The Deck is Shuffled!
Qualifying for local candidates is now over, and there have been a few changes. In the County Commission races we have seen Ward Scott decide that he does not want to face Lloyd Bailey in a primary. Instead, he has opted to move his campaign to District 5, where he will face Rodney Long in November. You may recall that Scott was originally running in the District 1 race, and looking forward to meeting his old nemesis, the incumbent Mike Byerly, in November. He lost to Byerly in the 2004 Democrat primary back before he switched to the Republican party.
The 2004 contest probably left a bad taste in Ward Scott’s mouth because he had expected to get some help from Republicans since they had not fielded a candidate. And if no one else entered the race except the two Democrats, it would have been an open primary. However, in the closing week or so of qualifying, Steve Nichtberger entered the race as a write-in candidate. Since Nichtberger was not running as a Democrat, he would be on the November ballot, thus closing the primary to Republicans and Independents. Scott lost a fairly close race (52-48%), and Byerly had clear sailing over the unknown Nichtberger (92-8%) in November. Some accused Nichtberger of being a secret Byerly operative, who only entered at the last minute to close the primary to non-Democrats, but others thought it was a bad gamble by Scott that went wrong.
This year Scott is a freshly minted Republican, and he was taking no chances on missing the opportunity to face Byerly this fall. However, Rick Bryant, a Democrat and a popular city commissioner among conservatives, got in the race with a pretty fair chance of unseating the sitting commissioner. This was not a promising contest for Scott, who decided to take his quest to District 3 to face the incumbent Paula Delaney. This would be a tough enough race with No Party Affiliated Lloyd Bailey already in it, but it got more interesting when Bailey decided to change to the Republican party in an attempt to eliminate Scott so he could face Delaney alone in November.
I do not know if Bailey and Scott had a discussion about who would get out of this race, but I cannot imagine Lloyd Bailey moving over to the District 5 race to face Rodney Long. Lloyd was in the District 3 first, and he already lost to Long in 2000. But this had to be a bitter pill for Ward Scott. It’s a good thing Jeff McAdams, another Republican, decided to get out and give Scott a clear shot in November.
In other developments, Paula Delaney’s primary opponent, Bill Russell, is out. And the District 1 race has picked up a write-in candidate: Owen Stephen Osborne. He will appear on the November ballot with Republican Kevin Riordan and the winner of the Bryant-Byerly clash in August. There are two Democrats running for Sheriff, so it should be an open primary.
Clerk of the Court Buddy Irby, Tax Collector Von Fraser, and Supervisor of Elections Pam Carpenter (all Democrats) are automatically re-elected since no one bothered to run against them. And two of the Soil and Water Conservation District seats are suddenly in contention. Thta will be worth a separate posting after I get the dirt on Soil.
