Some 718 people voted in the first day of early voting. I suspect many of them didn’t vote for the following candidates or issues. Here’s why:
Jill Long Thompson — In a poll of 600 likely Indiana voters, 10 percent of whom were Black, released last week by Research 2000 for the South Bend Tribune/WSBT-TV of 600 likely voters, 5 percent of Blacks surveyed said they’d vote for incumbent Governor Mitch Daniels, 74 percent for Long Thompson; but a disturbing 21 percent of Blacks said they were undecided.
Last year in the Mayor’s race, Bart Peterson had a similar percentage of undecided Black voters a month out from Election Day. The result was scores of Blacks staying home or voting in protest. And you know the result.
Long Thompson is counting on the huge Black Obama turnout. But many Blacks still don’t know her. And it’s still unknown how many Blacks will vote a straight ticket and how many will ticket split, or just vote for Obama and leave the polls.
When her campaign had cash, Long Thompson didn’t spend time marketing herself or issues to the state’s largest Black voting bloc. If she thinks she can win with a huge Black Lake County turnout, when far more Blacks will vote in Indianapolis, then her campaign is operating with a fatal flaw.
Many Blacks here don’t know Jill Long Thompson. And unless she gets her ads up on Black media and pushes her message and linkage with Obama, she’ll have no chance Nov. 4.
Linda Pence — The move to early voting by Black voters will hurt Linda Pence’s chances because bluntly, Black folks don’t know her and she’s done nothing to inform the community about herself. Yes, she’s campaigned in Black areas and done interviews, but hasn’t introduced herself to Black voters who really don’t know who she is.
In January, I felt Linda Pence was the Democrat’s other statewide hope. She seemingly had the ability to raise campaign cash and her personable style could win over voters.
But if she’s raised cash she’s not spent it on media ads. Four weeks before Election Day is awfully late to start introducing yourself to voters.
Because of that inactivity, Linda Pence loses many votes from early Obama voters who don’t know who’s running for Attorney General. Unless Pence catches on quickly in our community, this once bright Democratic light will quickly fade.
The IPS Referendum — You’re saying, what IPS referendum? Under the new property tax deal, schools planning major bond issues must get approval from voters — a system in place in several states, including Ohio and Illinois. The referendum would approve the next phase of the IPS renovations, including finishing the air conditioning of schools and bringing IPS just into the last ten years of the 20th Century.
Yet, the referendum will be overshadowed by the intensity of the final weeks of the too close to call presidential race in Indiana. Proponents of the IPS referendum are either underfunded and/or don’t have any clue how to run an election campaign. There’s been no PR effort, no outreach, no seeming strategy to educate voters (and columnists) on the issues and the stakes. A shame!
I dare say virtually every early voter will skip the IPS referenda question and another referenda question on keeping township assessors.
If the IPS referendum fails, it will be because those supporting it didn’t adjust to the changed election circumstances.
What I’m Hearing in the Streets
The Circle City Classic rebounded from the attendance woes of the past two years, with an announced attendance of 47,273 but scores of empty seats remained.
Many Classic sponsors get blocks of tickets and many of those seats went unfilled. The Classic, Black Expo and the Indiana Sports Corporation need to work with their sponsors so if those tickets aren’t going to be used, then those tickets can be donated to area youth groups, homeless shelters and community groups who’ll come to the Classic and fill those empty seats.
While the nearly billion dollar Lucas Oil Stadium wowed, there’s some problems that must be addressed.
During the game, stadium elevators were excruciatingly slow. Stadium signage continues to be poor. Suite attendees were lost and confused. There were numerous suite catering foul-ups by stadium food service vendor Centerplate.
The configuration of the suites made suite hopping, which is one of the pleasures of the Classic and is critical for Classic sponsors to network, virtually impossible.
In another development, the PR effort by the Indianapolis office of the American Cancer Society (ACS) was botched. The national ACS brought three former Heisman Trophy winners (Johnny Rodgers (1972), George Rogers (1980) and Mike Rozier (1983) to Classic to bring awareness of fighting cancer among Blacks.
Unfortunately, Black media wasn’t told of the visit until 3pm Classic Friday. If I’d left my office early that day, this column’s readers and my talkshow listeners wouldn’t have known.
Shame, local ACS chapter.
Former Mayor Steve Goldsmith brought our city/county into the internet age during his term when the city/county’s Web site, indygov.org was created. The Web site won several awards during Goldsmith and former Mayor Bart Peterson’s tenures for being among the best city/county Web sites in America.
But the new redesign by the Ballard Administration of the Web site now called Indy.gov is a major embarrassment. The new Web site was unveiled with no public warning and worse, without major testing.
In the first days, links didn’t work, words were jumbled. And there’s the huge photo of the Mayor on the Web site’s homepage. Not even the mayors of America’s biggest cities make their photo on their city’s Web site as big as Mayor Ballard did.
The new Indy.gov is an embarrasment for America’s 13th largest city.
See ‘ya next week!
Amos Brown’s opinions are not necessarily those of the Indianapolis Recorder Newspaper. You can contact him at (317) 221-0915 or by e-mail at ACBROWN@AOL.COM.
