[Durham INC] Political Endorsement Update:

[Darius Little]

**Since INC had a Candidate's Forum, I thought I'd send this article (which summarizes all of the endorsements for the General Election**


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Durham Committee revamps endorsement slate
The Herald-Sun
Posted:  10/01/2012 10:05 PM
     
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By Ray Gronberg

gronberg at heraldsun.com; 919-419-6648

DURHAM – The Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People has shaken up its endorsement slate for County Commissioners, by dropping Democratic Party challenger Fred Foster in favor of unaffiliated candidate Omar Beasley.

Committee members made the move over the weekend. In addition to Beasley, they’re backing incumbent Commissioners Brenda Howerton and Michael Page for re-election.

The group in the run-up to May’s Democratic Party primary had backed Foster, Howerton and Page. Also on its slate then was former Commissioner Joe Bowser, who lost his re-election bid. 

Durham Committee Chairman Phil Cousin in the spring said the group believed Foster could make a difference as commissioner.

Now, the group is dropping him to send a signal to another big-three political group, the People’s Alliance, Cousin said.

It’s not happy the alliance omitted Howerton and Page from its own three-candidate slate because of the continuing dispute over the controversial 751 South  real estate project, Cousin said.

From the People’s Alliance, the “message is clearly that you have two African-American incumbents, one of whom is chair [of the commissioners], and you find nothing viable in the candidacy of either,” Cousin said. “It doesn’t make for a good tone.”

Cousin added to that a criticism of the alliance’s focusing on 751 South as a key issue in the campaign.

“The question becomes, does every matter in the county now or facing Durham come down to 751?” he said. “Does one question decide the viability of a candidacy proven in office over four years?”

The People’s Alliance last week backed Foster, fellow challenger Wendy Jacobs and incumbent Ellen Reckhow for commissioners seats. All the candidates save Beasley are Dmocratic Party nominees. 

But the alliance urged its adherents to split their ticket to avoid voting for Howerton and Page. 

Voters nonetheless will elect five commissioners on Nov. 6.

People’s Alliance spokesman Milo Pyne said his group considers the 751 South dispute important not only in itself but because it’s “emblematic of larger issues” about the management of government its relationship with the community.

The 1,300-home development has been controversial since the last commissioners election in 2008. 

That’s because it targets a 167-acre site in a part of south Durham that local policy – agreed to unanimously by city and county officials in 2005 – says should host no more than two units an acre. The policy was not a major campaign issue in 2008.

Activists there regard the policy as a statement by the two governments they won’t encourage dense development between the Southpoint area and the Chatham County line. They fear such development’s potential to undermine local infrastructure planning and the city’s efforts to encourage redevelopment in the heart of Durham.

But Page and Howerton made it clear in the run-up to May’s primary that they don’t really use the 2005 policy, also known as Durham’s “comprehensive plan,” as a guide to zoning decisions. 

Advocates of 751 South also tout its job-creation potential, particularly when talking to blacks. Since 2005, the unemployment rate among blacks in Durham County has run seven percentage points or more higher than that among whites, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates.

Pyne said the People’s Alliance had two other issues with Howerton and Page. 

One was their tepid opposition to a state constitutional amendment that targeted same-sex marriage.

The other is their participation in giving Republican Party activists Richard Ford and Teiji Kimball key advisory board appointments.

“We are concerned that these ostensibly Democratic commissioners are paving the way for people like Mr. Ford and Mr. Kimball to run for office in the future, probably against these very same commissioners,” after gaining advisory board exposure, Pyne said.

The Durham Committee and the People’s Alliance both lean heavily Democratic, politically. Durham’s other big-three group, the Friends of Durham, is more conservative and Republican-friendly than either.

In discussing his group’s endorsements, Cousin didn’t say much about the relative merits of Foster and Beasley, except that Beasley “interviewed better.”

Cousin also indicated it was never in the cards for the Durham Committee to endorse all four of the blacks on the Nov. 6 County Commissioners ballot.

“There were only going to be endorsements for three” candidates, and Foster “just fell out of that third position,” he said.

     
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--------------------
Darius M. Little
Executive Business Consultant  and
Strategic Marketing Analyst

(web) www.linkedin.com/in/dariuslittle
 
Manta Business Profile/Report: 
http://www.manta.com/c/mtlwj1m/little-s-business-consulting


 
"And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive." [Matt 21:22]