The Roosevelt Gardens Civic League hosted a candidates’ forum for the 87th House and 6th Senate districts Tuesday night. I arrived just before the 7pm start time and found that the candidates had been sequestered! I never seen that before. The Democratic candidates were in one room and the Republican candidates in another. They were not allowed to mingle with those assembled prior to the start of the forum. Weird, huh? Oh – and once again, no recording devices and no pictures were allowed.
Like the Wards Corner forum the previous night, this was actually two mini-forums. The delegate candidates – Democratic incumbent Paula Miller and Republican challenger Hank Giffin – were summoned from their respective rooms and allowed to make opening statements. Six questions were posed to the candidates. I’ll give the organizers some credit here – a couple of the questions were on topics not covered in prior candidate forums and were specific to the neighborhoods represented.
After answering the questions, the delegate candidates were sent back to their rooms and the senate candidates – Republican incumbent Nick Rerras and Democratic challenger Ralph Northam – were brought out. Again, they were allowed an opening statement and then were asked the same six questions.
The only thing that jumped out at me over the course of the questions was Rerras’ claim that if transportation was funded with a gas tax, the money wouldn’t stay in Hampton Roads. Hmm – the current Hampton Roads Transportation Plan includes a 2% local gas tax, and the members of the authority want to increase that to 5%. Not sure where he’s getting the idea that the money won’t stay in Hampton Roads.
At the end of the questioning of the Senate candidates, all four were brought out for what I thought was going to be closing statements. Instead, they were subjected to a critique by the president, Paul Ballance, for the amount amount of mail and for the negative advertising that has gone on in these races. Some people that I talked with afterwards felt like Ballance was out of line in saying this. (I was chatting with someone when a woman came up and said that she didn’t like Ballance saying it, because it wasn’t true. She said Giffin and Rerras had not sent out any negative mail. Guess she hasn’t been seeing what I’ve been seeing.)
Do I wish that the campaigns had not resorted to negative advertising? You bet. I still cling to the idea that a successful campaign can be run only on a positive message. Unfortunately, I think I’m about the only person who believes that. Negativity gets votes, and that’s why campaigns do it.
VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local 