Election 2014

Here's my usual essay on some of the down-ballot races.

• County Sheriff. This race is officially nonpartisan, but neither candidate makes a secret of their party affiliation. The incumbant Rich Stanek is a Republican from the suburbs; the challenger Eddie Frizell is a DFLer who lives in the city.

  • Frizell has echoed concerns about Stanek's management of the sheriff's office which seem to be well-founded: the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Deputies Association overwhelmingly endorsed Frizell.
  • Where Frizell and Stanek have taken different positions, I've agreed with Frizell: in support of body cameras for deputies, taking real steps to limit foreclosures, and cutting non-police administrative expenses in the department. Frizell has also criticized Stanek for spending too much time, on the department's budget, lobbying in D.C.
  • The body cameras point strikes a chord of law enforcement personnel holding themselves above "civilians" (despite the fact that they are not military police; the sheriff and city police are themselves civilians). In the same vein, Stanek also refused to paticipate in any debates for this election, and there's an article on one of the community blogs suggesting inappropriate handling of a vandalism case against Stanek's son.

  So I'm planning to vote for Frizell.

• City questions. Yes on both: 30 people running for mayor was ridiculous, and we do need fewer restrictions on alcohol sales in bars.

• School board at-large. This is an ugly race - last-minute entrant Don Samuels is running a negative campaign, and calling the police on one community organization's Get Out the Vote drive.

  Much of Samuels's funding comes from out-of-state groups aimed at busting teachers' unions and privatizing the public schools: "This is often accomplished through efforts to expand 'school choice' through district and charter school competition, with the accompanying goals of weakening or eliminating both teachers unions and democratically elected school boards. The infamous Koch brother-funded 'American Legislative Exchange Council,' or ALEC, has also used its political muscle to push pro-charter bills through state legislatures across the country."

  It's certainly true that MPS does not address all student's needs, and that the north side schools in particular have gotten a bad deal. But I don't think the solution is to take funding out of the schools and into private profit. The radical agenda of Samuels's backers is wrong for Minneapolis.

  I'll be voting for Gagnon and Altamirano.

• State Supreme Court justices.
  • Associate Justice 2. Incumbant Wilhelmina Wright, appointed by Gov. Dayton, has an opponent with very little web or news presence. I don't know much about her, but in this case I'm taking no news to be good news.
  • Associate Justice 3. Easy vote for the incumbant, David Lillehaug. The challenger is a tea-party sort who wants to bring the bible back to courtroom.

• 4th District Court

  • Judge 16. The incumbant, James Moore, was appointed by Gov. Dayton and has the unanimous support for the city council for retention. I can't find anything about his opponent online, probably because a judicial candidate with the same name from Ohio seems to be working really hard at his campaign. But Dayton and the council's approval is good enough for me.
  • Judge 43. My first choice didn't make the runoff. I've since heard both of the candidates speak, and I think that they'd probably both make a great judge. I like a technical background better than a prosecutorial background, so I'm leaning towards Sullivan.
  • Judge 53. Another race that I don't know a whole bunch about. The internet tells me that Bev Benson has a DFL background - interning for Martin Sabo, for example - and for most of her legal career has been a prosecutor. It's harder to find information about Chris Ritts's background; he's currently defense and personal injury attorney. I'll probably vote for Benson.
  • Judge 61. It's easy to find information about these candidates, and it's easy to draw inferences from the clearly party-line difference in the people endorsing each. To me, Amy Dawson is the clear choice — I'll vote for the next Ruth Ginsburg over a possible next Scalia any day.

  The other judge races are unopposed. I'll probably write my neighbors in for some of them. Send me an email if you want me to write your name in too!