Wednesday, May 20, 2009

I worry about American Democracy

Yesterday I manned my local precinct for the Democrats in a special election to fill a vacant seat on the County Council. Looking at the result, I find myself wondering about our political process.

My county, with a population of about one million people, has a county government budget of more than $4 billion per year. The county is relatively affluent and well governed, with a population expecting and enjoying a high level of public service. Schools are good, The police force is highly educated, well trained, and responsive to public needs. There are lots of good libraries and parks, and neighborhoods are well relatively well planned.

Still there are a number of problems confronting local government. The obvious one is how to manage the taxes and expenditures during the current recession. What cuts can be made maintaining a high level of services, and where might the voters prefer to find new sources of revenue to maintain services? Moreover, there are continuing problems of dealing with a diverse population with significant growth, and dealing with aging neighborhoods in some areas and new developments in others.

The nine member county council has been badly divided in the past year. It seems obvious to me that we needed to add a member to the council who will intelligently and rationally deal with the problems of governing the country, and especially who will help the council deliberate more effectively on the issues before it.

One would expect in this highly educated, relatively mature residents of the county to have high levels of voter participation, but there are fewer than 120,000 registered voters, and less than eight percent of them came out to vote yesterday.

Nancy Navarro, received more than 3/5th of the votes. Since the Council District has a two to one Democratic majority, it was expected that Democrat Navarro would win. Moreover, she is well recognized in the local community, ran for the same office last year narrowly losing to widower of the previous incumbent who had died (and who himself died in office). Navarro is a member of the school board (which manages about half of the county government), she has twice been elected President of the board and has the reputation of being both able and effective in helping the board achieve compromises.. She had endorsements of the Washington Post, the major local paper, as well as organizations ranging from the Sierra Club, to unions, to developers, to Hispanic and African-American political organizations, to the transportation community.

But I find it hard to understand how Robin Ficker could have received nearly a third of the vote. Ficker was once a registered Democrat, who ran for County Executive as an Independent, but ran in this election as a Republican. He apparently moved into the District in order to qualify for the office. His license to practice law in Maryland was suspended in 2007 for at least a year:
The Maryland Court of Appeals ruled 7-0 against Ficker on three complaints from clients who said he had failed to properly represent them in criminal cases....

"The hearing judge found that he exhibited incompetence, lack of diligence, failure to communicate with his client, and committed conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice," among other types of malfeasance, Cathell wrote......

The court's decision noted that Ficker, 64, had been cited four times before for failing to properly represent his clients.
In reviewing Ficker's service in the State legislature, the Washington Post described Ficker as the "hands-down winner of all awards for worst member of the Maryland General Assembly," citing his "inability to produce the slightest constructive legislative result." Ficker's behavior as a basketball fan in the 1990's was so extreme that, according to the Washington Post, it "forced the NBA to change its rules on fan behavior." How can thousands of voters have decided that this was the man to represent them in our County Council during this critical time?

In any case, congratulations to Nancy Navarro, and good luck in your new responsibilities. Now, lets hope that a great replacement will be named to the School Board! And lets hope that the voters come out in greater numbers, with better information and analysis, in future elections.

Nancy Navarro's Campaign YouTube Video

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