The Next Mayor

Jet on over to Young Philly Politics to throw some queries at Councilman Jim Kenney. He seems to be checking in and out and responding pretty quickly to questions.

Well, we did it. Congratulations, Philadelphia. We've passed the 300 mark for murders. So as not to fall into the trap of considering that only a number, here are the names (where available) and ages of the latest three victims as reported in this morning's Inquirer and Daily News:

Jaysar Norville, 5 months old, died yesterday at 11 a.m. at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

According to witnesses, two men chased another into McElwees Market about 5:15 p.m., when shooting erupted. A stray bullet struck a woman who was a passenger in a vehicle. Her husband, behind the wheel, came to a stop on 58th Street near Springfield Avenue, where he flagged down police who were headed to the crime scene. The woman was pronounced dead at 5:31 p.m. at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

Police later responded to a report of a shooting on Wolf Street near 20th about 8:45 p.m. An unidentified 19-year-old male bicyclist was shot in the head, Sgt. Cooney said. The victim was pronounced dead at 9:01 p.m. at Children's Hospital.

So a 5-month old child, beaten to death by his mother's live-in boyfriend becomes number 300. I have no words.

Anyway, for the record, in the same time period last year, we were up to 286 murders. This problem isn't getting any better. I'm through trying to figure out who has to or can fix this - the mayor or the ridiculous state legislators or the President or me and you.

A 5-month old?

You can check out WHYY's special week of programming that's dealing with the violence epidemic. All week long, there will be news features during Morning Edition and All Things Considered as well as special Radio Times and Voices in the Family programs that discuss both the causes of and possible solutions to this problem. In fact, Voices will be airing a special program today at noon.

Philadelphia Weekly has some clever ideas for the potential candidates:

This is sort of off the topic of the mayoral campaign but at the end of the story in today's Daily News about Presidents Clinton and Bush coming to town to raise money for candidates, it mentions that at the Santorum fundraiser for Rick Santorum:

Tickets for the event are going for $1,000. For a photo opportunity with Bush and Santorum, it's $5,000.

Earlier in the same story, the writers made the point that:

For $2,100, the maximum contribution to a congressional candidate, supporters get into a VIP reception at which they can have their pictures taken with Clinton.

If $2,100 is the max, then who are the people that are paying $5000 to get their pictures taken with Santorum and Bush giving their money to?

Meanwhile, back on the topic of the mayor's race, the Daily News ed board agrees with the decision of Fattah's lawyers that he can't use the money he raises today for a possible mayoral run. But that begs the question: if he's not using the money to run for mayor and he's really got no credible opponent in his race for re-election to Congress, then what is he planning on doing with all that cash?

Chicago, a city just as rife, if not more, with corruption among its public officials, is taking a step towards reining in some of the most egregious offenses. Via the Government Innovators Network at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, here is an article about a confidential tip line being set up by which people can anonymously report on incidents of graft, selling of offices and general rule breaking by government officials.

The hotline is run by a the non-profit Chicago Crime Commission so callers don't have to worry about coming outside the next morning and see that their car was towed and their garbage left on the curb - unless they insist on wearing the "I Squealed on Richard Daley" t-shirt that you get for making a call. Maybe some group could set up such a thing here...hmmmm?

Did you see the Philebrity post about John Dougherty running as a Republican? We love Philebrity (mayoral makeovers! Nutter and Saidel!), so we asked our resident expert, John Baer, and he had this veddy, veddy interesting response:

"Johnny Doc as Republican candidate for mayor? Well, last March at breakfast at Famous I asked himself about that possibility. He responded, as I reported at the time, 'It's not out of the question.' I still tend to think he won't run at all, but if he does, I think the GOP might just find the doctor is in. I mean, who else they got?"

Hmmm.

Today at 4pm, in WHYY Studio 1, which I've been so far unsuccessful at renaming Studio 1 on the Sunset Strip, we'll be convening the sixth of our Next Mayor focus groups. It's been a while since I've written about the progress of the focus groups. The highest praise I can give to these events is that if I were one of the 6 or 7 (or 8) candidates for mayor, I'd want to be in the control room watching them and taking lots of notes.

We've had people from all walks of life come together and sit in small groups for an hour and a half to two hours, brainstorming about what they think the most important issues are for the city of Philadelphia and the Greater Philadelphia region. In addition, they've given us great feedback about the type of leader that they think can most effectively move the city forward.

