Mayor Alvin Brown Re-election Hopes in trouble?

[Cheshire Cat]

Conventional wisdom in Jacksonville for more than two years has been that Alvin Brown enjoys near invincible favorability. But a new survey from St. Pete Polls turns that notion upside down.

The poll reveals the incumbent mayor is in deep trouble and is facing a political environment that is moving away from him as more voters see Jacksonville headed on the wrong track than the right one. Also, 53 percent of voters say they are ready for a new mayor with under 40 percent saying Brown deserves to be re-elected.

Combined, this data is showing a serious collapse of the strength Brown enjoyed just last year.

http://www.saintpetersblog.com/archives/177173

[JeffreyS]

I still believe Brown will win but this definitely shows that Brown's strategy of non spending winning over the fiscal conservatives to be flawed. In todays political climate it is hard to win votes across party lines.  Brown should benefit from it being a presidential year.

[Cheshire Cat]

^In what way do you mean presidential year? By this I mean what impact do you see on Brown in tandem with what is happening in a race for president?

[downtownbrown]

I still believe Brown will win but this definitely shows that Brown's strategy of non spending winning over the fiscal conservatives to be flawed. In todays political climate it is hard to win votes across party lines.  Brown should benefit from it being a presidential year.

Non spending is absolutely flawed.  While his budget wish list was inspiring, without the willingness to fund it except by a lot of new debt is showing Brown for what he is.  A dreamer.  Jacksonville is in trouble.  We have an ineffective Mayor, a stubborn City Council, and an unwillingness to do what it really takes to fix downtown.  There may be no answer for this because of Consolidation.  Who really cares about downtown anyway?  Aside, that is, from a very small but committed group of believers and stake holders.

[Tacachale]

Conventional wisdom in Jacksonville for more than two years has been that Alvin Brown enjoys near invincible favorability. But a new survey from St. Pete Polls turns that notion upside down.

The poll reveals the incumbent mayor is in deep trouble and is facing a political environment that is moving away from him as more voters see Jacksonville headed on the wrong track than the right one. Also, 53 percent of voters say they are ready for a new mayor with under 40 percent saying Brown deserves to be re-elected.

Combined, this data is showing a serious collapse of the strength Brown enjoyed just last year.

http://www.saintpetersblog.com/archives/177173

Brown has a core of supporters who will turn out from him no matter what, but his serial incompetence makes him very vulnerable, especially with Lenny Curry continuing to pick up steam.

I still believe Brown will win but this definitely shows that Brown's strategy of non spending winning over the fiscal conservatives to be flawed. In todays political climate it is hard to win votes across party lines.  Brown should benefit from it being a presidential year.

It's not a presidential election year.

[Cheshire Cat]

^The conventional wisdom I believe the writer of this article is referring to is a general understanding in politics of the difficulty in challenging an incumbent office holder.  In this case a challenge to Brown.  It is usually understood and accepted that a challenge to a person who is an incumbent and has not been involved in scandal, with a decent or sizable bank account is a risky thing.  Brown had been posting decent approval numbers for a period of time and had managed to raise a sizable campaign account.  Using this as a measure political watchers and serious candidates understand that mounting a challenge to a sitting elected official is difficult, especially if they have a serious money behind them and the support of their party and major players, in Browns case that would be Shad Khan and the Democrat party. What we are seeing now in Jacksonville is the outcropping of Brown's lack of leadership and competence.  It was apparent that what was happening in Jacksonville was going to fall outside of "conventional wisdom".  Bill Bishop was the first to not only recognize this fact but to act upon it be getting into the race for mayor.  Also recognizing this fact and having an ax to grind, Republican Peter Rummell who had funded and backed Brown in his first election, publicly called out his incompetence while courting Republican Lenny Curry to run against Brown. 

[Cheshire Cat]

Conventional wisdom in Jacksonville for more than two years has been that Alvin Brown enjoys near invincible favorability. But a new survey from St. Pete Polls turns that notion upside down.

The poll reveals the incumbent mayor is in deep trouble and is facing a political environment that is moving away from him as more voters see Jacksonville headed on the wrong track than the right one. Also, 53 percent of voters say they are ready for a new mayor with under 40 percent saying Brown deserves to be re-elected.

