councilmember Juenemann) was her worst performance in the city.

Labels: campaign 2010, council politics

Posted by John Nephew on 8/12/2010 09:37:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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The Ramsey County Elections results page now has all Maplewood precincts reporting, and the landslide victor in the Maplewood City Council special election is Marv Koppen. The totals from all sixteen precincts:

ELIZABETH A. SLETTEN: 878 votes, 19.08%
REBECCA CAVE: 1,378 votes, 29.94%
MARVIN C KOPPEN: 2,346 votes, 50.98%

I know Marv worked very hard for this race, and the results speak for themselves. Congratulations to Councilmember-elect Koppen. If I am remembering correctly, he will be sworn into office at the start of our next regular council meeting, on August 23rd.

Labels: campaign 2010

Posted by John Nephew on 8/10/2010 10:56:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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Don't forget to get out and vote!

If you're not sure where to vote, visit the Ramsey County Precinct Finder.

Labels: campaign 2010, events

Posted by John Nephew on 8/10/2010 08:16:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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The front page of this week's Maplewood Review profiles the three candidates running in the city council special election on August 10th, and you can find the article online as well.

Given that I ran to replace Ms. Cave, and given Ms. Sletten's tight association with former Mayor Longrie (as well as knowing her from her frequent appearances in front of the council), it should come as no surprise that I'm supporting Marv Koppen in this race.

Labels: campaign 2010, media

Posted by John Nephew on 7/30/2010 05:36:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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Here's the second brief interview I recorded this past weekend, this one with Maplewood's congresswoman, Betty McCollum.

Labels: campaign 2010, public works, video

Posted by John Nephew on 7/16/2010 07:22:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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John Gunyou is the endorsed DFL candidate for Lieutenant Governor. I found him an intriguing choice for running mate Margaret Anderson Kelliher, not only for his background as a finance commissioner in the Carlson administration (an important qualification considering the fiscal challenges Minnesota faces) but his more recent work as city manager of Minnetonka.

I had a chance to record a very short interview this past weekend with Mr. Gunyou at a DFL door-knocking event, where I asked him about the relationship between the state and local governments.

Labels: campaign 2010, video

Posted by John Nephew on 7/13/2010 07:39:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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Matt Bostrom, who is running for Ramsey County Sheriff (and has my support), addressed the delegates at the June 15th endorsing convention for the Maplewood City Council special election. I recorded him speaking and uploaded it to YouTube:

Labels: campaign 2010, public safety, video

Posted by John Nephew on 6/20/2010 08:52:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
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