The Black vote or the block vote? David Gantt - one man, many votes; control or leadership?

"There's David Gantt," someone pointed out, as party members try not to turn their head, pretending they don’t know the man of constant controversy is crossing the floor. David Gantt has a presence that is 30 years in the making. To understand his influence is to understand how the big boss men of the past operated - Tammany Hall's Tweed, Chicago's Daley. "David," as some closer to him call him, falls in step with the prehistoric models of political proprietorship, minus the graft, minus the embezzlement, minus the front page fraud - which just leaves a powerful and effective leader, right?

The Assemblyman, ages ago was an outsider to the system, entering politics first as a fighter for the "underdog" now found himself the leader of a slate of candidates for city council, school board, and city Mayor that were expected to win.

"the process" Part I

A preliminary vote by individual Legislative District committees takes place in late April, which accurately forecasts what will happen at the May convention’s Party endorsement. There are three LD’s – 22nd, 25th, and 27th, with leaders respectively, David Gantt, Calvin Lee, and Adam McFadden, who were able to turn out the vote en mass for George McCall’s losing bid for Governor against Pataki in 2002. Because of these efforts, all three LD’s have emerged as the most powerful in the City, all three leaders are well recognized and all three are black and preside over heavily black areas of the city.

The question is whether this block of black politicians will weaken or propel a candidate in the broader city electorate? Will longtime association with David Gantt hinder Mayoral candidate Wade Norwood in the all city September primary? How vast and how intense is Gantt’s influence? How determined are his enemies and is there substance to their fears of a "Gantt machine?"

"Controversy" or "conspiracy" news black out

The only newsworthy item that took place on Saturday’s May convention, the newsmakers decided not to touch. Political beat reporters D&C’s Joseph Spector and City Newspaper’s Krestia DeGeorge together devoted a total of 4 lines to the only controversial story to emerge: the second round vote for City Council.

Democrat and Chronicle:

"The six-hour convention, however, was not without controversy and surprises. Party leaders sparred for about an hour over the vote count for the last of five nominations for City Council — won ultimately by Lovely Warren. Losing candidate Saul Maneiro vowed to force a primary."

City Newpaper:

"(Lovely) Warren's selection was preceded by an hour-long, heated dispute over whether ballots had been handed out improperly."

Why wouldn’t Spector or DeGeorge cover it? Was Democratic party infighting so commonplace now that it was not new? Was it that the man who the story centered upon this Saturday was so chronicled with controversy that to write again about Gantt’s maneuverings would be monotonous, not new and not newsworthy?

Or had the Daily and Weekly coverage gotten it right by their lack of coverage? Was there really no story here and more a matter of gossip. Were losing candidates mach ado about nothing? Worse yet, was it a vast white conspiracy trying to cast doubt, trying to detract from Wade Norwood and other victorious candidates of the Gantt camp?

The bottom line is the story was already framed to before the day began. This would be Wade Norwood's day and the D&C doesn't cover sideshows. They are in the business of news making more than reporting what actually happens at an event.

An Ass divided

Despite touchy-feel-good coverage by the newspapers, and the peacemaking rhetoric by mayoral candidates and perennial chairmen, there remains contentiousness with in the party of the mule. The superficiality of party unity was on display most recently on June 2nd during the new party chairman Joe Morelli's acceptance speech; "Tonight marks the beginning of a new era of unity for our party." This despite the fact that in the extremely long nomination speech by former Monroe County Democratic Party Chair Fran Weisberg, she somehow neglected to mention Mayoral Candidate Tim Mains name among the others running. Weisberg spoke of Morelli’s ability to bring various camps of the democratic party together – "those from Duffy’s and Norwoods’ side," and Morelli never amended or filled in th omission of Mains at his turn at the mic. Ironically Tim Mains and a lot of Mains' people were visible at Morelli’s swearing in, none of Duffy’s people were. So much for bringing factions of the party together.

There are specific incidents for such party fractures, many of those are personal - who did this for who, who backstabbed who. It is really a West Wing meets Dallas drama that goes on everywhere from Middletown America to the Middle East. But there are also some undercurrents none of which the news outlets want to address; 1) racial structure and identity issues and 2) systematic/democratic "process" questions.

Seeing the race in Blacks and Whites only

In order to understand the intricacies and localities of undercurrents it is sometimes instructive to look at the aggregate. There is the familiar study of colonies as external in Africa and other third world areas, where land disputes erupt when indigenous populations attempt to reclaim their land or establish their economic/political power after centuries of subjugation. The most recent example being in Zimbabwe with President Robert Mugabe's land-redistribution program. Since March 2000, ruling party militants have occupied more than 1,700 white-owned farms spurred by a government campaign to seize 4,600 farms owned by whites and give the land to blacks.

