Don’t Assume The Incumbent Is The Better Candidate
Tuesday next week people from all over the region will go to the polls for local elections. For those of us in the City of St. Louis this will be our second time voting this year — a month ago we had a partisan primary. Most localities in our region wisely have non-partisan elections.
This year we elect Aldermen from our 14 odd-numbered wards. Five of the 14 have general election challengers. Four with Green party candidates and one with a Republican challenger to the Democrat incumbent. All the challengers will lose but I applaud their participation.
If you live in an odd-numbered ward with a contested race (3,7,9,11, & 13) don’t just dismiss the challenger and vote for the incumbent. You need to determine which is the better candidate for the office. If you are not sure you really shouldn’t cast a ballot. The incumbent may well be the better candidate. But they may not be. You need to know more than the fact they’ve held the office for 20+ years to reach an informed decision.
In the race for Mayor we have the choice of four candidates. Again, decide for yourself using some objective criteria, other than just incumbency, to determine for yourself who should occupy Room 200 for the next four years. To help you reach an informed decision consider attending the mayoral candidate debate tonight at the central library, 7pm.
One argument incumbents make, especially democrats, is that in a democratic city like St. Louis, if you want to accomplish things in office/bring resources to your community, you need to be a democrat, and the more seniority you have, the better.
So for residents thinking about maximizing the benefits to their community, many believe they are better off electing an incumbents/democrats. Newbies and republicans are at a real disadvantage.
Using objective criteria, Slay is the obvious choice.