Sunday, July 05, 2009
Roanoke political parties ponder futures
Both the Democrats and the GOP have internal issues to settle ahead of the November elections.
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roanoke.com/politics
Roanoke Democrats have all but dominated city politics for more than a decade.
Democrats have held a majority on the city council since the days of the independent "Roanoke Forward" ticket of the late '70s, along with a majority of the city's constitutional offices.
Democrats are now reassessing the state of their party with a sitting city mayor in David Bowers who was a longtime Democrat but is now an independent -- as well two council members, Gwen Mason and David Trinkle, who returned to the fold after running as part of the independent "For the City" ticket in 2006.
Meanwhile, city Republicans are trying to shore up their ranks to become more relevant again. The GOP is running two candidates in four constitutional office races this November, with plans for more in next spring's council races. To make inroads in historically difficult terrain, they may need some help in the form of intraparty discord among Democrats.
The last two council elections have been marked by Democrats splitting from the city committee to run as independents. Last year, Bowers -- after an unsuccessful 2007 bid to become chairman of the committee -- ran for mayor and won as an independent.
Bowers identifies himself as a lifelong Democrat, but said he's torn between whether to rejoin the party or to remain an independent until the end of his four-year mayoral term. Some of that ambiguity appears to stem from decisions made within the city committee and on the council that Bowers has taken as personal affronts. For instance, Bowers' mother, Mary, a longtime city party member, was not re-elected as a committee member from her city district.
"I would say that I feel like every time I attempt to redeem myself with the party, I seem to get kicked in my teeth," Bowers said. "I have a lifelong affiliation with building up the party ... but at the same time I have to understand that some of the same bunch that threw my mother out of the party a year and a half ago now have thrown my secretary out of the mayor's office."
Bowers said he is supporting Democratic gubernatorial candidate Creigh Deeds, to whom he recently contributed $150. But how about his council mate Mason, who's running as a Democrat against Republican Bill Cleaveland for an open seat in the 17th House District?
Bowers hedged on the question: "I've had conversations with both Bill Cleaveland, who's been a [legal] colleague of mine for 30 years, and with Gwen. I've not made any endorsement at this time."
Former state Del. Clifton "Chip" Woodrum, a longtime key cog in Democratic politics, said he readily accepts Bowers as a Democrat. Further, he's not worried about a split affecting the party's chances in November.
"I think we're still the dominant party in the city," Woodrum said.
Roanoke City Democratic Committee Chairman Tony Reed said there's no split among city Democrats.
Councilman Court Rosen, one of three Democrats who swept the nonmayoral council race in 2008, agrees: "I think that the people who fairly regularly discuss and say that the Democratic Party in the city is divided, are those people who are largely a part of the reason the party was divided in the first place."
Woodrum acknowledges there are disagreements. But "it seems to me our main differences in the past few years have been differences based more on personality than on policy, while on the Republican side, you have serious ideological differences," Woodrum said. "It looks like you have ideological right-wing conservatives. You have more moderate Republicans. It seems to me there are litmus tests within the Republican Party that have really impeded their development."
The state of the GOP
Gilbert Butler, a Republican who is currently not a member of the city committee, said the city party's issues echo those of the state and national Republicans.
"There's a serious and implacable division between social conservatives, who have their own road map for the future of the party, and everybody else," Butler said.
But city Republicans have been on the move, even as the state and national parties are working to rebuild.
Some give credit for that to Roanoke City Republican Chairman Adam Boitnott, who has used the Internet to recruit new committee members. Over the last two years, the committee has grown from 55 members to 81.
That's still less than the Roanoke City Democratic Committee's more than 100 members -- but it still represents a growth of nearly 50 percent.
That growth has come largely from an ever-expanding e-mail list that Boitnott uses. Another factor would be his targeting of the various young professionals advocacy groups that have popped up over the last several years.
"Someone will join the committee and be a member of Valley Forward or NewVa Connects, and they'll bring in a couple of other people from those groups," Boitnott said. "I think I've got 135 people on the city committee's Facebook page. A lot of them are members of young professionals groups."
Beyond recruiting members to the committee, Boitnott tries to get them to watch for vacancies on the various appointed boards in the city. He's a member of two: The Roanoke Parks and Recreation's advisory board and the Roanoke Redevelopment and Housing Authority Board.
That sort of targeting allows potential candidates for elected office to pick up some public service experience before jumping into a campaign.
Boitnott's efforts have won him praise from both conservative and moderate Republicans.
"I think Adam's done a great job in terms of trying to get the committee moving," said David Nixon, a Roanoke lawyer and committee member. "The committee wasn't moving for some years prior to that. He's created a different type of atmosphere with a lot more people involved, a lot more young professionals. He's done a lot more in that respect. We haven't seen a lot of fruit just yet."
Still, the ideological divide looms in the background.
Boitnott "is doing the best he can to keep everybody together, but that division still exists," Butler said. "The social conservatives don't believe in the big tent theory and believe it's more important to have a more cohesive and unified party of conservatives rather than people who just call themselves Republicans. Others feel there shouldn't be a litmus test and people should be welcomed to the party with a broader scope of what they believe."
Nixon, who falls on the strong conservative end of the spectrum, said a perceived split is the "'moderates' view of what's happening." Nixon said that after a series of ideological clashes, the party is now more homogeneous than the "splintered" Democrats.
And it's when the Democrats have split, Nixon said, that Republicans have had their best chance at winning city elections. He cites the case of Ralph Smith, who in 2000 won election as mayor over Democrat David Bowers and independent Mac McCadden.
Former City Councilwoman Linda Wyatt, who is now chairwoman of the 6th District Democratic Committee, said her party isn't split so much as offering a "large umbrella" under which there's a diversity of opinions.
City Democrats will go through their reorganization in December, offering a chance for either a reconciliation or further bitterness.
Woodrum, however, said he's focusing on winning -- something he said that city Democrats seem to manage whether they're running under the party label or not.
"Anybody setting their eyes on the reorganization in December is really taking their eye off the ball," Woodrum said.
"The focus should be on November."
