Marcuccio Defeats Hoffmann For Mayor; Britton, Gajewski, Newton, Pierzchala On Council
Nov 4, 2009 0:32 - 51 Comments
The election results are in and there will be a new mayor of Rockville. >Phyllis Marcuccio has defeated incumbent Susan Hoffmann in the race for mayor.
In the campaign for City Council, the winners are: John Britton, Piotr Gajewski, Bridget Newton, and Mark Pierzchala.
We will have more election numbers, analysis, and more in the upcoming days.
For now, a hearty congratulations to the winners from your friends at Rockville Central!
Congratulations Phyliss! We are grinning ear-to-ear at our house. Congratulations to the new council members as well! All the best,Penni
Many thanks to those who supported me, and many congratulations to the other winners. The makeup of the council will be vastly different than the one that proceeded it. I think Rockville historians will be picking over this one for some time. Special thanks to Susan Hoffmann for her years of service to Rockville (planning commission, council member, and mayor), and for numerous other public service duties she has taken on over all of her adult life. Her resume is long and worthy.The council field was very strong. Most voters could pick their one or two top candidates easily but really struggled with their 3rd and 4th picks. I know I did. If I have any regret over the result, it is that the size of the council is only 4 seats.Mark
Congratulations to all for a well run election! Mike
Mark,Thank you for your gracious words. It was a pleasure getting to know you during the campaign.I wish you and the rest of the mayor and council all the best as you tackle some really tough challenges over the next two years. Tom
I echo Mark Pierzchala’s refreshing comments to outgoing Mayor Susan Hoffman. Ms. Susan Hoffman will be able to spend more time with her family and enjoy her grandchildren more. I thank her for her long service to the City of Rockville.Congratulations to the two newly elected council members, Bridget Newton and Mark Pierzchala, and the two returning council member, John Britton and Piotr Gajewski and.Also, thank you to all the candidates who worked so hard to run their campaigns. The increase in voter turnout was low, but I believe each candidate helped get the votes.Thank you Rockville for having a democratic process!
I find myself disquieted at the averred penury of Rockville City Council’s nascent majority. I am hoping the campaign rhetoric will be tempered.
I don’t understand Erik’s comment. None of the candidates campaigned as the impoverished choice.
There is more than one definition of penury.The second definition is extreme frugality. In plain English, I am hoping that all the talk of “fiscal responsibility” during the campaign will not wreak havoc with the high quality services, infrastructure and staff I have come to expect from the City of Rockville. To respond to Mark Pierzchala’s assertion that historians will picking over this election for some time, “I beg to differ”. Looking at the district breakdown, I see two big stories…1.) Marcuccio beat Hoffman in district 2, which contains Hoffman’s West End community. It is hard to believe that this is not the result of the Beall’s Grant II controversy.2.) District 9, which includes your own College Garden’s community, by far had the highest precentage of voters turn out. I note the rhetorical similarity in many of your platform planks to that of Marcuccio and suggest that a rising tide for Pierzchala raised the Marcuccio boat, electorally speaking. I’m wondering if the Montgomery College fence-asco played a role as well?
From this one person’s point of view, at least, the congratulations go not only to the candidates who won but to those who lost, as well. Regardless of whether you won or lose, you took the risk to run on what you believed, and that takes a lot of courage along with many other very admirable qualities, regardless of the outcome of the election. I don’t mean to write this to delight in the victories of the candidates who won at the expense of minimizing the disappointment the candidates who lost probably feel. If I had run for an office and lost, I probably would feel pretty badly today, and if I had run for an office and won, I probably would feel really great, today. Those emotions are natural and fine. However, I am writing this with admiration toward all of the candidates, because you chose to participate in the democratic process at a high level — seeking public office. Also, during this campaign, there were no election scandals – another thing for in which for all of the candidates to have pride; also, you in not having scandals, in the campaign, you have honored us, as a City, and I give you my thanks for that.Regardless of our individual current beliefs about what is happening, militarily, right now, or in the recent past, there has been a lot of bloodshed, bodies maimed, and lives lost in order to make and to keep this country a democracy; where people could vote, without fear; and where there would be a peaceful exchange of political leadership, when change was voted to happen. As candidates, you exercised our country’s high ideals of the democratic process. Again, for what it’s worth, this one person thanks you.I’m only sorry that, according to the Rockville City Clerk, there are approximately 33,000 people registered to vote in Rockville City elections. However, there were only a little over 6,400 votes cast (up from 2007 by about 700 votes), I believe. So, around nineteen to twenty percent of our registered voters voted. I am going on memory, with this, but I think this is a little lower than the State and presidential elections, but probably pretty much in line with municipal elections. It would be interesting to know, in Rockville, with a population probably over 60,000, what percentage of that population, who are eligible to vote, is even registered to vote. I imagine it’s fairly low.So, if we, not just in Rockville, but in our district, in our state, and in our nation, could only get more people to vote… Perhaps, that’s part of the work that’s put before all of us, now.
