As you’ll recall, I’ve been keeping half an eye on the Carbondale mayor’s race between incumbent Brad Cole and challenger Sheila Simon, the daughter of the late US Senator. Simon stomped Cole in the primary and now the two are facing off in the general.
The Republicans, including House GOP Leader Tom Cross, view this as an important race for a couple of reasons. Cole is seen as a valuable member of the GOP bench, and they’d like to have him appointed to or run for the House if Sen. Dave Luechtefeld retires and Rep. Mike Bost attempts to move to the Senate.
GOP staff has been sent in to help Cole, and the other day Cross, Luechtefeld and Rep. Bill Mitchell held a press conference with Cole to give him a bit of a boost…
Cross joined fellow GOPs, State Sen. Dave Luechtefeld, Carbondale Mayor Brad Cole and 87th district Rep. Bill Mitchell in Carbondale Saturday to call on Blagojevich to start showing some leadership, stop expanding programs the state can’t pay for and end the tirade against businesses they fear will drive more jobs out of Illinois.
Cole, who is seeking re-election for Carbondale mayor against Democratic opponent Sheila Simon in April, said Blagojevich has been the best business governor for Indiana, not Illinois, in his tenure in office.
Cole said the governor doesn’t seem to understand his proposed Gross Receipts Tax will come down on hundreds of small businesses across Illinois, including several dozen locally.
“If you look at any fast-food franchise in the area, they are going to be doing more than a million dollars in sales a year. Most of them are owned by local people, a mom and pop,” Cole said.
Meanwhile, a Facebook page has become an issue in the race…
A website that appeals to college kids is encouraging SIU students to vote for Brad Cole in the Carbondale mayor’s race.
His opponent Sheila Simon says the site is misleading.
The site, on facebook.com, claims Simon plans to raise the age for a person to enter a bar in Carbondale from 19 to 21, if she’s elected.
Simon says she’s never talked about changing the age policy in bars, and just wants voters to be accurately informed.
There are more than 500 members on the site, including Brad Cole.
Actually, he’s more than just a member, he’s an administrator. And raising the entry age to bars would be a huge issue in Carbondale.
Dave at Carbondaley Dispatch backs up Cole’s claims that he joined as an admin in order to “police” the page, and since the story broke they’ve taken down a lot of not so nice photos and comments about Ms. Simon. You need to be a member to see the site but Dave has posted a screenshot.
It’s really amazing what candidates can get nailed for these days.
Also, Simon’s campaign has had to deal with an unfriendly blogger the past several weeks. His most recent post (today) is about a lunch he had with Simon about six months ago, not long after she had announced for mayor…
After Sheila and Tom Redmond sat down and we had ordered, I asked Sheila the obvious question, “Why do you want to be mayor?” She responded, “I think the strongest person should take the heavy box off the top shelf.” I said, “what?” She repeated herself, exactly. I said, “what does that mean?” She went on, “you know, I think I’m a strong performer and have a lot to offer.” I said, “that is the reason you want to be mayor?” “Yes.” “OK.” I was surprised that she didn’t have a reason for being mayor that didn’t suck, but decided to move along.
He also wrote this today…
We have a funny exchange about the Northeast part of town. I told her a story about how I started to drive though the Northeast several times a day, over the course of several weeks the previous summer. When I was driving through, my greatest impression was of the young black men walking back to their houses with brown paper bags full of booze. It seemed like a shame to me then and a shame to me now. Sheila told me, “I have never seen that.” I told her, “you have to go look, when was the last time you were over there?”
And then in comments after someone accused him of being “racist,” he wrote…
There is a large difference between a college student doing the strip and people who don’t have a job, drinking all day. I think it is OK to discriminate based on people being lazy or stupid, that is called capitalism.
That one might sting.
- Will - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 2:18 pm:
Holy cow, Rob Taylor is STILL involved in Carbondale politics?! He ran for Mayor as a student back when I was at SIUC in the 90’s.
Last time I went back it looked like the strip had suffered a lot. I’m not sure I get why anyone would think Brad Cole will suddenly make Carbondale more fun again.
Anyway, it makes sense for someone in a college town to use facebook and myspace for their campaign. It would be foolish not to at this point.
- Yellow Dog Democrat - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 2:19 pm:
I’d love to know how many employees at BSquare, founded by this blogger, are African American.
His company doesn’t even have a policy on race or gender diversity on its website.
- Team Sleep - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 2:58 pm:
Carbondale will sink or swim based on the college and what President Poshard does with the school. It’s a college town in the same breath as Chambana, DeKalb, Columbia, Macomb, Lexington, etc. If the college keeps its image up, the town will do well. If Poshard runs the school into the ground, the town will suffer. End of story.
