Didn't we pick up 4 in the House?
Margi, Nichols, Mathieson, and Bouchard

I know the GOP got Loupassi over Waddell, but that was beating an independent.

Brian Moran made it clear on the phone call today that it was a net of 4 for us because the I seat counted against us.

Running againg Tom Davis, that is definately a consequence of yesterday

Harry Crisp held the seat for the Democrats after Pete Fields declined another term.

Bob Woodson, a Democrat, beat incumbent Chairman Jack Cavalier, an Independent. Woodson is also the first African-American to ever serve on the Stafford BOS.

Unfortunately Jerry Kirven lost a second shot at the Rock Hill seat.

Basically it's 3 Dems, 3 GOP, and 1 Independent. But that Ind. is Joe Brito, a former Stafford Democratic Party member.

Right now the odds-on favorite to take over as Chairman is Democrat George Schwartz from my home district of Falmouth.

Patricia Mancini's win changes the dynamic there, too. Now it's a 4-3 Board, and will see eye-to-eye with the Supes.

Patricia and Harry Crisp are lifelong friends and classmates. They will work very well together.

The Machine was so intent pushing their write-in candidate for School Board they forgot about their Supervisor candidate, and he got whacked.

I think we also gained some new talent who might not have won this year, but have set the wheels in motion for victories in '09.  Jay Donohue and Rex Simmons come to mind.  Carlos Del Torro too.

Del Toro lost by 25 points.  I don't know where you come from, but where I'm from we call that a whoopin'.  He has the resume, no doubt about it.  But if he couldn't win this year, when Democrats were favored, he isn't winning in 2009 unless the Republican candidate for Governor eats a baby or something.

Donahue did surprisingly well.  We'll see who is up next year.  Maybe he can go again, maybe not.

Rex Simmons lost big in a seat that both Webb and Kaine won.  Lots of different people are giving lots of reasons.  But I think Democrats in that area may need to be on the lookout for a new candidate there for 2009.

Del Toro may have a fighting chance in a few more years after re-districting and new people move into Stafford.  His background, enthusiasm and agility at public speaking are tremendous assets to the democratic party.  I trust that he has learned a lot from his first campaign and will thoughtfully consider the constructive criticism his campaign is receiving. 

The GOP stronghold on the BoS, all 5 members, was broken.  Democrats elected one in an unexpected surprise, lost another we'd hoped to win with a superb candidate, replaced two R's with I's (one who ran as a Dem in last year's special election, and if he'd had the courage, he could have won as a Dem this time).  Now, instead of 5 R's, the board will be comprised of 1 Dem, 2 R's and 2 I's.  One step at a time...  BTW, the Dem won in precincts where I haven't seen a Dem win anything in the last 4 years.  Words of the day from voters at the polls, growth and change.

When Abby Raphael gets sworn in on the Arlington School board, 100% of our elected officials will be Dems.

Good morning, RK!  In Roanoke County, incumbent Democratic Sheriff Gerald Holt and Commissioner Nancy Horn, both unopposed, were re-elected, and I defeated my Republican opponent for Clerk 62/38.

In addition, Democrat Charlotte Moore won a seat on the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors which had been totally Republican for the past several years.  (When I was last Chairman of our BOS in 1991, it was totally Democratic.)

Also, Democrat Dave Wymer won a seat on the Roanoke County School Board which, for all intents and purposes, had also been totally Republican for a number of years.

Democratic Delegate Onzlee Ware was easily re-elected as was unopposed State Senator John Edwards.

We are targeting key Republicans for next year's elections, and I'm really, really, really looking forward to being heavily involved in those campaigns.

I can hardly wait to get started, so please stay tuned...

Thanks!

Steve McGraw

We have Frank Principi now, and any voice of reason is welcome and has our sympathy on that crazy board.

If I am not mistaken, Steve McGraw wrote a diary last week about the door to door targeting they did in Roanoke for the first time.  Rather than doing massive lit drops through neighborhoods, they visited specific voters on a trageted list in order to get them to turn out on election day.

