There are four local races remaining in the 2007 election season, and as of today we've gotten overviews for two of them. First up is in District E, where Kingwood's Mike Sullivan is up against Clear Lake's Annette Dwyer.
Voters who do come to the polls will have to decide between two candidates with largely similar views on key issues and who disagree with some of the more controversial policies of Mayor Bill White.Both candidates, however, have pledged to work more closely with the administration under Houston's strong-mayor system -- in contrast to [Addie] Wiseman, a frequent critic.
The two candidates have divergent backgrounds and they split, in varying degrees, on other issues.Dwyer, a former Harris County economic development worker, now supports the city's red-light camera program, though she said she probably would not have voted for it originally. But she wants engineering studies to show that the signals are timed to increase safety. Sullivan says he is "strongly opposed" to the cameras.
Sullivan, who owns a marine and industrial paint company, also does not support Safe Clear, the mayor's mandatory freeway towing program. Dwyer says she would like to study whether it has been worth the $3 million annual cost.
There also is some division on the idea of a drainage fee to fund overdue projects in District E and the city. Sullivan said he would not support the idea, though he supports a "strong" capital-improvement plan. Dwyer is noncommittal, but said she might support a fee if the revenue was placed in a dedicated fund with identified projects spread fairly across the city.
"People should not have to live in this fear of repeated flooding," she said.
Endorsements and turnout projections are pretty much the entire story of the At Large #5 overview, which spends more time analyzing what happened in the general election than it does on any issue the candidates might want to discuss. It's true, as the article says, that Jolanda Jones and Joe Trevino are ideologically very similar, which may be why both of them managed to get the endorsement of Council Member Peter Brown, as both Matt Stiles and Greg Wythe have noted. But last I checked, same values != same priorities, and so it might have been nice to know what sort of thing the two candidates are emphasizing as they prepare to rally their troops to the polls. Maybe we'll get that story after one of them gets sworn in.
One last thing:
Trevino hopes his personal success and professional experience might sway the critical swing bloc -- Anglo voters."I have managed multimillion-dollar budgets," he said. "As a school administrator, I have experience working with people. You hire, you fire, you select, you train, you transfer and you always look for the best match for every position.
"I've always surrounded myself with people that are smarter than me," Trevino added. "If you can do that without being threatened, you can be very, very successful."
Jones also is emphasizing her up-by-the-bootstraps biography and coalition-building résumé.
"I've had sufficient life experiences, world travel, professional experiences to be able to listen to the citizens, negotiate with other council members," Jones said. "I have run a business since 1998," she added, referring to her law practice.
Jones has spent years working on local causes and building bridges with various constituencies. She joined the Mexican-American student group at the University of Houston as an undergraduate, the Asian-American group during law school and marched with Hispanic janitors when they went on strike last year.
"This is the problem with term limits: You have two very good candidates running against each other," [Rice political science professor Bob] Stein said. "Why? Because they won't run for anything but an open seat."