Seven Things To Know Before Voting Today

The Washington Post recently published a story about a study that concluded that 25 percent of college students may develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder because of the 2016 election.

After checking to make sure it wasn’t actually a story from “The Onion,” only one conclusion can possibly be drawn from the study: You ain’t seen nothing yet.

Take a look around, people. These are crazy times. Bipartisanship and civility have been washed away by a flood of hate and conspiracies spewed on Twitter and Facebook, and depending upon your point of view — which is likely partisan and unbending — you’d probably say the same political bile also shows up on cable stations like FOX and CNN as well.

It’s ugly out there. Ugly, and sad.

Even so, here’s the seven things you need to know for Nov. 6:

1. National politics is a war zone these days — the 2020 election is going to be off the chain bonkers and drive us all insane, promise! — but don’t let it get you down. Remember, local politics, while not nearly as sexy, thrilling and cable-TV worthy, is where you can see real differences made in your community.

Guess what? Neither Mariella Smith nor Victor Crist are going to ever vote on President Donald Trump’s wall. Ken Hagan won’t get to help pick the next Supreme Court justice. Fentrice Driskell isn’t going to fix immigration, and Angela Birdsong, as far as we know, isn’t going to fix the ongoing crisis in the Middle East.

What the local candidates who end up winning in the General Election on Tuesday, November 6, can do, however, is help fix our roads and solve our traffic issues, make our schools better and safer, keep our police and firefighters paid and help spur improvements in our local neighborhoods.

Do you think Trump or any senator has ever heard of Bruce B. Downs?

Don’t B. Silly. (sorry)

Focus and do your part to put the right people who you think can help your community the most into office on Tuesday.

2. Maybe if there was more polling on local races, there would be more interest, but know this — the most interesting race in our area is likely to be Driskell, potentially a rising star in the Democratic Party, vs. Republican incumbent Shawn Harrison, for the State House District 63 seat.

The seat, in a word, could be “flip-a-licious.”

Harrison won the District comfortably in 2010, lost it to Democrat Mark Danish in 2012 by 728 votes, reclaimed it from Danish in 2014 by 2,381 votes, and in 2016 held off Democratic challenger and fellow former Tampa City Council member Lisa Montelione by 1,363 votes.
In a district with more registered Democrats than Republicans, and potentially a prevailing wind at the backs of Democrats, the candidates are likely to be separated by a small margin of votes.

An SEA Polling & Strategic Design survey commissioned by Florida Democrats in September gave Harrison a 45-39 advantage, but voters with the highest level of interest tabbed Driskell by a 58-41 advantage.

If the blue wave is a real thing — and national polling suggests it might be — Driskell has a chance to flip the seat again.

3. Longtime Tampa Palms resident and Republican Victor Crist, who is term-limited out of his current District 2 seat, which covers New Tampa, on the Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners, is running for the District 5 county-wide seat. He also could be in trouble.

Democrat Mariella Smith, a local businessman woman and activist, has been able to keep fundraising pace with Crist, and is viewed as a serious threat to the continuation of his political career.

“It’s close. It’s really, really close,” Crist said this week when asked how the campaign was going.

4. Even though it’s a non-presidential year, the 2018 ballot is fire when it comes to statewide races.

It is topped by a number of key hotly-contested races that have transcended being merely statewide races — outgoing Republican Governor Rick Scott is trying to send longtime Democratic senator Bill Nelson into retirement, and if you haven’t found the Ron DeSantis-Andrew Gillum race for Governor entertaining, then you are just not paying attention. Which you should be.

Who do you want in control when the next hurricane or other natural disaster slams into Florida?

5. Your ballot this year has 12 amendments on it.

Twelve!

There’s not enough room to break them all down, but here’s a pro-tip: take a little time to dig them up on the web and read up on each before you show up to vote.

Some of the more discussed amendments, which require 60 percent of the vote to pass, are:

Amendment 1 — You can vote yes for an additional $25,000 homestead exemption for homes valued over $125,000, but that’s going to cut into your city and county money pot and could lead to cuts in services or even higher local tax rates.