Some of our participants have included: John Childress, director of African American Chamber of Commerce; Frankie Lancos, of Greater Philadelphia Cares, an organization on South Broad Street that matches volunteers with organizations that need help; Ralph Roberts, founder of Comcast; Mary Tracy, Executive Director of SCRUB, the Society Created to Reduce Urban Blight; Alleuyson Kim, a 20-something, new resident of Philly who lives in Northern Liberties and loves it despite several incidents of crime at her workplace and in her neighborhood.

You may recognize some of the names. They are the movers and shakers of the region whose names always seem to appear in bold in the business or social section of the paper. Others are just normal, everyday Philadelphians, like you and me, who are just trying to get by, raise their families, find a decent job, buy a home, save up money to enjoy a night out once in a while but who have no less a stake in the success or failure of the next mayor as those movers and shakers.

To borrow from the gran-daddy of reality shows: once again, we'll put a bunch of strangers, picked to share the same room for two hours, discuss the issues together and have their opinions taped, to find out what happens, when people stop being polite, and start getting real.

Ok... ok... for the most part they stay polite, but you get the picture.

I'll be back later to let you know how it went.

Attention candidates for mayor!

I hope you read today's Daily News and saw the article which actually tries to teach us about (gasp) ideas being tried by other cities to reduce gun crime. You see, it's ok to learn from what others are doing rather than trying to reinvent the wheel. I'm pretty sure, however, that based on what John Baer wrote about the great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the idea of registering gun offenders like we do with sex offenders has little chance of passing.

I do like this one:

Rochester, N.Y., authorities targeted gangs for heavy surveillance, resulting in numerous arrests. Those on probation or parole are required to attend courtroom "call-ins," in which their misdeeds are examined in shame-inducing slide shows in an effort to erase the anonymity that criminals covet.

Sort of like Punk'd meets MSNBC's To Catch a Predator.

Great exchange in Dan Gross' column today between Michael Nutter and Jonathan Saidel, at (of course) the Columbus Day parade, and involving (of course) the People Paper's Stu Bykofsky:

Political parading

Mayoral candidate Michael Nutter sidled up to Gov. Rendell to march alongside him at the start of the Columbus Day Parade Sunday afternoon. The People Paper's Stu Bykofsky, a fellow marcher, asked another potential mayoral candidate, Jonathan Saidel, who was in the second row, about Nutter's edging him out in a brilliant stroke of visual/political positioning. "I don't need to do that. I've been doing this 20 years. He needs to do it," said the former city controller about the former councilman.

"I was up-front because that's where leaders march," Nutter fired back yesterday.

This is pretty good too:

Speaking of mayoral hopefuls

U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah is just back from a Kennedy family clambake in Hyannis Port, Mass., where, we're told, U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy introduced Fattah to actor Martin Sheen as "the next mayor of Philadelphia."

Fattah yesterday told us he was photographed with the actor, but declined to confirm the introductory remark. Fattah said that "nothing that may happen in Washington," say, a Democratic takeover of the House, will affect whether or not he'll run for mayor.

Boldface names calling Chaka Fattah "the next mayor of Philadelphia":

Bernard Hopkins
and U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy (third item).

Did I miss anyone?

Our sixth Next Mayor focus group wrapped up about an hour ago it's taken me this long to digest what I just witnessed. Like with other groups, this was a diverse set of people that included:

• a young professional who lives in Center City,


• a couple of people who own their own businesses,


• someone who runs a youth development and cultural enrichment program for 6-18 year old African American boys,


• a minister from a large Center City church,


• one of the city's most well known experts on education issues, and


• the past president of a group based in West Philadelphia whose mission is to spread correct knowledge about Islam and talk about moderate Islam.

Several different issues were brought up by the group. Special emphasis was given to the sorry state of the city's infrastructure including the closing of recreation centers and the rundown condition of many neighborhood parks. One participant, a resident of Queen Village, was especially disturbed by how the city has sold some neighborhood park space to developers for more luxury condos and townhomes.

Another participant, a Southwest Philadelphia resident and founder of a non-profit that helps the needy, elderly, ex-offenders and the homeless by encouraging self-improvement and education, talked about education at the primary and middle school level. She made references to times when middle schools had to pay parents in order to get them to come in and receive their child's report card. At that point, the general theme of parental involvement moved the discussion in a direction that made me wonder exactly what we can get a mayor to do to make parents become more involved in their kids' lives.

