Municipal campaign stutters to a close

It's been a long, strange few months, and the last day of campaigning before the election doesn't bring a lot of new news, just more turns and churns before the ballot boxes get rolling on Tuesday.

First, there's a news release from former Ward 2 candidate Darius Little, who tells supporters and members of the media in an email that eliminated Ward 1 challenger John Tarantino has encouraged voters to write in Rev. Sylvester Williams' name in the Ward 2 race.

Little uses the opportunity to formally endorse incumbent Howard Clement: "The two men on the ballot have earned their right to run, alone and as such, I have endorsed Mr. Clement and would ask all 1,376 of you, to do the same. Experience matters and Mr. Clement isn't a Johnny come lately."

Meantime, one of the interesting elements to get some attention after the election, perhaps, is the "coordinated campaign" underway by all four incumbents -- an overlay on top of their individual campaigns, and one that's no surprise for a group of elected officials that have portrayed themselves as more or less members of a common team.

We'd expect that Mayor Bell and Ward 3's Mike Woodard are the most likely to bring long coattails into the election; both failed to draw enough challengers to necessitate a runoff last month.

The incumbents will be presumably celebrating their election victory as a team on Tuesday night downtown.

Speaking of Woodard: BCR has talked to both the incumbent and challenger Allan Polak about the ongoing dispute over Polak's review of email messages -- a review that ran into problems with City staff were, according to both the challenger and incumbent, unable to produce all the requested emails due presumably to a technical fault.

The N&O's Jim Wise documented this matter in a blog post at the Bulls Eye site. BCR has attempted to obtain audio or video of last week's candidate forum at the NCCU Law School last week but, unable to do so, there's not much new to say beyond a he-said, he-said.

How much longer til this election is over, anyhoo?

BCR will have full coverage here on Tuesday night, including liveblogging of the results as they start to arrive around 8pm tomorrow.

PS: Worth mentioning that our friends at Kids Voting Durham have an online option for Durham's youth to express their preferences this election cycle -- and Kids Voting boots at select precincts on Tuesday to boot.

Durham’s young people can make their opinion heard by casting a ballot for Mayor and City Council – just like the adults -- at a Kids Voting booth at Durham polling sites on Election Day.  Even if their families have early voted, students can visit a precinct with a Kids Voting booth and cast their own ballot on Tuesday November 3.

Middle- and high-school students can vote online at www.kidsvotingdurham.org now through 7:30 pm on Election Day, November 3.  Any young person under age 18 can vote at a Kids Voting booth or online.

Comments

[Allan Polak]

Kevin,

As I mentioned on Friday, the larger issue at stake regarding my request for Councilman Woodard's emails (of which I requested 2 months) is that of the right of Durham's citizens to information that both city and state statutes require be accessible. That the email may not be available due to a technical issue makes this no less a violation of the people's right to the information.

The election is tomorrow morning and I still have not received access to the emails and my request for an update on the issue from City Hall has gone unanswered.

Further, this issue most likely concerns not only two months of Councilman Woodards emails, but other electronic public records relating to other City officials as well.

Jim Wise's account of my exchange with Councilman Woodard is very accurate and hardly depicts a "he-said, he-said" scenario. http://blogs.newsobserver.com/bullseye/polak-calls-woodard-comment-complete-

As a journalist I would expect that missing public records would be of particular concern to you. This issue goes beyond a debate between myself and the Councilman and is larger than the election.

Allan Polak
Candidate for Durham City Council, Ward III

[Rob]

Going ad hominem against Mr. Davis... nice.... Now it's my turn.

I agree the public records are important, but if that (and your endless carping on Mr. Woodard's employer) are the whole of your platform, you should not expect very many votes at the ballot box today. Most voters like to see results, not complaints.

Besides, I think that Durham handles press requests for email very well. Most local media have direct access to the inboxes and outboxes of Council and the City Manager. No records request necessary. The fact that a few emails from a year ago are unavailable is disheartening, but I think it is a little quick to blame Mr. Woodard as solely responsible for the problem.

[Allan Polak]

Rob,

1. It is more than "a few emails." It is months worth, and not only Councilman Woodard's emails are missing. It is likely more, but I only took a random sample. I do not, nor have I, held Councilman Woodard solely responsible for this issue. I did raise the issue however, that as an IT professional, he should be particularly aware of the need to maintain proper electronic records. City Council passed the resolution detailing public access to Durham's computerized records and should be expected to see that the policy is carried out. I have most recently raised the issue not with Councilman Woodard, but with the City Manager, City Clerk, and City Attorney. I mention again, keeping these records and making them available to the public is not voluntary - it is City and State law.

2. I am the challenger in this race. Part of my duty is to do just that, challenge the incumbent. In addition I have a platform (www.allanpolak.com) that I discuss often and which does not involve the issues you mentioned.

I did not enter this race with the intention of uncovering what I view as serious questions regarding my opponent's actions and those of the City. These are issues that have arisen throughout the campaign and I believe they should be brought to light. These issues may not appeal to you as a voter, but at each candidate's forum I attend I am thanked by numerous citizens for bringing up issues that are rarely, if ever, discussed.

