Detroiters to encounter 235 names, double-sided ballot in primary

DETROIT — It’s primary election day — again. Michigan’s largest city has had its share of elections this year with the special mayoral election primary in February and the special election in May. By now, the 14 percent of voters that came out in both of those elections will likely be the only ones voting in today’s non-partisan primary.

It would be tedious to go through each candidate individually — there are 235 names on the ballot. And nobody, not even the city clerk, really knows details about the full slate. So we’ll try to keep it simple. Here’s what we know about today’s primary.

Turnout is expected to be light, somewhere between 20 percent to 15 percent. In all, there are 235 names on the doubled-sided ballot: 168 for city council, 44 for the Detroit City Charter Revision Commission, 15 for Board of Education, three for city clerk and six for mayor, including Dave Bing, who emerged victorious in May’s special election to fill the remainder of ex-Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s term.

We can start by narrowing the ballot down. Since there was already a mayoral election this year, that race has been very low profile. There have been no television debates this time around — unlike in the special election when local TV stations were holding a debate every couple weeks — few TV and radio ads and a general lack of public interest. Additionally, Bing is the only candidate in the race with enough money and resources to pull off a win. Bing’s challengers are unknowns with little cash on hand and no traction to speak of.

There’s filmmaker Bob Allman, accountant Tom Barrow, consultant Jeroll Sanders, engineer Duane Montgomery, and socialist D’artagnion Collier. Of the lot, Dave Bing and Tom Barrow, who ran against Coleman Young in 1989, are expected to move on to the November ballot.

If the mayoral race has sparked few fireworks, Tuesday’s primary is more about the Detroit City Council than anything else. The city council has seen all sorts of bad publicity in the past year, mostly from the infamous Monica Conyers, who was convicted of a felony and left office last month, and Barbara-Rose Collins, who decided to sing a spiritual hymn during a special meeting.

Although Conyers, who is married to U.S. Rep. John Conyers, has left office, she is on the primary ballot. And observers note that she has a shot of advancing to the November ballot. Of the 168 names on the ballot, 18 will move on to the general election in November. Polling shows that former Fox 2 news reporter Charles Pugh and current City Council President Kenneth Cockrel Jr. are likely to advance as well.

East Lansing consultant Mark Grebner, who conducted the poll, thinks Pugh has a chance at beating Cockrel for the council presidency. “All three nights [of the polling] Pugh beat Cockrel so it’s not just a statistical fluke,” Grebner told Michigan Messenger. “You have to figure it’s pretty likely he’s gonna be the next city council president.”

Also on the list of Grebner’s frontrunners are incumbents Kwame Kenyatta, Brenda Jones, Alberta Tinsley-Talabi and JoAnn Watson, who made the top 10. Martha Reeves, formerly of Martha and the Vandellas, and Monica Conyers bottomed out at 17 and 18 on the list of frontrunners.

All the council incumbents have a decent shot at advancing to the next ballot, Grebner notes, but there’s also energy behind electing new leadership. There are five new names in the top 10 and seven of them are men, despite Detroit’s 62-percent female voting population.

Grebner, who has followed Detroit elections over the years, finds this interesting. “It’s different. It’s not a long-term trend,” Gerber said. “Maybe it’s stereotyping or maybe there’s no strong women in the race.”

It could be that the incumbents, who are all female except for Kwame Kenyatta, are not the change voters are looking for. “Martha Reeves has not done her gender any favors,” Grebner said of the singer-turned-councilwoman.

It’s also interesting that in a city like Detroit that an openly gay candidate would be so successful. Charles Pugh, who isn’t shy about addressing his sexual orientation, has a lead over all other candidates in the race. Grebner thinks it could be the advantage of Detroit’s majority female voting bloc. “I don’t think gay men are a problem for women, especially elderly women, who are the ones that vote,” Grebner said.

Because it’s hard to remember 168 names let alone their credentials, certain groups have made endorsements to help voters navigate the field. The Sierra Club endorsed 13 council candidates, The Detroit News endorsed council candidates, The Detroit Free Press endorsed candidates as well.

There are a few convicted felons running for city council on the idea that if people can change, so can Detroit. There’s John Cromer, a former thief who changed his life after jail and is now a mentor; Raphael Johnson, a juvenile murderer who is now a motivational speaker; and Walter Hart, a former pimp who runs a non-profit. All are on the ballot with Monica Conyers, who has been convicted of conspiracy to commit bribery.

In addition to the numerous city council candidates there are 44 people running for the City Charter Revision Commission, a nine-member board that will have great power to re-write the city’s governing document. These are important candidates to know. Unfortunately, there are no polls for these candidates and none of them have broad name recognition. But that doesn’t mean they’re any less significant than city council hopefuls.

Many of the candidates have expressed interest in revising the charter to have city council members elected by district; others favor shifting power from the mayor to the council under the districts formula and almost all agree that the ethics board needs to become more powerful to punish and possibly remove disgraced candidates from office.

As of now, the ethics board is more of an advisory body than anything else. Of the candidates Michigan Messenger interviewed, no candidate believed that a revised charter should ban felons like the ones on the ballot now from running.

While the charter revision candidates did not get as much attention as they should have, the Free Press endorsed some candidates for the commission.

In other races, two candidates looking to unseat incumbent City Clerk Janice Winfrey. Joyce Moore, who served on Detroit’s Charter Revision Commission in 1996, ran to unseat Winfrey in the last general election. Little is known about the second challenger, Michael Stephen Ri’chard.

On the list of 15 candidates for the Board of Education, there are four incumbents and one state representative, Lamar Lemmons, a Detroit Democrat vying for a seat on the board. Of the group, the Detroit Free Press editorial board did not find any candidates worthy of an endorsement.

So today is the day to get out to the polls and support candidates for the November election. Remember, some polling stations have changed due to school closings. For a sample ballot, candidate information and to check your polling location, visit the Detroit voter information site Publius.org.