Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, August 6, 1993 TAG: 9308060221
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOEL TURNER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
If news reporters are causing you problems, go over their heads and take your case directly to the voters.
Hold town meetings and appear on television talk shows to get your message across.
It worked for Clinton. He was elected president.
Whether the strategy will work for Roanoke Mayor David Bowers in his campaign for consolidation remains in doubt.
For Bowers, the problem is Roanoke County's political leaders, not news reporters.
County leaders are united in their opposition to consolidation. They helped defeat a merger plan three years ago.
So Bowers has taken the Clinton approach.
He's taking the consolidation cause directly to county voters, going over the heads of the Board of Supervisors and other county officials.
He met Wednesday night with a half-dozen county residents to discuss consolidation. After the two-hour private meeting, the residents said the exchange of ideas with Bowers had helped them better understand the issue.
William Hill, a political science professor at Roanoke College, said Thursday that Bowers is making an end run around the county's political establishment.
"He is taking the fight to the county and [the supervisors] may underestimate his ability to sell consolidation, especially to newcomers," Hill said.
Hill doubts Bowers alone can persuade a majority of county voters to vote for consolidation, but he could change enough minds to embarrass county leaders. "They might have to do a little bit of damage control," he said.
County officials predict Bowers' efforts will be counterproductive and antagonize county voters.
But that didn't happen Wednesday night because most of those at the meeting either favor consolidation or are neutral on the issue.
John Porter, a county resident who attended the meeting, said Bowers did not try to force his ideas on the group.
"He's not trying to step on anyone's foot. He wants to know our concerns and what we would like," said Porter, who favors consolidation.
Jim Webster, another consolidation supporter at the meeting, said Bowers was trying to find out the feelings of county residents and the reasons for the anti-consolidation sentiment.
"It was a good open dialogue. No one was trying to persuade the other," said Webster, who voted for the 1990 merger plan.
Kathy Castle, who hosted the meeting, said she thought it was a positive session.
"We presented him some of our concerns and he talked about the city. There was no argument or debate," said Castle, who is neutral on consolidation.
Bowers intends to have similar meetings with other county groups, but he's not ready to announce them.
The symbolic significance of the Wednesday night meeting might have been greater than the actual value.
Bowers might not have changed many minds, but he showed his concern for an issue that he has pressed throughout his political career.
Supervisor Bob Johnson has criticized Bowers for making a new push for consolidation without even a courtesy call to county officials to alert them to what he planned to do.
"He's burning bridges as he goes," Johnson said.
County officials say county voters still oppose consolidation adamantly.
Bowers hopes to start a grass-roots movement for merger by listening to county residents' concerns - asking them about what they fear in consolidation and what can be done to ease it.
He said that was the focus of his meeting Wednesday with residents in the Woodlands subdivision in North Roanoke County.
Bowers doesn't expect county voters to change their minds immediately, but he said county residents need to begin the dialogue.
"We've got to go through a process. Rome wasn't built in a day," he said.
Bowers believes the 1990 merger plan was rejected because it lacked grass-roots support among county voters. He believes the voters vetoed the plan because no one had adequately explained the need for merger and the benefits of it.
The campaign was botched three years ago, he said, because the consolidation plan was "handed from the top down, rather than from the bottom up."
Bowers was forced to resign as a city negotiator in the 1990 consolidation talks after a controversy erupted over his role in a campaign to build support for it.
There was a pro-consolidation group in the 1990 campaign, but it was overmatched in the fight with an anti-consolidation organization and county supervisors.
Although citizen workshops were held to get the views of city and county voters while the plan was being developed, Bowers believes county voters felt the plan had been drafted by power brokers.
Hill said Bowers' success in rallying support for consolidation will depend partly on how he is perceived by county voters.
If he is viewed as a power-driven politician, he may turn off voters, Hill said. But Bowers doesn't appear to be that, although his style is different, Hill said.
"He doesn't play the same game as many others. He goes for the bold stroke," Hill said.
Most politicians would say county voters have rejected consolidation, Hill said, so we have to wait another 20 years to bring up the issue,
Not Bowers. "He's not the type to take that approach and wait 20 years," Hill said.
by CNB