Amendment 4 — Vote yes to grant felons — but not those convicted of murder or felony sex crimes — the right to vote after they have served their time. Vote no to make them keep waiting a minimum of five years before they can even apply to appeal those voting rights.

Amendment 13 — A vote yes would ban all dog racing in Florida by Dec. 31, 2020 (although the dog tracks would be allowed to continue to operate card rooms and slot machines). Vote no to let the dog racing continue.

(Note: Amendment 8 was stricken from the ballot by the Florida Supreme Court)

6. There are two referendums on the ballot in New Tampa, one for transportation and another for education.

The transportation referendum would increase Hillsborough’s sale tax by a penny for 30 years, generating $300 million a year. The money has been earmarked for road improvements and public transportation enhancements, and will be carefully managed by an oversight committee. Say what you will about the increase, but a solid, carefully thought out plan is certainly deserving of the voters’ consideration.

The same goes for the education referendum, which would impose a half-cent sales tax increase, but an aggressive marketing plan presented at a series of town halls, as well as a list of improvements the money will be spent on, appears well-reasoned.

Both referendums will be enticing to voters frustrated by Tampa Bay’s woeful transportation issues and schools that seem to be falling apart.

However, while organizers of both groups insist they aren’t hurting the other, voting for what is effectively two tax increases might be a tough pill for many locals to swallow.

7. Blue wave, red wave, no wave, grab your surfboard and get out there on Tuesday and vote.

 

Dem. Kelly Smith To Take On Mike Moore For County Commission In November

Kelly Smith 

For Kelly Smith, running as the Democratic Party’s candidate for the District 2 seat on the Pasco County Board of County Commissioners is more about civic duty than personal achievement.

“I really am coming at this from a public service standpoint. I never imagined I would run for office,” says Smith, who has lived in Wesley Chapel for 10 years and will oppose Republican incumbent and fellow Wesley Chapel resident Mike Moore in this year’s general election on Tuesday, November 6.

Neither candidate will face a primary opponent. In addition to partisan primaries for local, state and national offices, the primary election, which also included the only elections for Pasco School Board and several judges, were held on August 28.

Smith says that watching District 2’s boundaries evolve from relatively pastoral to thoroughly suburban provided her with the motivation to enter politics. She says her goal is to ensure that Pasco voters have distinct options as to who will best help manage the area’s growth.

“We need to bring change to our community and really be looking at how we can serve our community the best,” Smith says.

The foot-shaped Dist. 2 extends from the Hillsborough County line to north of S.R. 52, with its western border between U.S. 41 and the Suncoast Pkwy., and extending all the way to U.S. 301/Gall Blvd. at its easternmost edge in Zephyrhills.

Smith says she believes that the current lineup of Pasco commissioners has fallen short in meeting residents’ needs.

“Without a doubt, (they’re) not planning for the infrastructure and the service needs that go along with the growth we’re experiencing,” Smith says.

She says that growth is coming at a cost, and usually one that prospective homeowners can’t afford. She believes that future development needs to include a wider variety of affordbale housing for residents.

“One of the big components that’s missing in Pasco County is a better variety of dwelling types and a better variety of (housing) price points,” Smith says.

Smith also says she wants to attract more skilled jobs to the area’s economy, which already has a lot of customer service positions. Pasco County government can encourage wage growth in the private sector, she says, by setting an example and adopting a minimum salary of $15 an hour for full-time positions.

“Currently, 24 percent of full-time employees (who work for Pasco County) make less than $15 an hour,” she says. “As the second largest employer in Pasco County, that would certainly set a standard that hopefully the rest of the community would follow.”

Smith says her more than 20 years of professional experience provides an informed background from which to draw on when it comes to addressing quality-of-life issues like congestion. Her resume includes positions in engineering operations (including data analysis and contract administration) for site development and transportation projects in the private sector and serving as a zoning administrator for the City of Marco Island, near Naples, FL.

She also has been a coordinator for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for the City of Naples and Collier County. Smith earned a Bachelor of Science (B.S.) degree in Liberal Arts (with minors in Computer Science, School Health Education and Special Education) from Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven.

“I really do think that my experience has put me in exactly the right position to be a county commissioner,” says Smith.