Now make the topographical jump to viewing colonies as internal and you have some of the same dynamics at play locally in urban settings across America. White flight to the suburbs, but still by and large white people controlling the economic and political power structures, with the inner-city black community demanding more power for "their people." These are some of the non verbalized philosophies and fears residing under party divisions.

In actuality, the political landscape is more dynamic than this, but when thrown up in haste, race does have a place in the analysis. But how much of a place? Is race being used in broad strokes, to simplify the message - to sell the political product, to an A.D.D. tempered audience. So far from the Lincoln-Douglass kind of discourse, are Democrats - who pride themselves on being the more intellectual, the more idealistic party -now going the way of the FOX NEWS TICKER: Vote Norwood Because He's Black….Vote Duffy Because He's Duffy…Vote Mains Because You're Crazy!!!

Who is simplifying the message? Who has herded substantive discussion of issues into the foxhole of language limited to "the preacher, the teacher or the cop." Why aren't any of the Mayoral debates being covered in depth? We get big pictures with bigger headlines but no re-print of their actual answers - no transcript and therefore nothing really to transform opinion but images and soundbites. Newsprint is specially important when the broader audience - working families, can't attend the debates. Whre are the follow up questions by reporters?

Who is the true outsider now? Is the once underdog, grassroots Gantt truly representing "his people" when he stifles grassroot efforts by outside candidates to enter politics. When you put things in Black and White terms only, not allowing for any gray - then of course you are going to have stronger opinions and even anger some people. And anger is what many felt Saturday at the May convention.

Voter irregularities?

During the May convention, Gantt became the center of attention when proxy carrier Steve Eckel attempted to vote but his ballot was already filled in.

There were nine candidates vying for five City Council spots. After the initial vote four of the five candidates Gantt had supported won. City Clerk, Carolee Conklin, 19th Ward Community Association President, Dana Miller, incumbents Gladys Santiago and Bill Pritchard won outright by garnering the qualifying 50% vote total. For the 5th and final seat a second vote was needed, but the problem was by the fifth hour many of the delegates had already left.

Most LD leaders were busy trying to hand out, and track down the committee members or their proxies, a process that took quite a while. Gantt, leader of the 22nd LD, was finished first and well ahead of the rest. Had he handed them out and gotten all his ballots back that quickly? No, apparently he had filled or had someone fill them out. Then Democratic chair Rick Dollinger and Gantt had some heavy words some distressed looks, presumably about the pre-marked ballots. When candidate John Lightfoot found out about the "shenanigans" he motioned for the chair to discard the paper ballots of the second round vote and go instead with a roll call – where each individual committee member/proxy that was still present would vote again.

The situation was tense. After further deliberation, it was decided by the chair to have a vote by a show of hands for those who supported keeping with the paper ballot or discarding it for a roll call. That seemed democratic enough on face value, let the majority determine what to do next. The only problem was that not everyone knew the reasons why you’d want to throw out the paper ballot.

Dollinger, up until this point proved a calming steward in the storm, ushering us now to our seats, showcasing his jurisprudence, perhaps for a future judgeship somewhere. But a fair judge also allows all pertinent evidence to be submitted to the court and presented to the jury. In this duty, Dollinger, acting Party chair, was a failure. The jury had no clearly presented reason to discard the original paper ballot. No one spelled that out – that there were some obvious voter irregularities. Nor did anyone relate the counter argument that throwing out the paper ballots may be the wrong medicine, considering that everyone who left early is now cut off from the process. Is that a democratic solution either? Regardless, none of these arguments were verbalized to the general audience. They just kind of voted with the limited evidence they had from mainly hearsay from those around them.

"He handled it right," said Ted O’Brien, former Democratic Chair and County Legislator of the 17th LD – Irondequoit. "I thought people knew what they were voting for."

The Norwood/Gantt supporters, as they blurred together in this show of hands, all voted to maintain the paper ballot, however shady the collecting of those ballots may have been. The "outsiders"(of this convention) – specifically the city council challengers Lightfoot and Saul Maneiro and also the Duffy and Mains supporters raised their hands in opposition to the paper ballot and in favor of a roll call vote. By roughly a 2-1 count reflecting the make-up of those committee members still present, the Norwood/Gantt position prevailed and the paper ballot count continued as planned.

"Of course you had the one guy who didn’t make the cut, crying foul," explained City Councilman Adam McFadden, a Norwood supporter. "Lightfoot had no shot, everyone knew that. He only got about 13% the first round. Warren got 49.7 the first round – almost the amount needed to automatically land her the seat. The second vote is really going to be a reflection of what happened in the first vote."

There were rumors that on some ballots, specifically those from the 22nd LD, Calvin Lee’s committee, candidate names were even crossed out. But still if you work for months on a campaign, you are not going to just give up so easily, especially when you hear there were some ballot manipulations. Right?