Allan Polak
Candidate for Durham City Council, Ward III

[Bull City Rising]

Allan,

I should first note that I'm a subjective (not strictly objective) blogger who happens to perform journalistic functions in addition to opinion and analysis pieces.

I guess I'd note the following:

1) I think the email retention is an important issue, but not an end all/be all this cycle. In an earlier email to me, you stated you thought it was a more important issue than the police OT question. I disagree... and I suspect many citizens would as well.

Why? Well, if there was a failure to retain records, my assumption is this will point to a technical fault that needs to be fixed. If there is some kind of evidence that records were lost intentionally or that management knew retention wasn't working, then this is a major issue. But my expectation would be that the City would invest in a retention appliance -- a common practice -- to resolve this once and for all.

That said, if there ever turns out to be evidence of something more than a mistake, for me as a citizen and voter this would rise on the importance meter.

2) I can't speak for Woodard on this, but I would tend to think he shares the concern as well that this was a problem. The issue was uncovered when you placed a records request, yes, but I can say he seemed rather ticked off that the email messages couldn't be found.

I ran into Mike shortly after 11:30am last Monday morning, before you had an opportunity to analyze the records that afternoon but after he had seen the records -- and, according to Mike, after he called Technology Solutions to note that it was impossible he had no sent mail records for the entirety of October 2008.

(I know when I ran into Mike because I happened to be on my way to use my lunch break to deal with the non-redacted City memo on the overtime scandal. I bent his ear on the communications I received from the PIO's office on the matter; he told me he wasn't happy that the City couldn't find all his emails.)

3) As you know, I produced -- to you and to Patrick Baker, the city attorney -- the full headers of an email I received from Woodard from his City email account in October 2008. I did so in an effort to be of assistance in helping the City track down email messages, since full headers provide a MessageID tag that can be useful for grepping log files. To me, that should put to bed the question of whether the City account was being used for outgoing emails (and the answer appears to have been yes.)

...

On a broader point, my Durham Magazine column next month will deal with this question more broadly: but, to sum up, I find it curious that your campaign has turned on issues of whether a City Council member can work for an organization like Duke. (Obligatory disclaimer: I'm a university administrator myself, as noted on my About page.)

The problem I see in Durham is not that we have too many career professionals engaged in politics.

It is that we do not have enough.

And we end up as a result with governance by those who don't work, can't work, or are retired and no longer need to work.

At the LWV forum, Allan, you agreed with the incumbents' positions on most of the policy issues raised around infrastructure decisions, differentiating yourself largely on taxes and crime.

If your big difference from your challenger is that you work for yourself, and your opponent works for a large organization -- and we're supposed to draw the conclusion that you're a better putative Council member on those grounds, not on deep differences over issues and approaches...

Well, I don't suspect that's the stuff of which successful election bids are made.

We'll know in a couple of hours, I suppose. Best of luck with the race.

[barry]

Kevin - the polls have been closed for 25 minutes and you haven't declared the winners yet?

What's the holdup?

[Allan Polak]

Kevin,

As I've said a number of times, I believe the issue of the missing electronic records is larger than the election, and I certainly did not believe that this issue would win the election for me. The fact of the matter is I wasn't looking for this issue, but once discovered I felt it my duty to bring it to the attention of Durham's citizens. Whether the issue was caused by a technical fault, which I've never denied is a strong possibility, it remains a violation of the right's of Durham's citizens and of City and State records retention laws. Ignorance of the law is not a defense.

The fact of the matter is that the emails still have not been produced, nor have I received an update on the issue from City Hall.

Regarding your point #3: The fact that you produced one email from Councilman Woodard sent directly from the City's Exchange Server is not proof that ALL of his public business emails have been sent through their system. I have seen an email sent by Mr. Woodard, concerning public business, that was sent directly from his Blackberry - similarly, this is not proof that ALL of his emails have bypassed the City's Exchange Server. I remind you that my request for email records also included one month of email records from another Council Member, and those records were incomplete as well. Therefore, the email you have from Councilman Woodard does not put the issue to rest.

That I differ from Mr. Woodard on issues of crime and taxes would appear to be a significant difference. These are two very important issues to myself and to many of the people of Durham.

I respect your opinion on the Duke issue. There are federal laws regarding the use of Duke resources, including time, equipment, and personnel for political purposes. I only ask that Council members abide by these laws and recuse themselves from votes concerning Duke. Throughout the campaign I met numerous Durham citizens who were concerned about these issues, many of whom took a much tougher stance than I did.

In the end, I ran the campaign as I believe a challenger should. I raised issues that I felt were worthy of being discussed and that had been largely ignored.

With the election over I wish the Mayor elect and Council Members elect the best of luck in their new terms. As I mentioned to the Herald Sun, it was an honor to be part of the democratic process, and I truly mean that.

I thank you for your thorough coverage of the election. Your site often had much better coverage of the election than could be found elsewhere, and the audio recordings you sometimes had of candidate forums were invaluable.

I will continue to pursue the missing records issue until the City resolves the problem and provides the records.

Best regards,

Allan Polak
Former Candidate for Durham City Council, Ward III