I have been watching Brad work with the limited resources of Carbondale and start to turn things around as mayor. He wrote a plan before the last election and has marched down and done everything in his plan. The plan he wrote was reasonable and possible.
Brad has cut spending in City Hall. He has made doing business in the city go from impossible to possible, this is a big improvement. Brad has attacked the biggest building problems and solved them in partnership with private industry.
Brad has turned lemons into lemonade. But he also didn't decide to make his lemons into brandy or gold, it would have made him fail because he doesn't seem to believe in magic.
We know he has been the best mayor in Carbondale in my lifetime based on performance. I'm amused that Sheila Simon has decided to run against him with no visible agenda or platform, hoping her family name will work its magic (maybe she does have a plan and we will see it in November?). Why would anyone run against a mayor who is performing at such a high level.
I think that Brad deserves another term and since I'm shutting this down tomorrow, I'll put my support behind him now.
Wouldn't it be great if SIUC looked at Brad's methods and started to follow them? Bad buildings? Fix them up. Find partners in the business world to help you. Plan toward something possible in the short term, those big dreams are only possible if you win in the short term.
Please reelect Brad Cole as Mayor of Carbondale. He has earned it.
6 comments:
I concur ... not that you need my approval by any means. Brad deserves to continue to build on the foundation he's managed to lay heretofore. Most of my "polling" reflects that this is the majority opinion around town.
This won't be a popular statement, but hey, why not go out with a bang on this blog ... maybe Simon is running just because she's convinced that a Democrat needs to be in the Mayor's office ... not because a Democrat can necessarily be more productive, but ... well ... aren't Democrats just supposed to be in charge ...isn't it some divine right they have? Aren't Republicans, at any level of Government, de facto, wrong? This is what I've been told, anyway.
Sarcasm brought to you by the committee to re-elect Brad Cole.
Shawn, lay off the beer, man. Maybe you and Rush have been mixing some Oxydol...er, OxyContin with your beer.
Republicans as a poor downtrodden group? That takes nerve.
I'd hardly say Brad Cole will be mistaken for Rush Limbaugh any time soon. If you can come up with any substantive, quantitative factors that would disqualify Brad, let me know.
I'm waiting... then again I'll be waiting for a long time.
as difficult as i find it to support republicans at this point in history, Brad may be the better candidate.
i recently went to a meet-the-candidate event for Shiela Simon. i like her as a person, but i wonder about her judgement.
Although she stated interest in developing local small businesses, and that she will not accept large campaign contributions, she somehow picked former planner Tom Redmond for her campaign manager. In case you haven't had it out with this guy, he was in charge of city planning while the big box stores were built. He was responsible for the zoning, and he put a lot of small businesses out.
So, yes, i will probably go against party and personal feeling, and vote for the best possible candidate; Brad Cole
Poor and downtrodden ...no. Vilified ...yes.
There's a difference.
I think "nobody" has it about right. Personally, I don't think that partisan Illinois politics has much to do with this race. Who cares who what party anyone is with? At the city level the most basic services are provided should be about excellence.
I'm very disappointed with Sheila not having an clue about economic development. Helping small business is a stupid thing to say, everyone says that. After talking to both candidates for over an hour, Brad has read the rural economic how-to guides and his history indicates he knows how to get things done. If Sheila had a vision for economic development I might well be supporting her, but she doesn't.
Her partnering with Tom Redmond worries me. Tom is a great guy, but he has a bigger city government without results history. I don't think he could have stopped the big boxes in Carbondale, the people wanted them. I do think he ran an office that concentrated on the letter of the law and not enough attention to serving the public. If you are from out of town, Tom's people at City Hall made you feel unwelcome. My history talking to zoning worries me and the supporting stories I have been told make me think that the pre-Brad city hall did more damage to attracting new businesses to Carbondale then any other one factor. Sheila made this choice, I think it was wrong and it is a good reason not to vote for her.
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