I went to the candidate forum for candidates from Wards 5 and 6 tonight. I was surprised that the attendance at the old Payne Reliever site exceeded 100 people there. It was sponsored by Payne/Phalen District Five Planning Council. [Full disclosure: I am a director of the organization but did not take part in the arrangements.] It seemed to me that most of the people who came were the people who usually make our bigger meetings more than it did the folks who follow the candidates, but I am sure that both groups were there.
Although this was not a League of Women Voters event, the forum was stylized after the ones that they do. And, by and large, the candidates [all four of whom were there] did and said the things that you would expect them to do and say.
There were a few things other than the attendance which seemed noteworthy.
Before anybody else could do so, Dan Bostrom invoked the name of Bruce Vento, calling him a friend, before anybody else could use it. In his closing statement he also cited his role in getting
Pakou Hang countered with describing Paul Wellstone as her friend.
I do not discount either of these claims of friendship, but one should keep in mind that friendships with deceased politicians are easy to claim since they cannot counter the assertion themselves and they tried to convince a lot of people that they were friends when they were living, even having pictures taken with others and signing letters, certificates, and plaques. I do know that the late congressperson attended Johnson High with Councilmember Bostrom, but do not know what to infer from that.
Lee Helgen made a nice reference to Bostrom’s and Benanav’s push to require certificates of occupancy in one- and two-family rental properties. I am sure that many of his supporters were biting their lips on that one.
Questioners gave all of the candidates a chance to demagogue with inquiries about subsidized housing and pit bulls, vacant buildings and crime, but nobody really played things that way.
I did learn that the lame duck Boy Wonder in my ward is older than his opponent. But of course my problems with LDC Helgen do not derive from his age.
I still think that District Councils are not the best organizations to run this kind of forum as I still think the risks to the organization can dwarf the benefits, but this one somehow worked out all right, at least as far as I can tell at this time.
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2 comments:
"But of course my problems with LDC Helgen do not derive from his age."
I'd be interested to know what those problems are. I have big problems with Mr. Helgen.
I was looking for his website at http://leehelgen.com and found the domain name was unregistered. His actual site is http://leehelgen.org. I cannot believe the idiocy of leaving the .com unregistered like that.
As it was sitting unused, I registered leehelgen.com and have put up a page encouraging voters to de-elect him. I hope it's successful.
Still, interested in your disagreements with him.
JA Rotgut - jarotgut@aol.com
J. A.
That is an interesting trick grabbing the URL. Of course most people haven’t grabbed onto their own names and of course many cannot because somebody else already has it, but it does seem somewhat neglectful for LDC Helgen to have overlooked it in his case. Maybe the whole subject is worth a post later on. I do think I’ll put the URL more prominently on the blog. It is a good picture. I assume that you have the right to use it.
I supported Mr. Helgen last time when he was running against a woman from Vadnais Heights. She had said that she was looking for a residence in the Ward, but as far as I know she still has not found one – and she is supposed to be in the real estate business.
I suspect that we may have different problems with Helgen, but it seems that we agree that he has to go. Probably my major problem has been the smoking ban. While I have been somewhat resigned for some time that the preachers of intolerance would win this battle eventually, that does not mean that anybody should do anything to move that cause forward. And it continually amazes me that people who call themselves “pro-choice” should be so opposed to others exercising their won choices. [If you haven’t read my long October 1st post on the mislabeled “Freedom to Breathe Act”, you might wish to read it. I did not mention that Pawlenty belongs to a religious group which sees smoking as a major sin and that this whole thing made for strange bedfellows, but that’s what politics is about.] It does seem kind of funny to remember that when I went to his election party four years ago at the Halftime Rec that the place was quite smoky. I even remember his great “progressive” supporter Tom Montgomery with a very large cigar.
Also, although LDC Helgen has been better about remembering thst one-third of the Ward is on the East Side than Mr. Reiter was, he still falls far short of Janice Rettman in this regard. [Actually, most politicians fall far short of Janice in a lot of things.] He is kind of a throwback to Hugo Masanz in this regard.
I support a lot of green things, but Helgen seems to have taken greenness to an obsessive level.
You are correct that he is short on real world experience. Many people in politics are. I’m not sure that Mr. Haas has any more or better, but I’m willing to give him a try.
I am not sure that I hold the tax increase against Helgen. We had gone so long holding our levies artificially low so that Coleman the first and Kelly could run on holding the line on taxes that something was going to have to give. Even Dan Bostrom voted for this one.
Since I moved my personal internet action to this blog there have not been many who have followed me. Of course, I haven’t hyped it much yet because I want to make sure that I will keep working at it first. I do accept anonymous posts as long as the ideas are worth disseminating, but I admit that I am curious if you and I have ever met.
[I have been hearing from Midway Barb off and on for years, but still have not knowingly met her/him and do not know if she/he even has any connection with the Midway area. Somebody suggested to me that the name is a code for halfway making a dig into somebody. I thought I knew who she was once, but have since ruled that person out.]
RS
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