Tag Archives: Local government

Montgomery County Council Candidates List (With Websites And Map)

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Council office bldgCounty Council Candidates, 2014

Candidates are listed in alphabetical order by last name and party. They’re color-coded, blue for Democrats, red for Republicans, and green for Green Party.

All nine County Council seats are up for election for four-year terms in 2014. In Montgomery County we have 20 Democratic candidates, four Republicans, and one Green Party candidate.

The 2014 Primary Election is June 24. Democrats will have a choice of Democratic candidates for County Council in the at-large race and in four of the five districts. Not enough Republican candidates filed to give Republicans  a contested primary in the at-large race or any of the district races.

At-Large Candidates, Democrats (Vote for four)

At-Large Candidates, Republican (Vote for four)

  • ROBERT DYER — www.robertdyer.net — Republican 
  • SHELLY SKOLNICK — no website listed — Republican

At-large Candidates, Green (Vote for four)

Montgomery County Council districts map.

Montgomery County Council districts map.

Council District 1 (Vote for one)

Council District 2 (Vote for one)

Council District 3 (Vote for one)

Council District 4 (Vote for one)

Council District 5 (Vote for one)

Notes:

Information source: Maryland State Board of Elections. Some candidate websites may not be operational. Some candidates may have websites that are not listed with the Board of Elections.

Registered voters in Montgomery County can vote for four at-large council candidates, and one candidate to represent the district you live in.

Please report any omissions, misspellings or other errors to BJohnHayden@icloud.com.

(A few Republican candidates were nominated AFTER the candidate filing deadline by the Republican Central Committee, to avoid the embarrassment of having no Republican candidate at all for some seats. I’ll update the list eventually to include the Republican candidates who had to be pushed forward by the Central Committee, in order to provide an updated list of both Democratic and Republican nominees for the General Election.) 

Which County Council district are you in?

Easy to find out, even if you’re not a registered voter. Go to this page and enter your street address and zip code. You’ll get the location of your polling place, and your County Council district number, State Legislative district number, and Congressional district number.

For a more detailed look at the County Council district maps, click here.

Want to register to vote?

It’s easy. Click here to go to the Maryland online registration site.  Deadline for voter registration before the Maryland Primary Election is June 3. Registered Democrats can vote in the Democratic primary and registered Republicans can vote in the Republican primary. It’s that simple and obvious.

Other registered voters, such as independents and members of the Green Party or Libertarian Party, are not eligible to vote in the Democratic or Republican primaries. (Membership has its privileges and responsibilities. If you want the privilege of voting in a primary, you have the responsibility to register with that party.)  All registered voters can vote in the general election in November.

— Information Compiled by John Hayden

Montgomery County, MD, Candidates Needed As Filing Deadline Looms

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(My apologies to District 39 for leaving them out of my original report. Thanks to Cheryl Kagan for calling that to my attention. It’s particularly embarrassing to me because I made the same error on my other blog several years ago, leaving out a MoCo legislative district. Sen. Madaleno caught it that time. I have to keep reminding myself that we had a district added due to population growth somewhere along the line. Was it after the 1990 Census or the 2000 Census? Also, it wasn’t so long ago (in dog years) that District 14 was mostly in Howard County. When I was a precinct chairman in prehistoric times, MoCo had six legislative districts, and The City was still the legislative powerhouse.)

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MARYLAND STATE AND COUNTY ELECTIONS are approaching fast, with some offices still lacking for candidates. Let’s take a snapshot of democracy in one Maryland county a scant five months ahead of the June 2014 primary.

As I write this, we have 11 working days left for candidates to file for office, and lots of offices to choose from. The deadline is Wednesday, February 25, at 9 p.m.

Where are the candidates?

In Montgomery County, we’re governed by a nine-member County Council. At the close of business Friday, we had exactly six candidates filed to run for nine Council seats. We’ll take a closer at the County Council situation in a minute. Continue reading →

Montgomery County Council Minimum Wage Power Play (With Comments)

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Local politicians have more power to raise the minimum wage than the president of the U.S. and the governor of Maryland.

MarcElrich

MARC ELRICH

The Montgomery County Council, Prince George’s County Council, and D.C. City Council have passed nearly identical bills raising the minimum wage to $11.50 by 2017.

Here’s the backstory: Three neighboring jurisdictions joined a “pact” for a regional minimum wage in defiance of the $7.25 Federal law observed in Maryland. And it’s perfectly legal.

What’s the plot? Is this a holy alliance or a nefarious conspiracy? It depends on your point of view. Either way, it’s a bold maneuver to outflank the minimum-wage prerogatives of both the federal and state governments.

Might this portend emergence of the modern city-state? Something to keep in mind when you vote in local elections. Local is important.

The standard textbook model of a minimum wage ...

The standard textbook model of a minimum wage set above the equilibrium wage. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

At this writing, Federal and Maryland governments have been unwilling or unable to junk the worthless $7.25 minimum wage. Dysfunction in Washington and inaction in Annapolis.

