Write in a neighborhood mayor

So far I’ve been under whelmed by our choices for mayor, so here’s a community-building alternative — just to make things a little more interesting.

What say Hillsdale gets behind a local neighborhood write-in candidate for mayor. Other strong neighborhoods like St. Johns or Hollywood or Multnomah Village might do the same with its own candidate for mayor.

The candidate would campaign only in the local community, but the vote would clearly register when the community’s precinct results are tallied. The results would measure the desire for community autonomy, not from Portland, but from the city's centralized, rigid, unresponsive government.

The neighborhood campaigns would be low-budget. No sound-bite TV or radio ads. No glossy mailed brochures. Just a lot of yard signs and high-touch, door-to-door, neighbor-to-neighbor canvassing within one walkable community.

These local candidates would send the message that our neighborhoods are tired of City Hall's dancing to the tune of downtown interests. We’re tired of lobbying City Hall with so little to show for our volunteer efforts. We’re tired of the city planting utility poles in our sidewalks; finding new, “creative” taxes to provide what should be essential services, stone-walling community initiatives, commercializing the "commons," and calling “community town halls” that are nothing more than window-dressing.

At the very least, local insurgent mayoral candidacies would attract more political attention to their communities. At best, they would lay the groundwork for neighborhood political action.

The greatest chance of a high protest vote is in places that already have strong community identities, want to control their destinies, and are tired of being played the fool.

I might add that each of the communities I mention above (Hillsdale, Hollywood, St. Johns, and Multnomah), happen to have newspapers or other effective means of communicating messages like this one.

Where there is communication, there are communities. Where there is strong communication, there are communities with the means to exercise their strength.

It’s time we started doing it.

Moving forward while getting "it"

Right now, I haven’t decided between Sam Adams and Sho Dozono in the mayor’s race.

My negative experiences with Adams in Hillsdale dealings outweigh his much touted experience in City Hall.

But I’m keeping an open mind, especially after meeting Sho Dozono last week

He had come to Hillsdale for one of Don Baack’s walk-arounds. The candidate was wearing mismatched walking shoes — on purpose.

One was an Adidas sneaker; the other was a Nike, so as not to offend. Talk about politically correct.

I was reminded of Thoreau’s advice that you should never to take a job that requires you to change the way you dress.

To which we should add: never run for public office if it forces you to wear mismatched walking shoes.

Then there is that obscure Dozono campaign slogan:

“Sho gets it. Sho gets it done.”

Which leads directly to the Clintonesque question “What is the meaning of ‘it’?”

A visit to the Dozono web site doesn’t address “it.”

"It" is an indefinite pronoun. Very useful for an indefinite candidate.

Then again, perhaps this is straw pronoun? Could “it” really be “them”?

And if so, why not say so, except that it sounds funny: “Sho gets them. Sho gets them done.”

Face it, these campaign consultants are WAAAAY overpaid.

Meanwhile on the Adams front, Sam’s suggestion that neighbors tax themselves through “Halo” local improvement districts (LIDs) in order to build sidewalks in Southwest Portland is turning out to be a bust. It’s one of those city proposals that swells attendance at neighborhood association meetings— because the citizenry is outraged. When the homebodies flick off the tube long enough to personally shout down city officials, officialdom knows it has a problem.

Adams, alas, is in charge of the Portland Department of Transportation and floated the Halo LID idea here. Expect him to run out from under the Halos as fast as he can.

By the way, Adams’ lawn sign slogans are as jejune as Dozono’s are vague.

They implore us to vote for Adams “Because Portland belongs to ALL of us.” Is anyone suggesting otherwise?

The other tag line is “Let’s move Portland Forward!” Reverse anyone? Neutral? Park?

Where is WEIRD when we need it?