Things were lively and almost reached the point of "impolite" as participants pressed each other to clarify what "concrete suggestions" they would have for the next mayor in order for him or her to be able to rectify the issues that they were bringing up.

We have one more scheduled for tomorrow and then we may start the process of assembling another group - with a slightly different angle to it. Stay tuned for more details on that.

...will be happening in 30 minutes. Check back later for a quick report on how it went and what was said.

As tame as yesterday's focus group was, today's was that wild. First, without naming names (that'll happen when we put these on tv), here's a quick rundown of the bios of the folks who joined us this morning:

1. An artist and teacher at Drexel, this 30-something lived in the Grad Hospital area for ten years before moving out to Bucks County.
2. A director with the Greater Philadelphia Urban Affairs Coalition, who formerly led Penn's West Philadelphia Initiative.
3. An environmental activist from Germantown whose group, the Monoshone Watershed Association, seeks to raise awareness about watershed management and water pollution issues.
4. A consultant and former city planner who also worked at the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corporation. This participant now consults developers who are trying to navigate city government
5. A developer who is largely credited with transforming Manayunk from where it was in the 80s to the thriving restaurant and retail center it is now.
6. A small businessman who owns a North Philadelphia-based automotive recycler and is a board member of the Empowerment Group.
7. An author and founder of a unique non-profit lecture and performance series that brings black thinkers and artists to speak at a church in North Philadelphia.

For the first 20-25 minutes, the group focused on the need for improved education at all levels. One participant suggested that the next mayor needs to take a more "holistic approach" (no, it wasn't Sylvester Johnson) to education, thinking about every level from pre-school to grad school and creating initiatives that enlist every sector of society - business, universities, public, sports. Another participant, a developer who has had many tenants who leave the city in search of better educational opportunities for their children, agreed. However, for at least the second time since we've been doing these groups, a couple of participants pushed for a mayor who would foster some sort of "entrepreneurial spirit" in the city, including in the schools.

The former city planner pointed out that the next mayor must realize that Philadelphia isn't just competing locally or even nationally for jobs but that several, formerly white collar, jobs that require schooling and education are now being done far cheaper in foreign countries. Later on during the session, a participant would bring this up again when she suggested that the next mayor push for a school curriculum that required all students, from pre-K on up, to learn a second language. "Imagine how attractive this city would be to business if half of our kids speak a second language," she said.

Time and again, the group came back to the idea of fostering a more entrepreneurial spirit in the city. People spoke from experience about what it's like to start a small business in the city and deal with Licenses and Inspection, pay business privilege taxes, pay wage taxes, and deal with zoning. They said that the next mayor, while he or she doesn't necessarily have to be a businessman, should develop a more responsive organization. One participant went so far as to suggest that each of the candidates for mayor should apply for a zoning variance or building permit just to have to go through the experience. Another one related how he called L&I four times with the same question and got four different answers.

A participant who didn't come from a business background said that while she agreed that the next mayor should believe in business, she also wants one who believes in government and can actually instill that belief in everyone who works for the government. She said that there seems to be a distrust of government on the national level and that if the bureaucrats (a word she said with a completely neutral, if not positive, tone), don't believe in the process then the whole system can get ossified (a great word - you could tell she's a writer).

The last several minutes were spent on a discussion about regionalism and the need for cooperation between the city and the surrounding region and between the city and the state. This topic had been brought before by members of the group in response to our watershed activist who was definitely on his message about the pollution of the Monoshone Creek in Germantown.

While a good ten minute chunk of the session was spent on the specific problem of the Monoshone Creek, which none of the other participants had heard of, the rest of it was a very useful discussion.

Other highlights included:

1. The second mention of Jane Golden, director of the Mural Arts Program, as a wonderful example of a good leader. Potential dark horse candidate?


2. The importance of entrepreneurship and small business creation for job opportunities throughout the city.


3. Education, education, education


4. Aside from a brief mention in the context of small business creation, not much mention of the city's tax burdens. Small business people seemed more concerned with burdensome regulations and the difficulty with which one navigates "the system."


5. Strengthening of cultural areas and the fostering of "gallery districts" similar to what they have in New York


6. Having an open minded leader and a system that is comfortable with disagreement, discussion and risk taking

I'll let you know when these groups will be going on tv.

