On the last day of January, the waters of the Big Muddy were brown with silt and mostly frozen over. But they were relatively calm.
Twenty-four hours later, the waters were riled and turbulent, like a pond filled with carp after you throw in a handful of bait. That noise you hear is the sucking sound of bottom feeders grasping greedily for the newly discovered meal.
If all had gone as anticipated, this year’s election cycle would have been a minor blip on the political radar. Nothing on the ballot but small-time races in the ‘burbs and townships and elections of district reps in T-Town. Five of those six races would feature incumbents. None would be considered particularly vulnerable to electoral challenge. The only open seat would be in District Three, vacated by term-limited Mike Craig. That would likely provide the only political hijinx.
Political junkies would be much more interested in rumors of upcoming electoral comebacks. Was Mikey Bellbottoms considering a run at County Commissioner Pete Gerken in Twenty Sixteen? Which festering political vendetta would Sleepy Walrus Jack Ford pick at next? And the ubiquitous question, what foul machinations had the Finkly stink on them?
Chump charter
Then the unthinkable happened: Mayor Collins passed away in office. Suddenly, a ho-hum political year has become a hotbed of political blood sport, as the foibles of the Charter of the City of Toledo have been exposed and the wildest succession election in the history of the City is about to unfold.
There are several backstories to the current conundrum. Mayor Collins was elected without the backing of either major party, which means either party would have liked to challenge him at the end of his term in Twenty Seventeen. Rumored to be eyeing a run were current and former elected officials, from Treasurer Wade Kapszukiewicz to Councilman Rob Ludeman, from Gerken to Councilman Tom Waniewski, from failed Twenty Thirteen candidate and County Auditor Anita Lopez to State Rep Michael Ashford, with a side dish of Toledo’s Finance Director and former Councilman Georgie Sarantou.
These potential suitors of the city electorate would have had to face a tough primary race, hoping to squeak through for a final head-to-head between the top two vote-getters. Eliminate the fluff, and then make it through a majority rules election for the leader of Frogopolis. The chosen mayor would have to be selected by over fifty percent of the voting citizenry.
There’s a September primary election this year along with a November general election. It would make sense that a successor to Mayor Collins would have to get through the primary, and the top two would square off in November. This is what would have happened two years from now if the events of November First hadn’t. It’s also what has happened in every mayoral race since the charter change that created the strong mayor form of government in the early 1990s.
But that same charter change now will have it otherwise. The numbskulls who drafted the early 1990s change had the harebrained idea that, if there is a vacancy in the mayor’s office, it should be filled at the next general election. No primary. One-time run off, winner take all.
In the off-year election of Twenty Eleven, about 61,000 Toledoans voted. Split those votes a dozen ways this year, and who knows who comes out on top?
This fact isn’t lost on the rapacious piscine politicos listed above. They can all see their chance to unseat newly elevated Mayor Paula Hicks Hudson, who replaces Mayor Collins through the remainder of this year. Nor is it lost on Bell and Carty and the ever lurking and usually dozing J Fo, all of whom could enter the fray. Throw in the nutbags and crank cases like Terry Shankland and Opal Covey and whack jobs to be named later, and we predict a frenzied finish unprecedented in our town.
Rejection election
Imagine the unthinkable. Votes are split and strewn to the point where no one candidate gets more than six or seven thousand of the total cast. That would mean that the top vote-getter might become mayor with a plurality of 10 or 15 percent of the vote. Put a different way, the next mayor may have been rejected by an overwhelming majority of nearly 90 percent of the voting public.
Thinking about it that way, we have no doubt Carty will get in the race. He can absolutely count on being rejected by an overwhelming majority, just as he can count on an equally rabid base to push him toward the top of a crowded field. Talk about Finkly stink. This town isn’t ready for “Carty IV: This Time It’s, ‘Get Over Here, Fatso.’”
We shudder at the political perils that slink beyond the near horizon. And what dunderheads concocted the charter change that allowed for all this nuttiness of a no-primary race for mayor?
Would you believe it was Carty and J Fo? Nah, we didn’t think you would.
Believe us, folks, you can’t make this stuff up.
