Campaign Season

Labor Day is behind us and we move into the toughest season of all for North Bay Village, campaign season.   On the ballot this November are the races for Mayor and Commissioner-At-Large and the candidates are:

Jorge Brito running against incumbent Connie Kreps for Mayor.

Mario Garcia running against incumbent Jorge Gonzalez for Commissioner-At-Large.  

Eddie Lim will retain his seat as Commissioner from Harbor Island as no one declared to run against him.  

North Bay Village politics tends to get ugly very quickly with personal attacks, anonymous mailings, attempts to intimidate family members and employers, rather than a focused discussion of the issues.  I'm afraid this year will be more of the same. 

The smear tactics have already started.  Anonymous complaints have started about the professional life of the candidates and imprecations are being thrown around on posting boards.  

Given the history of how Kreps took over the mayoralty, I guess it's to be expected.  

Kreps was the founding mother of the now defunct Citizens for Full Disclosure who regularly sent unsigned emails in CAPITAL LETTERS attacking anyone who disagreed on any policy issue.  

The word around town now  is that Kreps has engaged her former enemy, Randy Hilliard, as her campaign consultant.  Hilliard has nicknamed himself the Prince of Darkness and has a long record of effective negative campaigns, mostly conducted through shadow PAC's and Electioneering Campaign Organizations.    Given her temperament and past performance, this style of campaign will probably suit the mayor fine.  It's her comfort zone.  

I hope I'm wrong.  I hope instead that this campaign is a discussion of issues and views on how to fix the city. 

As North Bay Villagers, we are accustomed to sewage running in our streets.  It's probably going to fill your inboxes too.  Let's learn to walk around it.  

Kevin Vericker

September 2, 2014