Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, September 28, 1995 TAG: 9509280022
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BRIAN KELLEY STAFF WRITE1R
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Long
On a Friday morning in February, cheerful Democrats wandered the floor of the House of Delegates chamber just before the day's session began. They were savoring their defeat of Republican Gov. George Allen's proposals to cut millions from the state budget.
Jim Shuler, the freshman delegate from Blacksburg, scanned the House floor and summed up what it meant to him to be a part of the action: "It's really awesome to see the process at work."
That victorious Friday could turn out to be just a faded memory for Virginia Democrats, if Republicans win control of the General Assembly this fall, or a harbinger of lame-duck sessions to come for the governor, if Democrats hold the line.
Shuler is trying to make sure it's the latter. He's seeking re-election to the seat he won easily two years ago over a young Republican. It's a seat Democrats have held since 1982 and one Republicans want very badly to win.
This time, Shuler is facing Larry Linkous, a better-known and more seasoned challenger than his last opponent, and with strong ties to the Blacksburg community. That local popularity could cut into Shuler's Blacksburg voting base, where previously he racked up 70 percent or more of the vote in five of six key precincts surrounding Virginia Tech.
To Shuler, a quiet, unassuming veterinarian, the race is about more than just his political future.
Despite recent polls showing many people unaware of who controls the Legislature, Shuler says it does matter. Republicans need only three seats to overtake the Democrats, four seats to take outright control of the House.
"If the numbers change, all the major committees will be headed up by fine people from Northern Virginia," Shuler says. "I'm suggesting that not as a politician, but as a realist."
The governor, Shuler suggests, already wields a tremendous amount of power. This past winter, Democrats in the General Assembly checked that power, in particular leading the effort to restore funding to Virginia Tech and its Cooperative Extension Service. Without that check, as Shuler sees it, the forecast is dire for local interests.
"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see what's going to happen to Southwest Virginia," Shuler says.
Ever since he began his campaign in a Blacksburg elementary-school library in May, Shuler - though he wouldn't characterize it this way - has run against the Allen agenda and for sustained or increased funding for public education, from primary grades to colleges. Last week, he endorsed the Democratic Party's plan calling for $200 million more for higher education in the next two-year state budget.
He's also made a point of becoming a self-appointed defender of state workers, decrying what he says is the Allen's administration's attempts to portray government employees as lazy, computer-game playing bureaucrats.
Shuler stresses the larger stakes in most every campaign appearance. "It's probably the most important election throughout the commonwealth that we've seen in the last 100 years," he told a Sept. 19 Blacksburg campaign forum. "I pray, and say that sincerely, that you search your soul and vote for the future of Virginia."
Shuler ran a quiet, gentlemanly campaign in 1993. This time he and Linkous, who professed to be friends before the campaign, stuck to the same course initially but have tangled over each other's voting records and campaign tactics this month. Linkous says the Shuler camp is conducting misleading phone surveys about his record and has investigated his businesses. Shuler says Republicans are doing the same to him.
This time, unlike in '93, Shuler seems far more comfortable with the role of politico, and with the give and take of politics.
"I'm certainly a lot more knowledgeable on the issues at hand," he says. "It's probably true that I feel more comfortable as I obtain more knowledge."
Shuler grew up the youngest of six children on a 100-acre dairy farm in Page County, in the Shenandoah Valley. His father worked for the railroad and sold insurance on the side. His mother ran the farm and raised the children.
He came to Blacksburg to attend Tech, met and married a Pulaski woman and earned his veterinary credentials at the University of Georgia (in the days before Tech had a vet school). He worked in Fairfax County for three years, then returned to Blacksburg with his young family to start Companion Animal Clinic.
Twenty-two years later, his business is a success and he and his wife, Margaret, have two grown children: a daughter who graduated from Georgetown University and a son in his fourth year at the University of Virginia.
Shuler served on Blacksburg Town Council and the state Board of Health during the 1980s. By running for the House, he sought to follow in the political footsteps of Joan Munford, whose seven House campaigns he'd worked for between 1982 and 1991.
On the local front, Shuler, working with state Sen. Malfourd "Bo" Trumbo, R-Fincastle, was key this year in pushing a bill through the General Assembly to grant an exception to Warm Hearth Village from the state's ban on new nursing home beds. That measure will allow the Blacksburg retirement community to apply for state permission to build a new facility.
But he says statewide issues - particularly the budget battle - have been his most significant legislative work. Aside from restoration of Extension funds and other education money, Shuler points to the restoration of money to mental health programs and to passage of a major education bill that included provisions to bring technology to schools in rural areas and decreased pupil-teacher ratios for at-risk children.
He says he's focused on building "coalitions of support" for the region in the General Assembly, given Southwest Virginia's shrinking political clout and Northern Virginia's burgeoning power.
The only veterinarian in the General Assembly, Shuler says his profession has given him an opening to meet and deal with a wide variety of people in Richmond. Whether Democrat or Republican, legislator or secretary, everyone likes to talk about his or her pet; call it canine caucusing. A conversation about a sick dog one day, Shuler says, can later lead to support for something important to the New River Valley.
JIM SHULER
Party: Democrat
Age: 51
Occupation: Veterinarian
Residence: Blacksburg
Family: Married, two children
WHAT THE CANDIDATE SAYS ABOUT HIS:
CORE VALUES: Education. "I'm not going to compromise on that any at all. Money's not the total issue in education, but we have to make an investment. ... The best payback for Virginia over the long term will be a refocusing on efforts to make education again at the top of our priority list."
INDEPENDENCE: "I've always voted my conscience and what I've thought was the best for the 12th District."
VISION: Making the same educational opportunities he had available to future generations. "I came from not an affluent background. My parents thought the most important thing for their six children was to try to give them a better educational preparation than they had. They instilled that in us at an early age."
Keywords:
POLITICS PROFILE
by CNB