Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, September 18, 1995 TAG: 9509180099
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RICHARD FOSTER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHAMBLISSBURG LENGTH: Long
There are five candidates running for sheriff in Bedford County, but to hear some folks talk, it sounds as if there are only two.
"It's a two-way race," said dairy farmer H.L. Morris as he ate his lunch at the grocery store his wife runs in Chamblissburg. "From all I hear, it'll just be [Doug] Maynard and [Mike] Brown."
Ellis Palmer, who runs a hobby shop down the road, has a sign for Maynard in front of his business, but he hasn't decided how he'll vote.
"Whoever is the best man, that's who I'll vote for," he said.
Regardless of how he votes, he said, he thinks only two people have a real chance at winning: Maynard and Brown.
Maynard - an investigator for the Bedford and Roanoke public defenders' offices who is running as an independent - and Brown - an international security consultant who is running as a Republican - certainly have been the most visible candidates.
Both announced their candidacies in January, and both have raised more than $20,000. They've had large wooden roadside signs up for months. They've held fund-raisers and shaken hands door to door and at public meetings before most of the other candidates had entered the race.
Gov. George Allen and Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Roanoke, have endorsed Brown. Maynard has been endorsed by Bedford County Supervisors Dale Wheeler and Gus Saarnijoki.
The other three candidates - Sgt. Dave Cooper and Deputy Chuck Reid of the Bedford County Sheriff's Office and Officer Darryl Updike of the Bedford Police Department - just got going near Labor Day, the traditional start of the campaign season.
Signs for Cooper, Reid and Updike are competing with signs for Maynard and Brown in the windows of local businesses. Their bumper stickers are popping up in traffic alongside cars festooned with Maynard and Brown stickers. Wooden signs similar to Maynard's and Brown's are sprouting by county roads, and Cooper, Reid and Updike are getting out to many homes and civic groups.
Still, Maynard and Brown don't feel threatened.
"From what everybody tells me, it's a two-way race," Maynard said. "I'm sure each person running has their own pocket of support, but, as I go out, people tell me it's a two-way race.
"What I'm hearing throughout the county is they do not want somebody from inside the sheriff's department to take over. They want somebody from outside."
Brown said, "We consider them all contenders," but added that "the two closest races will be ours and Doug's."
His campaign manager, Rick Wiita, said the one factor that will whittle down the race is fund raising.
"The tale of the tape is the [campaign] budget," he said. "How much radio time can you buy? How many newspaper ads?
"I don't want to say it's just about money, but here's the long, tall and short of it: If you wish to wind up running a public office and handling a $3.7 million budget, then you should have the wherewithal to organize a team that can go out and raise funds."
Not surprisingly, Cooper, Reid and Updike disagree. They haven't raised thousands of dollars, and they say a grass-roots approach is what Bedford County voters really want.
The Brown and Maynard campaigns have spent about $800 and $250, respectively, on permits for their large political signs. The county requires $25 building permits for signs that stay up longer than 60 days.
For the other three candidates, that kind of money would come close to emptying their coffers, or at least putting a significant dent in them.
That's one reason Cooper, Reid and Updike said they waited until 60 days before the election to put up most of their big signs.
"I hope the people in Bedford County don't think money's everything," Cooper said. "I hope they'll vote for the candidate and what he really stands for.
"I don't have a consultant or a campaign manager. My wife and kids are making my signs. I'm spending my own money.
"I'm not as elaborate as Brown or Maynard maybe, but I've been in the sheriff's department for 20 years now and I know the internal workings of the department."
Reid said: "Everybody out here running feels they're going to win. But what a lot of people I'm talking to say is they really want somebody from inside.
"As far as Mike and Doug feeling it's a two-way race, I guess it's good to have that confidence."
The key for him, Reid said, will be door-to-door contact. "They can put up all the signs and posters they want," he said, "but that's what's going to do it."
Darryl Updike's campaign manager, David Norcross, said, "Where [Brown and Maynard] started strong, we intend to finish that way. The signs and the billboards don't mean anything. We're not promoting signs and billboards. We're promoting a candidate."
Updike said he's counting on word-of-mouth from parents who know him as their children's Drug Abuse Resistance Education instructor. He's also counting on making personal contacts at local homes and businesses.
But Maynard and Brown are promising a heavy campaign all the way to the end. Maynard has taken a long vacation from work to campaign and said he has lots of events planned. Brown is talking about television ads.
"Right now there's a lot of flash and fluff that the other candidates are producing," Updike said. "And that might work right now. But as the election gets closer, people will want to know about who the candidates are. And when that happens, the others will fade away to the side and there I'll be."
Keywords:
POLITICS
by CNB