"Everything is at the Board of Elections. You can go see all the vote totals there. It wasn’t even close. They even threw out the suspected 22nd Ld. ballots for the second round vote and still Warren won big. That’s something people don’t know - that they threw those out and still people are crying. Plus (Gantt’s) committee votes 23-0 so there wasn’t really any real trick or shouldn’t have been any surprise there anyway."

"the process": Part II

What about the question of process about Gantt controlling his committee so much that they don’t even necessarily need to show up for the vote, he might as well just fill the ballots in himself?

"Look at it this way, in my committee there are a couple of members who do their own thing, but most of them come up to me, they came to me at the convention and said…’Adam which way are we going?’ Call that what you want, but that’s what happens."

"It’s rare in other LD’s," said Molly Clifford, former Democratic Party Chair and now working for the Duffy campaign. "Most other LD committees are not that controlled." When asked about the integrity of the May 14 convention, Clifford joked, "what integrity?"

The controversy was not about the weighted vote as the D&C had reported, Clifford said, "no, that’s what [Joseph Spector] reported, but I was explaining how the weighted vote worked, I was not complaining about that."

"Party leaders were operating within the rules," said O’Brien, also a former Democratic Chair and now a Norwood supporter. "It’s not a secret ballot, the Party rules provide that the voting be open for everyone to see."

Calvin Lee, leader of the 25th LD, and chosen to give the second nomination for Morelle, at the June 2nd Convention, defended the committee and convention process.

When asked if his and David Gantt’s strong control of their committees was a matter of earned respect or heavy-handedness, Lee responded:

"Leaders ought to have trust. If that is the issue, the issue of control, well then that’s the same issue as yesterday and in the past. That is the law of the land. Some want to divide and conquer. But we need consensus and unity. We need to bring the party together. We’re all Democrats."

Lee in his nominating speech, would later use the famous Lincoln refrain, "A house divided can not stand." On the accusations of voting irregularities, Lee said:

"Candidates have to work with the committee and earn their right to run. It’s a way of weeding out and having the strongest candidates run. Now some people want to change the format.

With regards to the convention, the credentialing and ballot collecting process already started. John Lightfoot challenged the process. He was looking for some loop hole in the middle of it. He was disrespecting the process. He was going against the chair.

Aside from that he never got the endorsement from our committee in April. He never gained the respect he needed there. That’s where you show your ability."

The standard grievance against Lee's process oriented approach is that "the process" keeps qualified candidates from gaining committee exposure in favor of those with political connections --- connections which eventually may compromise that official’s ability to work in the best interests of the larger district or community.

Clifford, when she was chair of the Dems addressed some of these same questions in an interview with City Newspaper in 2003 during the race for school board.

"It is an open process. We have committee people who vote on who they want their candidates to be, and that's what happens."

Clifford takes offense at the notion that Gantt or Johnson have undue influence over the party's picks. "I think it's a little insulting to the members of the Democratic Committee that they're seen as so malleable," she says. "These are all people who are interested in the Democratic Party and the democratic process.

"We have people who are part of the Democratic Party on all ends of the spectrum," she says. "Some people may look to David Gantt to give them advice on who to vote for, but many do not. So I don't think that that's a part of it." *

Clifford's statements at that time, as chairwoman of the Party, were in correct order of her job description - in defense of the practices of the party and its leaders. Since those statements her endeavors seem to tell a different story. We know Clifford left the chair over Party strife and is now backing a candidate that opposes the Norwood/Gantt connection.

On the question of whether committee leaders control too much who gets on the committee, Ted O’Brien said:

"If people want to join they can. Most people are pulled into politics and into the committees because of personal relationships with someone. I was."

And the race is off…

In the May 14 Democratic Convention results, Norwood won 64 percent of the weighted vote. Duffy got 27 percent and Mains got 9 percent. Certainly in the race it is personal relationships that are dictating who supports who -who has done or not done things for this and this person or group. So far it appears Norwood has done more things for more people at least within the Democratic Party structure. But if the integrity of that structure is in question, that support becomes a house of cards.

"Those were David's cards to play, and he played them," said Mike Patterson, a political commentator with the Jason Crane Show, "end of story." But in real time - with the political play clock ticking - this game has only just begun.

Questions remain whether personal relationships will trump all odes to principles or issues, even when that personal loyalty limits choice and stifles political access? On the issue of voter irregularities and fixed ballots - weren't Democrats just complaining about this kind of thing when it happened in Ohio? Or are we Democrats in Rochester somehow immune to that sort of racket?

From now until September, there is still time for Party and personal introspection. Should allegiance to your friend, your "people" or neighborhood, block out all other considerations? Will it come down to the black vote, the block vote or a blocked vote?

(Reporter's Note: Neither Mr. Lightfoot, Mr. Eckel, nor Assemblyman Gantt, responded for comment. We welcome their response still.)

* Comments referenced from "Welcome to the Machine" by Chris Busby for City- Rochester's Alternative Newsweekly, May 28, 2003.