By Ann Craig-Cinnamon
Now that the primary election is behind us, the winning candidates gear up for the big election in November, right? Except in areas like Hamilton County where the primary was, in many cases, the real election because most of the candidates were republicans and they face no opponent in November.
On a national scale, Hamilton County has not voted for a Democrat for President since 1960. DailyCaller.com named Hamilton County the fifth most conservative-friendly county in America.
In the just-ended primary election in Fishers, there were 43 candidates running for the offices of mayor, clerk, city council and Delaware and Fall Creek Township Trustee and Board. Of those 43, there were only three Democrats running. Fishers’ first mayoral election was just a contest between six republicans, with no candidates from other parties. The extreme lack of Democratic candidates has led some to say that the two party political system in Hamilton County – including Fishers – is broken.
Keith Clock, the Hamilton County Democratic party chairman says that it’s been a challenge to get enough candidates.
“It’s sort of a situation where there’s conventional wisdom out there that ‘why would I run as a Democrat in Hamilton county?’ The answer to that is, until we see the county sort of equal out as far as Democrats or party affiliations, we need to give voters a choice on election day,” he says.
Clock says it’s a shame that in Fishers, for instance, there’s going to be a few thousand people in a city of 80,000 that will be electing everyone’s council members and mayor in the primary rather than in the general election.
“Until people start looking at the actual candidate instead of their political affiliation, I think it’s going to be a hurdle to overcome,” he adds.
Clock agrees with those that think the system is broken, but his Republican counterpart, Hamilton County Republican Party Chairman Peter Emigh does not. He thinks broken is the wrong terminology to use for so few Democratic candidates.
“That doesn’t mean it’s broken. It just means the party isn’t strong or they don’t have the candidates,” he says.
“I think the views of the residents – whether it be in Fishers or Carmel or anywhere in Hamilton County – are being expressed. That’s what the citizens want. The citizens decide at what level they want to get involved and support candidates and what level they actually want to run for different offices and in Hamilton County I think it has been generally a conservative county where the views of most of the electorate are pretty well reflected and as a result you find that national periodicals consistently rank our cities in Hamilton County the best places to live and raise a family and run a business,” says Emigh.
Clock does see a ray of hope for his Democratic party though.
“In the past we haven’t had any candidates run in Fishers offices and this time we have three quality people running for city council seats. So I think that is progress. It’s not a full slate but it is progress and it is a choice for the voters that live in those districts. So they have the option in November of electing someone that’s not a Republican on the council,” he says.
According to Clock, he is in talks now with a couple of potential candidates to run for mayor of Fishers in the General Election and he says it is definitely a possibility.
“I’m looking for people committed to campaigning and not just putting their name on the ballot,” Clock says.
The deadline for a party to choose a candidate to run is June 30. The head of the Libertarian Party in Hamilton County, Joseph Tucker, says they would love to put up a candidate for mayor of Fishers but currently have no one in mind.
Clock says his cynical side says ‘how can you compete with someone who is directly handing out contracts and tax abatements?’
“I drive (U.S.) 37 every day going to work and on my way home and I see a Scott Fadness for Mayor sign right next to the American Structure Point construction project and you can’t get more ironic than that. So I mean there are some obstacles to this where you can’t compete in a pay-to-play political system as Fishers is,” says Clock.