This release is so good, we'll just go verbatim. (see the version we were sent at the PR archive):

NUTTER CHOSEN FOR JURY DUTY

Mayoral Candidate Michael Nutter was picked for jury duty today. Nutter received a notice a few weeks ago to report for jury duty today and like every other citizen who receives the notice; Nutter arrived at the Criminal Justice Center at 8:15 a.m. this morning. Now, most people would think that a former City Councilman would be the last person lawyers would choose as a juror, but today that’s exactly what happened.

Nutter served as a juror 16 years ago in a civil trial that lasted for two-weeks. “Jury duty is one of the most critical components of a fair and democratic society, said Nutter.” “It is an honor to serve as a juror and it is one of the true responsibilities of citizenship as an America. Everyone should experience this at least once. This is my second time.”

Nutter reports for duty tomorrow morning at 9 a.m. Oh, by the way, the last time that Nutter served as a juror was in 1990 - one year before he ran for city council – he won. “Here’s hoping that history repeats itself, said the candidate with a smile.”

Nutter says he will hold a press conference at 4:15 Thursday in front of the Criminal Justice Center for a "public safety state of emergency" in city neighborhoods hardest-hit by violence. (Read the press release in our PR archive.) And what does that entail? Well:

Block off the streets and restrict vehicle access to create safety zones for the targeted communities
Establish new curfews and limit public travel in the safety zones
Coordinated arrest of all probation/parole violators by city, state and federal agents
Installation of surveillance cameras in the targeted areas immediately
Close certain businesses earlier than usual
Aggressive confiscation of all weapons on the streets in target areas
Significantly increase police presence and activity in the safety zones

We'll post an update to the blog as soon as the event is over.

Michael Nutter had his press conference Thursday afternoon, calling for a state of emergency in the most crime-ridden parts of the city. The Daily News' Catherine Lucey was there -- and got the sharp response from Mayor Street as well.

Here's an excerpt from Catherine's story, which will be in the Daily News tomorrow:

Mayoral candidate Michael Nutter yesterday decried the rising homicide rate and said Mayor Street should crack down on crime by calling for a State of Emergency.

“We cannot wait any longer. The daily death toll continues to rise, said former Councilman Nutter, who spoke in front of the Criminal Justice Center where he is currently serving as a juror.

Through Tuesday, 313 people had been killed in the city.

Under the City Code, the mayor is allowed to declare a state of emergency, which would temporarily give the city broad crime control powers, like establishing curfews, restricting traffic flow, closing bars and prohibiting the sale of guns and weapons.

But then Street fired back:

“For Councilman Nutter, it's very late in the day for him to now be talking about hiring police and spending more money in the prisons,” Street said. “For almost the entire time that I was mayor, he wanted nothing but tax reductions.”

And there was Street's comment on Nutter's job with consultant firm Econsult, which has done work for the city on tax structure and other issues:

"I do know he had a relationship with Econsult. I think he should have gotten an ethics opinion, I guess," said Street.

Here it is folks! You can take this to the bank. I am 110% sure of this one. Am I talking about Eagles vs. Saints game or Temple vs. Team-that-will-slaughter-Temple?

Nope. In answer to this column from Wednesday's Philadelphia Weekly that asks of Chaka Fattah, "D.C. or Philly? The Hill or City Hall? Congress or mayor?" I'm saying this:

Chaka Fattah will absolutely run for mayor.

And apparently, Clout (and Fattah) agree with me.

"XXX"

One thing that not too many people realize about campaigns is that once someone declares him or herself a candidate for office, the volume of their incoming mail increases dramatically. All of sudden, they're getting more brochures than a high school senior with 1400 SATs. Much of this mail comes from different interest groups and advocacy organizations that are curious about the candidate's opinion on specific issues. Each group sends surveys or questionnaires with very specific questions about various policy proposals and pieces of legislation.

And that's where the lowly Issues Director and his or her staff come in. On each of the campaigns I worked for, part of my job was to take this myriad of questionnaires, read through them, research the topics that they were asking about and sit with the candidate to bang out answers. I'd provide him with the information that I found. He'd either make me aware of parts of his voting record or give me anything from his private sector career that might be relevant to the issue and we'd draft the answer. After checking to make sure all of the answers are consistent with our message and the candidate's past statements, he'd sign off on them and we'd send them back to the organization that submitted them.

