 Ballard: outsider becomes insider |
 |
When Mayor Greg Ballard ran for mayor in 2007, some of his supporters used the unofficial campaign slogan \"Vote the Marine, not the machine.\"
Back then, anti-tax protesters rallied around the first-time candidate who had little backing from Republican insiders and $51,000 in campaign cash -- about one-30th that of incumbent Bart Peterson, a Democrat. Ballard\'s grass-roots supporters embraced his campaign persona of an everyday reformer and retired Marine without ties to the power structures that typically try to influence City Hall.
In a little more than two years since his election, Ballard has raised more than $1 million for his campaign war chest. Last year, some of his biggest donations came from the same institutions and people who once rebuffed him: the law and engineering and consulting firms that compete for city business, as well as leaders from those kinds of companies.
For critics and some initial supporters, that\'s evidence that candidate Ballard, who they thought was going to challenge the status quo, has, as Mayor Ballard, become part of it.
\"Because he apparently was an \'outsider,\' that was sort of the general impression I had -- that there was going to be change,\" said Fred McCarthy, a Northeastside retiree who voted for Ballard in 2007 and writes a blog about local taxation issues, \"and I haven\'t seen any change.\"
Among the dramatic reforms some supporters had hoped for was rejecting contributions from law firms and other groups that lobby for city business. Some also had imagined Ballard\'s election would bring an end to the use of public funds to generate activity Downtown. Others thought he would push harder to repeal property taxes, a notion he supported during his campaign.
But some political experts say Ballard\'s situation is far from unique. Plenty of candidates bill themselves as outsiders, but once they\'re in office, it\'s difficult and, some say, ineffective to push a divisive agenda.
\"There\'s a dose of reality that you swallow once you actually get in place,\" said Brian Roberts, a professor of government at the University of Texas-Austin. \"You have a set of political institutions that you have to navigate, and you don\'t always get what you want. Compromise and cooperation and coordination shouldn\'t be a complete surprise.\"
Contd..
http://www.indystar.com/article/20100228/LOCAL18/2280350/Ballard-once-an-outsider-has-become-an-insi
|
|
|