Now, there has been a lot of chatter here on RK about how to get more Dems to turnout in off year elections and I think Steve and his group in Roanoke have the template to do it.  But unless this type of targeting is done across the state, we are going to continue to lose close races in the future.  The DPVA really needs to look at what was done in Roanoke and begin setting up workshops to teach local committees how to do this.

You can't expect a campaign to put an effective ground game together four months out from election day.  The local committees need to do this as one of their tasks each year, year in and year out.  Imagine the impact statewide if this was being done by every local committee.  And a candidate could then feed volunteers into this existing structure to help expand the local committees reach.

A ground game like this could be very important in next years presidential election.  Perhaps local committees could target precincts with a high percentage of swing voters and do selective targeting in these precincts to convince these voters to vote for our presidential candidate as well as for Warner for Senate.  Based on their resutls they could then implement a more far reaching program during the 2009 gubernatorial election. 

But a plan like this need to be put together now, as a program like this will take time to implement. 

Voter ID and ground game was critical in Loudoun this year. The winning local stories from various unexpected Dem victories around the country have everything to do with knocking on doors and neighbor-to-neighbor contact.

I cannot tell you the number of names I was given, doors I knocked on, where the people had moved, or a Strong D was not noticed because they had only moved in 18 months ago (like, say, myself). These lists are critical.

Thanks, "Flipper"; agreed - in the Roanoke area, targeted canvassing has been used successfully in the past, but this was the first time that I actively participated in same after 28 years of campaigning here.

Towards the end of our campaign, after we had completed our initial lit drops, etc., I returned to the campaign trail to work further with the Breiner campaign's targeted canvassing and saw first-hand just how successful it could be.

Of course, we also employed a direct mail piece, telephone calls, a newspaper insert, radio and TV ads, billboards, large signs, countless yard signs and all the rest throughout the campaign.

It now appears to me that targeted canvassing, applied as a final campaign effort and combined with other mass approaches, can produce the best results.

It certainly worked for me...

Thanks again!

Steve

Do regular dinner parties with your neighbors, invite your local elected official as well.  Make sure the table discussion wanders across Democratic, Progressive, and Liveral values periodically.

Host movie nights where the movie viewing is educational or thought provoking.  Do how-to classes in how to be a volunteer, how to hand out literature, how to canvass.

Encourage people to take a turn being official election officials, or if the hours are too long for them, polling place workers for a campaign or combined campaigns effort.

Get on each other's mailing lists and speed dials so we can quickly share information and respond to surprise issues.

Apparently there is a story down in Chesterfield County regarding the Board of Supervisors race that is astonishing and vadem touched on it a bit.  Does anyone know what happened here?  Apparently the Dem that won in a huge upset was a guy named Holland, an African-American gentleman running in a majority white district.  How did this happen in Chesterfield of all places - what is going on down there?  Great news - but I want to know more details!! 

Yes, Flipper.  Didn't realize it made the news out of this area.  This is MY district, BTW.  The incumbent, Kelly Miller, had been on the BoS for 11 years, and was the current chair.  He's a sourfaced, unsmiling, grumpy man who was known for running the meetings with an iron fist.  He gave citizens 1-2 minutes to speak, even going so far as to having people escorted out. 

Jim Holland was urged to run and filed literally at the last possible minute.  He ran in 1999 and lost.  Jim is a very affable and easy going man, an African American, CPA retired from Phillip Morris.  He had very little money, only getting an infusion of a couple thousand at the end by Republicans for Holland.  Jim had a great advisor, and the help of a handful of us in the district.  He has been active as a volunteer with school activities, and his wife is a principal, so they do know a lot of people.  At the end, we made some (not nearly enough) calls for him, but did manage to have poll workers fill almost all slots on Tuesday to greet voters and offer Jim's material.  NO ONE, and I will repeat, NO ONE expected Jim could unseat Kelly.

His message?  Leadership that listens.  A great and uplifting win for us.

Thanks!

Steve

Hat tip to Steve Cochran (County Democratic Chair) and Daisy Stewart (County Democratic Vice-Chair)and all who made this happen.  Democrat Bill Brown, former Blacksburg Police Chief won in a heavily conservative district.  He unseated an extreme conservative, whose only "accomplishment" is to install public prayer at school board meetings.