In addition to her professional work experience, Smith volunteers on behalf of young people, advocating for kids going through the legal system with the Florida Guardian ad Litem program and as a photographer with Heart Gallery of Pinellas & Pasco, a nonprofit organization that promotes the adoption of children in foster care.

“I have always looked at how my actions can have a positive consequence outside of me,” says Smith, who lives in Meadow Pointe with her husband Patrick and their three adopted teenage children: Macy, Andrew and Carter.

Running as a Democratic against a popular Republican opponent in a county where President Trump won 58 percent of the vote in 2016 might seem to be a formidable task, but Smith says she’s up to it.

“I really do think I have a chance,” she says, adding that she gets a good response from people, including Republicans, when she canvases neighborhoods. “Local government is not so partisan. It’s about what’s best for your community.”

Visit KellySmithforPasco.com or “Kelly Smith for Pasco County Commissioner” on Facebook to find out more.

How New Tampa voted

Ken Hagan

Two faces quite familiar to New Tampa voters — Republican Hillsborough County commissioners s Ken Hagan and Victor Crist — both easily won their primary elections Aug. 28, officially kicking off campaigns which, if successful, would result in them exchanging seats on the Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners. Meanwhile, Tallahassee mayor Andrew Gillum pulled off a shocker statewide that reverberated nationally.

Gillum shocked almost everyone with a win in Florida’s Democratic gubernatorial primary, to set up a showdown with Donald Trump-endorsed Republican Ron DeSantis to replace Rick Scott as Florida’s governor.

Both gubernatorial candidates defeated establishment-backed candidates, setting the stage for an interesting fall battle that will match contenders from what many believe to be the party’s bases.
With his victory, Gillum, a progressive candidate backed by U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, becomes Florida’s first black gubernatorial candidate, after he defeated favored Gwen Graham, the daughter of popular former Florida governor and U.S. senator Bob Graham.

Although he was fourth in many polls leading up to the primary vote and was outspent by Graham $13 million to $2.5 million, there was talk of a Gillum surge in the final days, which turned out to be prescient.

Andrew Gillum

Gillum captured 34.3 percent of the state-wide Democratic vote (or 517,834 votes of the 1,509,794 cast). Graham finished second with 31.3 percent, while Phillip Levine (20.3 percent) and Jeff Greene (10 percent) rounded out the top candidates in the Democratic field.

“People didn’t think we had a chance, but we did,” Gillum told CNN shortly after being declared the winner. “I think voters have had enough with the status quo.”

DeSantis, first elected to Congress in 2012, represents the Daytona Beach area and originally ran for the U.S. Senate in 2016, when it appeared that Marco Rubio, coming off an unsuccessful presidential campaign, was not going to run. Once Rubio re-entered the Senate race, DeSantis exited.

Running behind former Commissioner of Agriculture Adam Putnam at the time, DeSantis fully embraced an endorsement from President Trump in the spring and it shot him into a lead he never relinquished. DeSantis was the choice of 913,955 Republican voters out of 1,618,372 who cast ballots in the primary, or 56.4 percent. Putnam was a distant second with 36.5 percent.

Ron DeSantis

President Trump congratulated DeSantis on the win the night of the primaries, and the next morning, he attacked Gillum, calling him DeSantis’ “biggest dream…a failed Socialist Mayor named Andrew Gillum who has allowed crime and & other problems to flourish in his city.”

In New Tampa’s voting precincts, DeSantis beat Putnam by a smaller but still decisive 50-43 percent margin. Putnam won only three precincts — 357 and 358 in Tampa Palms, and 671, which primarily encompasses Pebble Creek — but only by a combined 13 votes.

Gillum was much more popular in New Tampa than in the state in general, winning 45 percent of the vote in our precincts to just 32 percent for Graham. In votes cast just for Gillum or Graham, Gillum was the choice 58 percent of the time.

Locally, Hagan, a former New Tampa resident now residing in Carrollwood who previously served in New Tampa’s District 2 before being elected to represent countywide District 5, defeated Chris Paradies 72.4 percent to 27.6 percent in the Republican primary race for the District 2 seat.