As far as I can remember, this process was repeated 90-100 times on questionnaires that ranged from 1 to about 20 pages. That's not to say that we got to all of them or got them all done before their deadlines but we tried. A candidate's time is very precious, considering that in order to have an effective media campaign, a candidate needs to raise about a thousand dollars EVERY HOUR of every day. We did as many as we possibly could because I felt it was important that a candidate's campaign reflect the responsiveness that he or she would have as an elected official. Afterall, if you can't count on someone to respond to your questions about an issue when he or she is trying to get your vote, what hope do you have when he or she is in office?

That said, it appears that survey season for the candidates for mayor has begun. As you may have seen In the Spotlight on The Next Mayor, each of the likely candidates and candidate Nutter received a survey from The Technical Assistance Center for Emerging Contractors. I've already made arrangements to get copies of the surveys filled out by Michael Nutter, Dwight Evans and Jonathan Saidel so that you can see everything they wrote. According to the press release announcing the results of the survey, Brady, Fattah, Dougherty and Knox failed to return their surveys.

Often, once these surveys are sent back, they get very little attention. A group like TAC may send out a press release. Other groups mail the results to membership lists, use them to determine whether they will endorse a candidate, or post them on their website. I hope to be able to get a hold of or link to as many of these surveys as possible so that we, the voters, can have them all in one place. Likewise, we can use this to gauge the responsiveness of the candidates to simple, straightforward questions about their positions.

One caveat: these surveys should be viewed very skeptically. We're all aware of a candidate's tendency to promise everything, knowing that he or she probably won't follow through on all of it. As you look through them, pay special attention to instances in which the candidate actually says no and the explanation that he gives.

It's easy to tell everyone yes. With a city that continues to have, by most accounts, a high tax burden, a city worker pension fund in crisis, a crumbling infrastructure and several other priorities, we need to learn if the next mayor knows how to say no and still get people behind him.

...that you live here.

Joe Frick did. And it sounds like he wants to help fix it by getting a group of people who actually can create jobs to try and fill those jobs with people from neighborhoods like Kingsessing. This is indeed an encouraging development. I've been asking myself ever since I got back from the anti-violence rally in Harrisburg where I saw activist Bilal Qayyum arguably passionately for "Jobs Not Guns", where he meant for those jobs to come from.

I had a sinking feeling that he was asking that the government create those jobs in the form of more city worker jobs doing things like mowing the grass at park sites, sweeping the streets or doing any number of things that, while necessary, would continue to put the city into a precarious financial position. And besides, job creation on the scale necessary to make a societal change could never be accomplished by adding three or four hundred new low-skill city jobs. It needs to come on a macro level from every business, large and small, in the city and the region. Frick's idea to expand internship opportunities so that young people from low income neighborhoods can get the kind of real world work experience necessary for future employment is the right first step in bringing together the private and public sectors, business and government, to effect that macro level change to the entire economy. Put that together with stronger partnerships among the city schools, universities, businesses and government to improve education from pre-k to 12th grade and we may actually have the formula for success.

And by the way, while one candidate was having a high profile press conference to deal with improvements to law enforcement to help the problem in the short term by stopping the bleeding, another "potential" candidate thought he could slip this smartly written letter to the editor by us.

I had a chance to catch up on some of my blog reading today and noticed that local blog star Atrios offered his entry for top issue:

The one who gets my vote is the one who makes the public transit situation a priority.

Check out the comments, some of them are pretty funny.

Chaka Fattah will unwrap a shiny new race for Mayor on his 50th birthday. The congressman has been hinting that he will announce his candidacy for the 2007 race near his birthday, which is Nov. 21; but Monday, at a panel discussion at the Philadelphia Bar Association - covered by the Daily News' Mensah M. Dean - he was clearer than ever about it:

"I'm going to make an announcement on or before November 21. It's my 50th birthday, its a time to reflect on what one might do in the second act of their life."

Certainly, the campaign-like promises are flowing already. Also at the discussion:

As Paul Vallas, who was also on the panel, bemoaned the fact that he was still waiting for $10 million that Mayor Street had promised him, Fattah promised that if he were mayor the school district would be his "top priority" and that it "wouldn't be last to get money, they'd be first to get money."

One of my favorite clichés made it into the Daily News's editorial page today:

SCHOOL DISTRICT CEO Paul Vallas didn't throw any administrative underlings under the bus after it was discovered the district had a $21 million deficit.

From my experience, so many people get "thrown under the bus" during a political campaign that you'd think SEPTA was speeding down the street during a block party. I didn't get the nickname "Pass the Buck" Pohlig for nothing ;)

What are some of your favorite clichés that are often associate with political or governmental stories?