Carbondale is booming and so is Marion. But how much of that is tied to the I-57 and Illinois 13 expansion? They are both nice places to live, and the easy through access for companies, tourists and students make the two-city locations (not to mention Murphysboro) an attractive locale.
- decaturboy - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 3:59 pm:
Mitchell should be worried about his own district. He was worried about getting involved in the Decatur mayor contest 4 years between 2 republicans.
- Saloukee - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 4:00 pm:
Carbondale is the BEST college town
Ousting Cole would be a plus
Maybe Cross should send that dreamey state rep from Peoria to try to save Cole. What does Mitchell add to the effort
- Levois - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 5:39 pm:
Well this is the second time today Facebook has wound up on The Capitol Fax Blog.
- Robbie - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 5:53 pm:
How many people that join that facebook group will even vote in Carbondale? I would assume most of the students aren’t registered voters in the city, and that most who are, won’t vote anyways.
- Southern Illinois Voter - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 7:08 pm:
Brad Cole has been an excellent mayor for Carbondale. He has done more for that city in 4 years than the previous one did in 16 years. If he’s not re-elected, it will be a shame.
- leigh - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 7:38 pm:
Cole is a good mayor and Simon would probably be fine. Lucky for Carbondale they have some good choices. Wish the same could be said for the statewide elections!
- so ill - Monday, Mar 19, 07 @ 7:48 pm:
Hey you can’t spell Carbondale without C-O-L-E!
Seriously, Cole has been good for the city and should get a medal for his ability to put Carbondale on the map in Illinois, despite the kicking and screaming of certain residents who still think it’s the 1970s.
It’s too bad that this election has been made out to be a partisan race. And the same people who vote blindly for their political party (cough, Democrats; cough, cough, Blagojevich) are probably going to ruin a good thing for our city.
But one the bright side, people in So. Ill are familiar with being disappointed. Which is why this region of the is so easy to ignore.
- Said Blogger - Tuesday, Mar 20, 07 @ 3:17 pm:
I was noting the comment about Bsquare’s racial policies. When I was there we hired 100% of the programmers we interviewed, that were black. Which was exactly 1 person. Black programmers are in high demand and generally are hired up by the federal government or the Fortune 50. In truth there might have been more, but they didn’t survive the phone screen or didn’t apply.
Of course, we had 15 or 20 Vietnamese, 50 to 100 Indians, 25 to 75 Chinese. I bet we had about as many Caucasian employees then as we had non-Caucasian. The only thing we cared about is if you could perform. We would have hired a one legged Martian if they could program and had a green card.
I had a management team working for me that was over half women, in a business that has maybe 15% women in total. I couldn’t help it, they had more people skills and deserved the promotions. But that doesn’t count in Illinois does it?
Capitalists have a racial policy that involves green and performance. If you don’t have government contracts, you just hire the best people you can. I guess Bsquare still doesn’t have government contracts.
It is fun to live on the West Coast, you quickly forget about discrimination. You hear nothing about it. There are black, white, brown, gay, straight, liberal, conservative, pretty and ugly all searching for success. Everyone is so busy working, we forget to look for our entitlements.
It was so shocking to move back to Southern Illinois and step right back into the snake pit of racial problem. It is sad.
- Said Blogger - Tuesday, Mar 20, 07 @ 3:25 pm:
I disagree with Team Sleep’s comment. Carbondale has little in common with the other cities listed. We have no outside industry at all. We have lots of service jobs and the regional hospital, but we make nothing, beyond training students. This is because Carbondale’s city government has been broken for many years.
In the last 4 years, there has been real progress. Our store fronts are filling up. Rental prices are up. Property values are up.
I bought a commercial building on Highway 13 (our main drag) in Carbondale a little over 5 years ago. It had been sitting empty for a couple of years, I bought it for half of asking. Now people stop in and try to buy it from me when I’m there. I’m fairly sure I can sell it for headed toward 3 times what I bought it for.
This is the power of a pro-business mayor in office for 4 years.
One of the great problems SIU faces is a lack of local businesses to interact with. There is simply nothing here, no internships, no funded research, there is just nothing here.
We wish we were like those other cities listed, but electing an anti-business mayor will not do it.
- Gadfly - Wednesday, Mar 21, 07 @ 6:45 am:
How do you get that Simon is anti-business? She is anything but.
As to Facebook, the naughty language has been cleaned up but the fabrication of Simon’s record remains. Brad is still an administrator there and the clean-up obviously shows he’s paying attention. If he has done so much, its not clear as to why he needs to lie to people to get their votes.