ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, May 8, 1996 TAG: 9605080079
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARY BISHOP AND LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITERS
NOTE" Above
Although he captured the majority of the black vote, the mayor said the decline of black backers serves as a wake-up call.
Mac McCadden stood in the middle of the Republicans' election party Tuesday night and surveyed the damage: His fellow black voters not only had helped re-elect Mayor David Bowers, but also had rejected two black Republican candidates for other seats on Roanoke City Council.
"This is the damnedest thing I've ever seen," said a stunned McCadden, a Republican who leaves council in June. "I'm really embarrassed for Roanoke."
Across town, former city Democratic Committee member Henry Hale pondered the same thing.
"I really think that black folks have to stop thinking about party lines and vote for those candidates who are appreciative of their communities," said Hale, who is black, "and David Bowers has been the most unappreciative and unresponsive person for the black community - and he still got significant votes out of it."
Given that, Hale said, black neighborhoods "can't ever expect to be respected."
Bowers was skewered by black political organizations this spring for flip-flopping on a referendum on a modified ward system. The referendum - which Bowers endorsed, rejected, then recently re-embraced - has strong backing among black voters who believe the at-large council has neglected them.
But Tuesday, many black Roanokers weren't feeling bad about Bowers at all. Eighty percent of his margin of victory came from the six predominantly black precincts in Northwest Roanoke.
"I think he has done a lot for the community," said Alice Kemp, voting at Lincoln Terrace Elementary School. "I've met him and he's very personable. I think he's trying to help people. Some people complain about him, but I have no problem."
Doris Winner voted for Bowers at her Villa Heights precinct.
"I live in Melrose Towers, and he came to one of our parties. I shook hands with him and he was nice. Plus, he's a Democrat, and he's in the right party."
The Rev. Edward Mitchell said he cast votes for both Democratic and Republican candidates - those who seemed interested in addressing concerns of the black community.
Mitchell said other black voters also chose not to vote along party lines. They shared his concerns that City Council members had not lent Roanoke's black residents a fair ear.
Council members "have to listen to what people are saying and say what people need to hear," Mitchell said.
Mitchell cited the Henry Street redevelopment - which drew complaints from black residents who said the city failed to solicit their views before announcing plans - and the news that there's no money for a traffic signal at 10th Street and Hunt Avenue as examples that city government was relegating the black community to the back burner.
The Rev. Ben Tyree - vice chairman of the Concerned Citizens for Justice U.S.A., a Roanoke civil rights group - said some black residents perceived Bowers as having taken the black vote for granted.
His support among black voters eroded in some precincts Tuesday from 1992 levels. The loss of support "may give him a wake-up call," Tyree said.
Bowers acknowledged Tuesday that if voters were trying to give him a wake-up call, he is wide awake now.
"During a campaign, a candidate not only speaks out on issues, he listens to what people are saying," he said. "I've listened carefully. I've learned a lot. I think I've gotten some messages during this campaign."
Roanoke NAACP President Charles Green said he wasn't surprised by the election results. "Black people have a tendency to hang to the Democratic Party regardless of what happens. It's been that way since Franklin Delano Roosevelt."
Rev. Green, another persistent critic of Bowers', said blacks may not have returned Bowers to office if they had been offered a stronger alternative than Republican first-timer Pat Green, a little-known businessman.
Green, former council member David Lisk and black candidate Jeff Artis were the other defeated Republican council candidates. Black Democrat Carroll Swain was elected.
McCadden said he understood but did not agree with the reasons many black voters didn't rally around Alvin Nash, a longtime top leader in Roanoke's Total Action Against Poverty.
"They think that Alvin is part of the establishment, being black in the Republican Party. I don't think our African-American citizens have gotten to the point where they think for themselves."
McCadden said black Roanokers are finally voting in large numbers and said that is good. "Now, if we can get them to think for themselves instead of getting people to think for them and forcing it down their throats."
Staff writers Joel Turner and Dan Casey contributed to this story.
LENGTH: Medium: 92 lines KEYWORDS: ELECTIONby CNB