MOCO already had Democratic constitutional officers (Treas., Commissioner of Revenue, and Sheriff.  But we added Clerk of court as well.

Additionally, though School Board is non-partisan, Democrat Joe Ivers won a write-in contest in my voting district, despite the Roanoke Times endorsing his opponent.  Go Joe!

Note also that our Democratic county treasurer, Richard Shelton, has done such a superb job that he was unopposed.  There is simply no comparison between the old operation and the one under Shelton.  Property tax bills used to barely make the legal deadline (2 weeks before they are due) for getting into homeowner hands.  Now we get them two months early --allowing for better budgeting for those not in escrow accounts and smoother payments on behalf of those in escrow accounts.  The customer service is incredible.  Waits, even on the last day for payment, have been minimal. Computer and filing systems are up to date.  Collections of unpaid balances are up.  There are a dozen other ways Shelton has improved the treasurer's office. 

We also have an extraordinary human being in our county Sheriff, Tommy Whitt (Democrat).  In addition to his law enforcement duties, he works hard on crime prevention, and recidivism prevention.  He's brought the notion of helping inmates get their GED to the county jail.  He's work to educate officers about how to deal with the mentally ill who are in crisis (so as to avoid mistaken and unnecessary incarcerations).  There are many improvements Tommy has brought to the office of sheriff as well.

If you lived in MOCO Virginia you'd be proud to have Richard Shelton and Tommy Whitt represent you.  I am.

I certainly was proud of them while I had the privilege of living in Blacksburg!  Go Montgomery County Dems!!

Matusleo
Ut Prosim

Mathews County School Board - 1 seat gained - Jen Little!!

Democrats split the Board of Supervisors 3/3.  Best showing since 1999.  We took the At-Large Seat (a comeback for Sam Dickson), defeated the GOP incumbent (Wes Hurst over Glenna Myers) in the Pine Creek District, and Manus McMillian took the heavily GOP Fancy Gap District.  We lost Pipers Gap District 54-46% and only lost Laurel Fork District by 11 votes!

Three independent challengers (all Democrats running as independents) beat incumbent conservative supervisors, and an incumbent official Democratic nominee prevailed over a challenger.  One of the incumbents had been in office for 34 years and was considered unbeatable.

The result is that all five members of the Board of Supervisors are Democrats of one kind or another.  It's a huge step forward from four years ago, when the election of two Republicans created a bloc on the board that threatened to undo decades of planning and zoning work. (Did undo quite a bit of it, in fact.)

All members are now on the board for the right reasons, genuinely concerned to listen to and represent their constituents, and have real respect for each other.  A new day.

The seat Holland won - was the incumbent a Republican?  If so, Lowell needs to ad this to his list of pick-ups! 

Flipper, indeed Holland's win was over the Republican incumbent (Dale district).  The BOS make-up has changed almost as dramatically as possible here--from five Republicans to only two, as VaDem pointed out.  And one of the two independents ran as a Democrat previously; I agree with VaDem that he could have maintained his party affiliation and still won this time.  All in all, people here were really ready for change. 

I should add to the characterization of Kelly Miller, the incumbent:  he spent an inordinate amount of time on immigration issues, foremost that he wanted to make English the official language of the county.  He was not an impressive supervisor.

BOS, Independent did not run.
Joe Dan Johnson, Democrat in a race of 4, won by 3 votes. Will know definitely by Nov. 19th.

Sheriff. Democrat retired.
W. David Brooks won by 397 votes over a Repulican who ran as an Indenpendant.

Since Connie Brennan lost that makes 3 Democrats, 1 Republican and 1 Independant, Republican leaning for a 3 to 2 BOS.

Democratic Control 3 BOS, Sheriff, Treasurer, Commissoner of Revenue.

Independant Clerk of the Court and Republican leaning Commonwealth Attorney.

Picked up a seat in the Albemarle BoS, putting Dems in the majority.

While officially non-partisan, John Montgomery (former HOD 97th District candidate x2) is replacing a Republican in one of our 5 school board seats giving Dems 2 of the 5 seats.  One of the remaining Reps was targeted by the county committee but survived.