Enter intrepid local pols of Maryland and D.C. (stage left) to rescue the working poor.

The three-jurisdiction pact was brokered by Montgomery County Council member Marc Elrich, who apparently demonstrated superb leadership despite the fact that he was not authorized to commit his fellow council members.

Popular support for the minimum wage is stipulated in all three jurisdictions. But so is opposition from the business community. In my view, regional cooperation of this magnitude would not be possible if we had Republicans around to throw sand in the gears. All council members in Montgomery, Prince George’s and D.C. are currently Democrats. Even though they’re all Democrats, they represent a range of economic interests.

Despite Democratic solidarity, Prince George’s and D.C. lacked confidence in Montgomery’s ability to uphold the pact, and with good reason. They told Montgomery County: “You jump off the cliff first.”

And so the Montgomery Council held a snarky debate on Tuesday, Nov. 26. When the dust settled, the members voted 8-1 vote to raise the minimum wage.

Despite the pose of near unanimity, the Montgomery Council was sharply divided. All members claimed to support a minimum wage increase. But six also wanted to placate  the business community. They differed over “how low can we go.” A token raise to $8 or $9 would have been welcomed by some.

A six-member majority of the all-Democratic council was allegedly prepared to delay or defang the wage bill. Only three members — Elrich, Nancy Navarro, and Valerie Ervin —  were fully committed to an $11.50 minimum phased in between October 2014 and October 2016. (That’s three years in the future, for those of you keeping score.)

Minwage3

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

With each effort to reduce the wage, Navarro asked why the poor always get thrown under the bus. (My words, not her’s, but same sentiment.) Ervin called for “courage” and “heart” to retain the $11.50 target.

Count Council member George Leventhal as a fourth supporter. However, Leventhal seemed willing to make accommodations with opponents. His many and lengthy statements succeeded in obfuscating his position on the fine points. To be fair, Leventhal is chairman of the committee that reported the bill.

I lost count of the number of gambits (technically, amendments) opponents deployed in efforts to delay or weaken.  Along the way, there was at least one 5-4 vote. That’s how close it really was, not 8-1. Eventually, opponents succeeded in delaying $11.50 until Oct. 2017. (That’s four years in the future.)

In the official, final vote, Council member Phil Andrews was the diehard holdout. It may or may not be pertinent that Andrews is challenging County Executive Isiah Leggett in the June 2014 Democratic primary.

(Instant analysis: With one vote, Andrews won conservatives and minimum-wage haters for the coming election battle. That’s if there are any conservatives in Montgomery County, some might say.  Yes, Virginia, conservatives really do exist in Montgomery, and they are not generous like Santa Claus. Many conservatives vote in the Democratic primary, registering as Democrats for that very purpose. However, it may safely be predicted that NOT ENOUGH conservatives live in MoCo to prevail in a Democratic primary. At least, I hope not.)

The next day, Wednesday, the Prince George’s Council, with all nine members as cosponsors, passed a similar bill.

On Tuesday, Dec. 3, the D.C. Council completed the hat trick, unanimously.

The federal system shows signs of entropy. As a result, Maryland and other states have an opportunity to assert more power. Regions capable of political cohesion, such as Montgomery, Prince George’s and D.C., can assume more local control.

The rare success at regional solidarity is not yet a done deal. The D.C. mayor and executives of the two counties could theoretically veto the bill. But the P.G. and D.C. Councils apparently have enough votes to override a veto. And Montgomery’s Leggett is unlikely to veto.

All this is not unprecedented, but it is unusual. A number of regional efforts have stood the test of time in the D.C. area. Local minimum wage bills have passed in a few places, most notably San Francisco. Maybe Montgomery will become the San Francisco of the East.

The takeaway: The regional minimum wage pact is a big deal, maybe. The federal system shows troubling signs of entropy. States like Maryland have an opportunity to grab more power. But if states are unable to pass minimum-wage laws and fund programs such as education, authority might devolve downward to cities and counties. Enter the modern city-state. Local pols will be alert for any regional arrangement that works, including pacts that cross state lines.

— John Hayden

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J.K. Rowling’s “Casual Vacancy,” Book Review, Take 1

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“The Casual Vacancy”  is instantly notorious because it’s J.K. Rowling’s first novel for adults. It comes with a prominent black “X” on the cover, fair warning that between these covers you’ll find a subject that’s TABOO in America.

The subject is class warfare and classism. Ms. Rowling’s story takes place in England, and you have to remember that the British and Europeans are not as squeamish about class issues as we Americans. Until recently, we’ve been in full denial.

(If you’d like to read my preview of Casual Vacancy before you start the review, see J.K. Rowling’s “The Casual Vacancy — Prices Slashed.)

Ms. Rowling takes the micro approach to class warfare, focusing on the lives, relationships, and foibles of the individual men, women and children of one small town in England. The macro alternative would be a “God’s-eye view,” examining society from a distance. Rowling understands that you need to get up close and personal to understand classism and class warfare.

In the first 100 pages of Casual Vacancy, Rowling introduces an average of one new character every two pages.

Continue reading →