Currently the longest current serving county commissioner, Hagan has raised $485,574 and barely touched his war chest to beat Paradies, spending $98,773 (which is almost twice as much as Paradies and Hagan’s November 6 opponent, Democrat Angela Birdsong, have raised combined).

Birdsong was the only Democrat to file for District 2, which is currently the seat held by Comm. Crist.
Crist is running for Hagan’s soon-to-be-vacated District 5 seat (both are term-limited out of their current positions), and defeated Angel S. Urbina Capo for the Republican nomination with 81 percent of the vote.

Crist’s Democratic opponent in November is expected to pose a much stiffer challenge. Mariella Smith, a local businesswoman, is a first-time Democratic candidate but has the backing of U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor and other state Democratic leaders.

Smith garnered 83 percent of the ballots cast, or 77,228 votes, to 15,904 for her opponent in the primary, Elvin Piggott.

Victor Crist

She has shown the kind of fund-raising prowess that could help her overcome Crist’s money and name recognition, with $81,423 raised and just 14,007.14 spent.

Crist has raised $129,080 but has spent $88,814. “When I fund-raise, I do it to benefit the nonprofit organizations I support (like the University Area Community Center),” Crist said. “I don’t spend any time fund-raising for my campaign.”

In District 7, another countywide seat currently held by outgoing commissioner Al Higginbotham, Todd Marks defeated Aakash Patel in a bitterly fought Republican primary.

Patel spent more than $400,000 trying to the win the nomination, and boasted endorsements from Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, State House Speaker Richard Corcoran, former Florida House Speaker Will Weatherford and U.S. Rep. Gus Bilirakis.

However, Marks, who spent only about a third of what Patel did, picked up 68 percent of the vote in a surprisingly decisive win.

Marks will face Democrat Kimberly Overman for the District 7 seat in the fall. Overman, a financial planner, took 47 percent of the vote in a four-person field, finishing well ahead of second-place Sky White, who had 20 percent.

In Hillsborough School Board elections, New Tampa’s District 3 seat, currently held by Cindy Stuart, was not on the ballot this year, but a countywide seat in District 6 (to replace April Griffin) was up for grabs, as a field of six candidates battled, with Henry “Shake” Washington (32.7 percent) and Karen Perez (28 percent) advancing to a November runoff.

In what will be another hotly-contested local race on Nov. 6, District 63 State Rep. Shawn Harrison, a Republican, will try to hold onto his seat against Democrat candidate Fentrice Driskell. Neither candidate faced a primary opponent on Aug. 28..

Montelione files to challenge Harrison for seat

LisaLisaTwo-term Tampa City Councilwoman Lisa Montelione (D) filed paperwork Wednesday morning to run in 2016 for State House District 63, the seat currently held by incumbent Shawn Harrison (R-New Tampa).

Montelione, who ran unopposed in her last city council race in March, winning her second four-year term in District 7, posted a prepared statement on her Facebook page.

“The issues facing our city and the entire Tampa Bay region are too big for us to continue waiting for the current dysfunctional Legislature to solve,” she wrote. “Throughout my time on the Tampa City Council, I’ve always sought to find solutions by bringing us together around common ground, rather than allow gridlock on an issue. I will take that same approach in Tallahassee in order to move our community forward and provide the leadership we so desperately need.”

Montelione has been an advocate for things like road repairs, commuter rail and more advanced forms of transit for the Tampa area.

She is the second Democrat to file to challenge Harrison, joining Mike Reedy. Harrison has already raised $58,100 for the 2016 race, according to the Florida Department of State Division of Elections website, while Reedy, a 24-year-old Tampa native and statewide business organizer for the LGBT activist group Equality Florida, has raised $15,061.

Montelione is a 54-year old native of Long Island, N.Y.. She moved to Hillsborough County when she was 25, and worked in banking and real estate before earning a B.A. degree in Interdisciplinary Social Sciences with a focus on Urban Policy & Social Work from USF in 2000

In 2011, Montelione was elected to the Tampa City Council for District 7. In her role as a council member, she serves as a board member on Tampa’s Community Redevelopment Agency, where she was elected Vice Chair, and was also appointed to the Metropolitan Planning Organization by Tampa mayor Bob Buckhorn.