Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 20, 1992 TAG: 9202200585
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
THE BIG EVENT IN ROANOKE
AS A MEANS of nominating candidates for public office, the mass meeting is a less-than-artistic affair, and it has shortcomings.One is the impression it fosters of being a semiprivate partisan event for party activists, political junkies, candidates' cronies and faithful followers. In other words: for someone else.
In fact, Roanoke's Democratic mass meeting on Saturday, whoever may attend, could prove important for the entire city. This is so not just because, for the first time in 16 years, Roanokers face the prospect of a mayor other than Noel Taylor.
It is so, also, because the differences between the two Democratic candidates, Vice Mayor Howard Musser and City Councilman David Bowers, are considerable.
Now, don't get us wrong. The nomination of neither man could be mistaken for the Second Coming. Too, neither is a devil who would bury Roanoke in darkness. Either might make a fine mayor. It's simply that the record gives cause for concern.
When Musser ran for council a decade ago, he gave voice to resentment against rising taxation, the city's focus on downtown development, the influence of the business elite - and Bowers has sung the same song.
Musser, though, has grown in his job. Mayor Taylor stood behind him when he announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination, and the mayor continues to praise Musser's leadership. It's a telling stance for Taylor, a Republican who served on council in 1982 when Musser won election criticizing the city's spending policies.
Musser the insider has continued to support tax cuts against the city's best interests. But he also has come to support aggressive economic development efforts and downtown renewal. He tries, he says, to be the quiet team player, to do the responsible thing.
Bowers, by contrast, remains a whirlwind of posturing. All over the place, with gesture and bombast he has curried favor: Voting against razing the Hunter Viaduct. Condemning the hiring of outsiders for Roanoke jobs. Protesting the city's schedule for street repairs. (Council members, said Bowers, should be able to demand repairs in neighborhoods of their choice. Hey, why not start with your neighborhood!)
At times Bowers has betrayed a preference for politics over governance, for grandstanding over seriousness of purpose. He has hesitated not at all to strike symbolic poses and embrace irresponsible notions, if by so pandering he might accrue political points. He has thrived on class resentment.
Now Bowers says he wants to "take back City Hall" from the bureaucrats. But for what? Some shaking up of the bureaucracy would be a good thing, but there needs to be a purpose to it beyond sloganeering and one man's ambition.
When Bowers was asked for his nomination of the city's worst decision in recent years, did he suggest, say, its abandonment of housing policy? No. The greatest offense Bowers could think of, characteristically, is a symbol cited for divisive effect: the placing of public art in the courthouse atrium.
Presumably in Bowers' view, the unseemly thing symbolizes a frill for the elite, underwritten by suffering masses. This view, like the artwork, is a distraction from the serious business of government. It promises little help for the suffering masses.
Saturday's mass meeting won't be pretty by most people's standards, but it will be elitist in this sense: A minority will make choices affecting all of Roanoke. The more Roanokers who attend, and choose wisely, the better.
Keywords:
POLITICS