Combined, this data is showing a serious collapse of the strength Brown enjoyed just last year.

http://www.saintpetersblog.com/archives/177173

Brown has a core of supporters who will turn out from him no matter what, but his serial incompetence makes him very vulnerable, especially with Lenny Curry continuing to pick up steam.

I still believe Brown will win but this definitely shows that Brown's strategy of non spending winning over the fiscal conservatives to be flawed. In todays political climate it is hard to win votes across party lines.  Brown should benefit from it being a presidential year.

It's not a presidential election year.

Tacachale, you are correct he has core supporters but it is interesting to note that many of those who once favored him greatly, now have found great dissatisfaction in him and his representation including many in the cities most challenged districts/communities who see Brown as a guy who has effectively ignored his own while at the same time portending support for them.  Nothing tangible to his talk.  The only one he has really thrilled at all is Shad Khan who got all that he needed support wise from Brown along with Tony Sleiman owner of the Landing who is looking to broker a sweet deal for himself.  His supporters are now hard core Dems who only want to keep a so called Dem in office and others who feel they have created some degree of influence in his office.

[JeffreyS]

Not being a Presidential year helps any contenders don't know how I confused that.

I will be leery of GOP candidates but will look at them which doesn't speak well of the Mayor.

[Cheshire Cat]

One breakdown of the numbers in the poll that begins this thread.  http://floridapolitics.com/archives/4978

Four questions were posed in the poll:

Do you feel that Jacksonville is on the right track or the wrong track?
Should mayor Alvin Brown be re-elected, or is it time for a new mayor?
If the election were held today for Jacksonville mayor, would you vote for Alvin Brown, Lenny Curry, Bill Bishop or someone else?
If the election for Jacksonville mayor were between Alvin Brown and Lenny Curry, who would you vote for?

and

Brown's support in a multiparty race, when broken down, may not be as encouraging as the initial number. Almost 62% of Democrats would vote for him against Curry and Bishop – another indication of the erosion of white liberal support for the incumbent. One encouraging augury: the fact that, among all races except for whites in a multipolar contest, Brown holds an advantage over Curry and Bishop. One more discouraging finding: if these results hold true in March, only 23% of whites will vote for the incumbent.

[Jimmy]

Here's a deeper dive into the numbers from Jacksonville's AG Gancarski.

http://floridapolitics.com/archives/4978

I don't agree with all the conclusions reached by the poll (or the analysis), but this supports the new conventional wisdom among people in my circle.  The Mayor has been largely abandoned by the I'm With Audrey crowd from 2011.  Progressives, LGBT, Avondale types.  Time is running out for the Mayor to win us back.  And it appears his folks think they can win without us.  But I don't see how...

[Jimmy]

I take exception to the idea that there's no path to victory for Bill Bishop.  We have Mayor Brown with his built in base.  Then we have Lenny Curry, who I would argue is to the right of Mike Hogan, who lost last time out.  Bill Bishop is the choice of middle-of-the-road types.  His is the vote that was split last time by Audrey Moran and Rick Mullaney, who apparently had a Mutual Assured Destruction factor going on.  There's a lot of race to be run between now and March.

Are there any Mayoral debates scheduled?  There were 3 debates before the First Election in 2011.

[Cheshire Cat]

Jimmy, there are a few candidate forums set up but not much in the way of debates (perhaps by design?) which I think is extremely unfortunate and I hope that changes.  There is a single candidate forum on tap which is Candidate Forum for all
  City Jacksonville
   candidates   
St. Paul A.M.E.Church
6910 New Kings Rd.
Jacksonville, FL 32219   February 26, 2015
5:00PM-6:00PM Meet & Greet
6:00PM

There was also a scheduled forum with the Meninak Club, which Bill Bishop is to attend but the other candidates for Mayor at first said they would not and then one, changing their mind.  I believe that was Brown but need to verify that.

[Cheshire Cat]

It was Lenny Curry who backed out of the Meninak Club forum, said he would go and has yet again backed out of the forum. 

[Jimmy]

Thanks, Diane.

A.G. is telling me there's at least one, to be held at WJCT.  That's a good start.

[Cheshire Cat]

That's good news.  The best thing that could happen for Jacksonville is a series of good debates for the office of mayor.