Other take-home points…3.) Almost 90% of District 10 (King’s Farm)voters cast a vote for Gajewski, a whopping 22.33% out a possible maximum of 25%!4.) Only Newton’s 17.05% in District 2 (where she resides in the West End Community) had more impact on contributing to a successful individual candidacy the Gajewski’s King Farm support, due mainly to the sheer number of voting citizens from said district.
Fascinating! Like the trick-or-treaters it sounds like some candidates learned how to most efficiently campaign!
Congrats to everyone who won. You all ran marvelous campaigns
Well, 3 out of 4 isn’t bad. Sorry to see you didn’t make it, Tom. Congrats to Mark!
Also congrats to Piotr and John for their re-election!
Although, I like learning new words, I was glad that Erik expounded on his comment!
@Mark B.: Why, thank you!
Once again thanks to all who ran and congrats to all all the winners. It was a pleasure being involved in the process and I know I will certainly stay involved during this term.
“In plain English, I am hoping that all the talk of “fiscal responsibility” during the campaign will not wreak havoc with the high quality services, infrastructure and staff I have come to expect from the City of Rockville. “-Times like these make Cities focus on their core essential things. Ours is no exception. The earlier we start, the easier it is. Municipalities across America enjoyed consequence-free fiscal irresponsibility thanks to a rising tide (now known to be phony) of home “values” and therefore related property tax income. Getting fiscally responsible need not require sacrificing essential quality services. Just getting back to basics and living within their means.
Fiscal responsibility: Definition by Mark Pierzchala. Conduct an extremely thorough review of the budget, much more than usual, on a periodic basis of perhaps every 5 or 7 years. The first aim of this more thorough review, which would be done by Mayor and Council work session, department-by-department, is to detect “scope creep” and to decide what to do about it. The reason for this excercise is to clarify our values as a City and to make sure that our budget is in line with them. The second aim (and just as important) is to make sure we are always in a position to maintain the excellent services and other aspects of the City that we all cherish. Budgets are harsh right now. The federal, state, and county are all in true deficit and will have to cut greatly. Some of these cuts will fall through to Rockville. Additionally, our main source of revenue, the property tax, may stagnate or diminish in coming years, and this is new territory for Rockville. Additionally, there are new spending requirements imposed on the City that we have to deal with. Thus the budget review is to prepare us for harder times and to be able to maintain the excellence of the City.I had to continually remind voters during the forums that I’m a moderate and that you want a moderate to do the budget review. Otherwise you’ll one day get a fire breathing dragon to do it and that wouldn’t be nice.Mark
Andrew,Perhaps I perceive less threat to the local economy that a substantial segment of the voting populace. Perhaps, this is a consequence of my personal circumstances, perhaps, other’s perception is an aftershock of recent declines. No doubt it is both.I am comforted by the fact that Rockville has an imperative to balance its budget and I’m glad they were able to succeed for FY2010 with minimal adjustments, while carrying over a surplus of funds.I am hoping that the FY2011 budget will be balanced as easily. Perhaps, this will require a certain amount of belt tightening by the city and I am prepared for that eventuality, but I would prefer no more than necessary.My concern is that the belt tightening will get out of proportion to the threat that exists and damage the City. Haven’t we been living within our means? As long as we balance the budget, won’t we be living within our means?
Councilmember elect Pierzchala,Brownie points to you for responding so relevantly to my concern and for reminding me that you perceive yourself as a moderate (the proof is in the pudding, right?
I believe I understand your plan and intentions, although such words as “values” are subjective. How will such values be assessed? To me, this would mean having citizen input during the “discovery” process and during the determination of what is fat and what is lean.For example, COLAs and step increases for city employees are an obligation the city should meet. Some of the elected do not share my opinion.Sure, we could have lowered the budget even further without such raises, but it would have been on the backs of the very employees that help make Rockville a great place to live.To reiterate, I remain concerned that cuts will be made out of stinginess and not out of necessity. I have reassurances from you that your intention is to find opportunities just in case. Let us see how such knowledge informs the FY2011 or FY2012 budget.
