ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, May 8, 1996 TAG: 9605080078
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAN CASEY STAFF WRITER
NOTE: Lede
Despite rumblings against him by labor, gays and some black leaders displeased with his performance, Roanoke Mayor David Bowers won re-election Tuesday, trouncing Republican challenger Pat Green by a 10-point margin.
Meanwhile, Democratic candidates for City Council scored a clean sweep, taking all four seats that were up for election and leaving their party with a 6-1 edge over the GOP in council's political makeup.
The biggest winner of the night was Baptist minister and School Board Chairman Nelson Harris, who blasted Republican Jeff Artis by better than a 2-1 margin in a head-to-head special election for a 2-year seat.
Harris won the most votes of any candidate - 7,220 - and was the only candidate to win every precinct in the city.
Another big winner was Councilwoman Linda Wyatt. In at-large voting for three four-year council seats, Wyatt ran first among six candidates, winning the post of vice mayor for the next two years. Second was Carroll Swain, while former Councilman Jim Trout placed third.
Running fourth was Alvin Nash, whose showing surprised many Republican backers who had expected him to win a seat. Former Councilman David Lisk, another Republican, placed fifth. Independent candidate Joe Nash finished sixth.
In unofficial returns, Bowers took 6,620 votes to Green's 5,423. That was 3,642 votes fewer than the mayor pulled four years ago, when turnout was stronger. Then, 47 percent of the city's registered voters went to the polls; on Tuesday, only 30 percent did. But by percentage, Bowers' share of the vote showed only a slight dip from 1992.
No candidate seemed more jubilant or sounded more vindicated Tuesday night than Bowers. For more than a year, he was pilloried by union leaders and some members of the black community who said he betrayed them after they backed him in 1992.
The mayor sounded as if he had borrowed his lines from boxing promoter Don King and former Republican Vice President Spiro Agnew. He said:
"Let me just say that the nitpickers and naysayers, the doomsdayers and the denigrators, all the nattering nabobs of negativism, have had their say. But together, the positive people of Roanoke had their say, and it was a Democratic sweep."
Green said he didn't want to sound negative in defeat, but he did.
"Roanoke is in trouble," the insurance agency owner from South Roanoke said. "I don't think the best-qualified people are going to be sitting on City Council. I'm truly disappointed for Roanoke."
Green won seven of Roanoke's 32 precincts, mostly by small margins. His biggest margins of victory came in the traditionally Republican stronghold of South Roanoke, where in two precincts he beat Bowers by a total of 271 votes out of 1,215 cast.
Bowers beat Green in 24 precincts, and he rolled up large margins in the predominantly black precincts of Eureka Park, Villa Heights, Washington Heights, Lincoln Terrace, Westside and Melrose. One precinct, Monterey, was tied at 167 votes each.
"With the exception of South Roanoke, Lee-Hi, Fishburn Park and the black precincts, it was neck and neck," said political number-cruncher and former Democratic operative Bob Firebaugh. "Green's problem was he didn't get the traditional margin of victory a Republican can usually expect from South Roanoke, and David lost only about 10 percent of the support in the black community that he had [in 1992]."
After the returns were in, Democrats partied gleefully at the Colony House motel on Franklin Road.
"I have completed another part of my dream; that is, to serve the people. I have crossed the threshold," said Swain, 68, a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel who racked up 5,906 votes to place second out of three in the race for four-year seats.
This victory ``allows me to serve on council in the '60s, the '70s, the '80s and the '90s,'' said Trout, who lost his last three council bids. ``This will carry me into the next century.''
But Republicans, who gathered at the Marriott Roanoke-Airport for a post-election party, seemed stunned by the results. They were most surprised at Alvin Nash's loss.
At his home in Wasena, independent candidate Joe Nash said he wasn't at all upset about finishing last. He ran strong in Wasena and Raleigh Court, but weak in black precincts in Northwest Roanoke.
"We got 4,381 votes," Joe Nash said of his first involvement in politics. "We went from zero to 4,381 votes in six weeks."
Artis, a conservative black Republican who earlier in the day had predicted victory, blamed the Republican Party for failing to support him and said he was considering bolting the party.
"It's extremely difficult to take the hits I take - being called an Uncle Tom, a race traitor ... and then not get the support from the party," Artis said. ``That's like saying, `I love my kids,' but not feeding them.''
The new council lineup brings Wyatt, a liberal schoolteacher who has strong union ties, together with Trout, a former railroad executive and four-term council veteran, and Swain, a career military man who was chief of physical plant for the Roanoke school system. Harris is a Baptist minister with moderate-to-liberal leanings.
"It will be an interesting mix," Wyatt said. "There will certainly be some new dynamics."
Some of the lessons from Tuesday's voting may include:
* For black Republicans, former Mayor Noel Taylor and departing Councilman Mac McCadden are hard acts to follow.
Demonstrating that were poor showings by Alvin Nash and Artis in predominantly black precincts.
Nash scored in old-money white precincts, such as South Roanoke No. 1, which he won, and South Roanoke No. 2 and Fishburn Park, where he placed second.
But in Eureka Park he ran last by far, pulling only 61 votes. And in other Northwest Roanoke precincts, Nash ran fourth in Villa Heights, fourth in Washington Heights, and a weak third in the precincts of Westside, Lincoln Terrace and Melrose.
* Endorsements by interest groups may help a candidate but can't cinch a political contest.
For instance, Wyatt scored the only clean sweep of endorsement by the seven organizations that made them. She also placed first in balloting among the candidates for the four-year seats.
Bowers, on the other hand, retained the support only of the Roanoke Education Association. The city Police Benevolent Association, the Peoples Voters League, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance and the Painters Union all endorsed Green; other organizations made no endorsements.
Nevertheless, Bowers took 55 percent of the vote, only about 2 percent less than in 1992, when most of those groups backed him.
Staff Writers Mary Bishop and Leslie Taylor contributed to this story.
LENGTH: Long : 134 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: 1. PAUL L. NEWBY II/Staff. Roanoke Democrats (from left)by CNBNelson Harris, Mayor David Bowers, Jim Trout, Linda Wyatt and
Carroll Swain celebrate their victories Tuesday night. 2. DON
PETERSEN/Staff. Mayoral candidate Pat Green (right), City Council
candidate Alvin Nash (left) and city GOP Chairman Ralph Smith listen
as council candidate David Lisk thanks his supporters Tuesday.
color. 3. STEPHANIE KLEIN-DAVIS/Staff. Carolyn Payne passes out
fliers for independent Joe Nash outside Highland Park Elementary
School, a Southwest Roanoke polling center. 4. Nellie Shepperson
receives an ``I Voted''sticker from Audrey Wheaton at the No. 5 Fire
Station on 12th Street Northwest. 5. John Nelson leaves Wasena
Elementary School after voting. KEYWORDS: ELECTION