In one of my favorite childhood stories, "The Barnyard Revolution", an arrogant farmer named Turnipseed so enraged his animals that they rose up and took over the farm. The final line of the story was the animals speaking in chorus: "Let other farmers now take heed, or they'll end up like Turnipseed".
Take heed, Turnipseeds on Quakertown council: David Zaiser 736. Donald Rosenberger 696. Dan Williams 685. Ray Fulmer 594. Mark down Election Day 2005 as the start of the Revolution.
You say you want a revolution. Well, you know, we all want to change the world. In this historically blue-collar borough, Dave Zaiser reaffirmed the value of hard work. And Turnipseed Ray Fulmer lost his seat in exactly the same way he sat on it for 10 years. Doing little, and assuming no one would care.
You say you got a real solution. Well, you know, we'd all love to see the plan. I had my doubts back in February, when Zaiser announced his run for council. Managing a municipality is like managing a business; there is no substitute for experience.
But the next best things are enthusiasm and hard work. Zaiser spent months attending meetings, organizing rallies, knocking on doors, talking to the residents, listening to their concerns. He, literally, took his campaign to the people. Meanwhile, Fulmer, and council, sat back and yawned that the citizenry was always free to come to them at the scheduled monthly meetings. Rosenberger actually said that regularly going out into the community "doesn't make sense". Well, you know, you better free your mind instead.
Had Fulmer made the effort that Zaiser did, he would have seen the level of anger and resentment at council's shenanigans. Improper no-bid contracts, huge tax and utility increases, deferred maintenance, lack of historical protection, no cooperation with Richland. Total indifference to citizen complaints.
Fulmer's lazy campaign consisted primarily of a handout at the Halloween parade extolling the virtues of the borough. A little door knocking, mostly in his own ward. A letter to the editor saying that Zaiser couldn't find any real issues to raise. Then, incredibly, he expressed shock when he finished dead last.
His total lack of understanding of the result perfectly mirrored his total lack of understanding of the myriad problems. Qtown voters saw. Clearly. How council had let them down. How their support was taken for granted. And they responded by giving Zaiser more votes than all three incumbents! That is the value, and reward, of enthusiasm and hard work.
Let Election Day 2005 be a lesson to the rest of the Turnipseeds on borough council. "Ignore the people, don't bother to bid, and you'll end up like Fulmer did." The Quakertown Revolution has begun, and the next David Zaisers are preparing for Election Day 2007. Don't you know it's gonna be alright.
Meanwhile, over in Richland, everyone got into the supervisor campaign act - the candidates, the two incumbent supes, a State Senator and Representative, outside agitators, the attorney for one candidate, even the Richland police.
Republican Craig Staats rolled over Vic Stevens by 58.5% to 41.5%. Staats won all four districts, and his 1086 votes was by far the highest total ever for an RT supervisor. Stevens received 770 votes, almost matching fellow RCA member Mike Zowniriw's 2003 total of 780. But Staats improved on Pat Keller's 2003 figure of 702 by more than 50%!
A Democratic committeeperson said "I don't want to read that this is a mandate". The Harvard University Institute of Politics defines "mandate" as "The belief that once a candidate is elected, he has the support of the people to institute his policy proposals."
Well, 58.5%, and the highest vote total in township history, certainly says that Staats has "the support of the people". And the crushing defeat of the RCA-backed Stevens clearly signals that the two-year old Zowniriw Era has been recognized as (in the words of one fellow Democrat), the Zowniriw Error.
Z campaigned hard for Stevens, spending hundreds of his own dollars for ads in a local shopping paper, and touting him on the Internet. His Green Party buddy from Perkasie set up the deceptive Republicans for Stevens website, featuring pictures of Stevens with prominent GOP's like Rob Wonderling, Paul Clymer, and Steve Tamburri, in an attempt to confuse voters as to which party endorsed Stevens.
And apparently the confusion traveled as far as Doylestown. Early voters at the Richland Elementary School found that one of the machines actually listed Stevens, and all Democrats, as Republicans!
By the time the error became known, twenty people had already cast ballots. If any Richland or Bucks County races had been decided by twenty votes or less, those twenty people would have been called to return and revote - knowing that everything depended on what they did. Can you say "headed for the courts?"
Even if you can't, Democratic Attorney Larry Otter can. Election Day 2005 was supposed to be the biggest day of his life. The day he was going to defeat Diane Gibbons, and become the new Bucks County District Attorney. Unfortunately for Larry, he received only 26% of the votes in the primary, losing to Terry Houck. You might even call it a mandate.
So Otter had to content himself with lawyering for fellow Dems like Stevens, and Patrick Murphy. And filing a suit against Staats for saying that another Murphy lawsuit , against Richland, was "bogus". Richland police are investigating complaints that Otter showed up at two polling places, allegedly grabbing Supervisor Rick Orloff, and getting in the face of Staats' campaign manager. Both filed police reports, especially because Otter is from Hilltown, and not even eligible to vote in Richland.
If Otter is cited, he may finally get to face Diane Gibbons.