Well, while I've been focused on preparing for our Election Night 2006 coverage, the blog has been pretty quiet this week. Fortunately, there's been a really active discussion that's similar to some of our prior posts in which we asked you to name your issue.

Over at Young Philly Politics they've decided to break into some good back-and-forth about the 2007 election. Granted, YPP is a left-leaning blog that takes pride in its role as a voice for the young, progressive community of Philadelphia so if you're looking for folks who want to reduce the Business Privilege Tax or the City Wage Tax, you'd be better off checking out Philadelphia Forward. (While you're there, you check out their Citizen/City Hall Compact (pdf).)

Regardless, if you're interested to see what some of your fellow Philadelphians have put forward as the "progressive agenda" for 2007, you should check it out.

I hope to have a better handle on Election Night preparation by Monday or Tuesday so I can get back to some more active blogging next week. Enjoy the weekend everyone!

Why don't we just define "candidate" as "one who is running for office in Philadelphia and can raise as much money as they want regardless of the law we recently passed that set limits on campaign contributions?"

Sheesh.

Since I've taken the opportunity to point out some of the good things being done by mayors in other large cities, I should also be ready to share stories about the more questionable activities of those mayors. Not that I'm judging or anything (I'll leave that to commenters if you want), but it seems that San Francisco's Mayor Wunderkind, Gavin Newsom, about whom I've blogged before, is dating a girl half his age, the wonderfully named Brittanie Mountz. If you care to do the math, he's 39 (or possibly 40 by now). To the good people of San Francisco, the biggest problem with this relationship may be that she is a registered Republican. Newsom enjoys an 80 percent approval rating a year out from his re-election campaign.

Not that a solar/hydrogen-powered house in New Jersey has much to do with the 2007 mayor's race in Philadelphia, except that the issue of sustainability has been getting a lot of support on this blog, but this is a pretty cool story.

I think the thing to take away from this story is the need for government officials, included high-level elected officials like the mayor, to be open to new technologies and ways of doing things. As we get more exposure to the candidate and potential candidates for mayor, we're going to have to listen carefully to find out which of them has this quality.

One is a wealthy, well-kept area of the city, boasting a strong and diverse retail environment and housing prices that make me realize why I'm doomed to life in a one-bedroom walk-up.

The other is a neighborhood which many think has its best days behind it. A neighborhood in which vacant buildings and empty lots depress the value of the homes around them and crime is a fact of life.

Perhaps coincidentally, both were featured in today's Inquirer. I don't know about you, but after reading both stories, I feel much better about the second place. Just goes to show you what a community can accomplish with dedicated, selfless individuals and smart, targeted government investments. In the case of Chestnut Hill, you see what a community considers to be a major problem when they're not faced with the intense poverty, degradation and crime that other parts of the city struggle with. I can't blame them though. History shows just how easy it is for a neighborhood to lose its luster and end up with those vacant buildings and empty lots.

Congratulations to Paul Vallas for being picked by Harvard University's Center for Public Leadership as one of the top leaders in the United States.

Oops... my bad. I totally meant to link to this article. Sorry 'bout that, Mr. Paul Vallas.

On a related note, why does Controller Butkovitz hate Vallas so much?

Reprinted below, in its entirety, is a challenge from Wendy for anyone who is a regular to this site and who also plans on participating in the Committee of Seventy's Dash for Democracy on November 4th:

The next election for Philadelphia mayor isn't until 2007, but it's not too early to express how you feel about it. Preferably, via costumes.

For more project information visit www.thenextmayor.com.

So there's the challenge. If you win we'll let you pretty much blog about whatever issue you want. Granted, if you start blathering on about how much you love a certain candidate, people will see right through that and pretty much tune you out so you won't want to waste your chance.

And as always, the comments section is yours to do with what you will.

So whaddya say? I'll tell you right now that if you dress up as municipal pension fund reform or no-bid legal contracting reform, you'll get my vote! I plan on wearing my 3-1-1 government services hotline costume.

(edited to add) And don't forget, you can register to participate in the Dash any time from now until the day of the race.

Stu Bykofsky, in the guise of a political columnist, has an interesting gimmick in Monday's Daily News. Stu argues that Brady (who Stu has known for years, and now, in a way, serves -- since Stu's also a Democratic Committeeman) will run for mayor in 2007.

And then, using basically the same facts as proof, Stu argues that he won't.

Which is more convincing?