ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, December 27, 1995 TAG: 9512270120
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A8 EDITION: METRO
IN WASHINGTON, D.C., a Republican Congress is at budget loggerheads with a Democratic president.
In Richmond, a 20-20 party split on the floor of the new state Senate has party leaders at odds over who should control the chamber and how firmly it should be controlled.
Now, in Roanoke, a soon-to-be evenly split City Council can't agree on an interim successor to Vice Mayor John Edwards. (His impending resignation to take the state Senate seat to which he was elected in November will alter council's composition from 4-3 Democratic to a 3-3 tie.)
Don't look for city government to suspend operations a la Washington, or for either party to seek City Council defectors from the other a la Richmond. Thankfully, the situation in Roanoke, where municipal issues don't often break down along party lines anyway, isn't that bad.
The Democrats want to name someone - presumably a Democrat - who's likely to run for election in his or her own right this spring. As we noted in an earlier editorial, the obvious candidate under this scenario is School Board Chairman Nelson Harris.
Not only has he been an intelligent and conscientious public servant; he also finished just out of the running in the 1994 councilmanic elections. We would have hoped even the Republican members would have gone along with his appointment.
The Republicans, however, want a caretaker on council, someone who has no interest in running for election to council this spring. This is a reasonable position, with good arguments to support it. The point, in any case, is that if the three GOP council members want to stop the Democrats from naming Harris, or anyone else, they have the votes to do it.
After 30 days of council indecision, the matter would be sent to local circuit court judges. That's OK by the Democrats, they suggest, since the judges were named to the bench by General Assembly Democrats.
True enough. But the respected Roanoke Valley judiciary also has followed - wisely - a tradition of steering clear of partisan politics. The judges' appointee might well be - indeed, probably would be - a nonpolitical caretaker, the very outcome that council Democrats say they don't want.
Except, of course, judges rather than the directly elected council would make the choice. Given all this, why should council default the decision?
In light of Republicans' view of the matter and the new parity on council, Democrats should seek an accommodation - and a suitable caretaker on whom a council majority could agree.
Regardless of the avenue by which Edwards' successor is named, disaster hardly lurks in the offing. And in any event, city voters will have the final say in the 1996 municipal elections.
In the meantime, though, Roanoke would set a welcome and timely example - in contrast to Washington and Richmond - if City Council, avoiding partisan strife, came to an amicable arrangement on its own.
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