Can someone remind me please of who the Gazette endorsed? Thanks.
The Gazette endorsed Susan Hoffmann, John Britton, and Peter Gajewski for re-election, and Mark Pierzchala and some other dude for the open seats.
The other dude is Tom Moore (in case you couldn’t guess).
More observations culled from the precinct voting data…5.) District 2 was the King maker. For 8 of 10 candidates district 2 gave the most absolute votes of any district. The exceptions were Van Balgooy, who got 7 more votes from district 4 (Silver Park/Twinbrook Meadow) and Gajewski who received 499 votes (11 more) from District 10 (King’s Farm). Not surprisingly, 2 (Britton, Newton) of the 4 candidates (also Moore and Onley) from District 2 were elected to the City Council.6.) A candidates home district usually had the most impactful (scaled size/popularity notion of mine to normalize against the sheer size of district 2) contribution to a candidates final tally.7.) Had Carl Henn received the same percentage of votes from district 1 (Hungerford-Stoneridge) that Mark Pierzchala received from district 9 (College Gardens), Carl Henn would have been elected by a 5 vote margin.8.) As a percentage of votes cast, candiates tended to be more popular in districts that share a border with their home district.>Observation: Where a candidate lives really matters in Rockville elections. The size of ones local loyal base is a big factor for every candidate, win or lose.
It would be interesting to see just how many registered and eligible voters reside in each district. I suspect we’ll see a wide range of participation levels.
The Gazette and Judy had a haze over the crystal ball, that’s why we had so many cloudy days.Who ask why a staff member was at a celebration? Still waiting for a name or was a look alike perhaps. Only you know since you ask. Please respond.
Is nobody else a little bit bothered that a news publication feels the need to endorse candidates? I know all papers do this, but if their goal is to report news, it should be more like this website and not takes sides.Don’t get me wrong, though. I love the Gazette. Its a nice free weekly bundle I can start my woodstove with after I scan through the error-laced stories! Fact checkers and proofreaders are too expensive for a free paper, I guess.
Erik, thank you for your analysis.I think the results show the need for district voting on the Council level.I believe the West End has too much power, and I say this as a resident of the West End.I also would love to see more diverse candidates. The city has many different nationalities represented yet you’d never know it by looking at the Mayor or Council. I’d like to explore ways to encourage different candidates who better reflect the make-up of the city.According to the 2000 U.S. Census, 30% of Rockville residents are foreign-born. Fifteen percent are Asian and 12% are Hispanic. These numbers have only grown over the years.
We could use more diversity, no doubt. Westies have always dominated our government - I presume Phyllis to be the first Eastender Mayor. Peerless?Initiatives to change our governing structure tend to lose. I personally like the at large approach and voted against four year terms.
Remember Harry Thomas? That’s why I, in the end poll sat for Max Van Balgooy. This thread is getting long, but maybe we SHOULD expand the council and vote along district lines. Isn’t Twinbrook the largest Neighborhood? They should be represented.
Jonathan, I share your sentiments regarding the proposed changes to district representation, council expansion and term length. I prefer things the way they are, but I might be persuaded to endorse increasing the council size.Personally, I think the Westies dominance is bourne of other districts general lack of understanding of the underlying demographic realities. Having said this, it seems that Districts 9 and 10, with their higher voting percentages (and higher turn out) for Pierzchalera and Gajewski know the deal. As I previously indicated home district loyalty seemed to be a key factor for both councilmember elects.By all rights, our home district 1, which ranks 3rd in total votes cast in 2009, should be able to put a member on the Council. However, our district is fragment with Waddington Park/Fireside/Lynfield separating Hungerford-Stoneridge from New Mark Commons. Meanwhile, Villages at Tower Oaks, Markwood and Rockville Heights form an apparently isolated periphery.Outside of their home districts, Henn had slightly higher appeal than Pierzchala (as judged by average percentage vote city wide).As expected, Marcuccio dominated the Eastern districts (3,4,5), winning by gretaer than 22%, which is necessary for a Marcuccio win given their smaller pool of actual voters (by votes cast ranked 9,8 and 7 respectively).Given the demographic realities that have burbled out of this election, I suspect we’ll see this district loyalty pattern intensify in coming election cycles.In fact, my voting heuristic already considers a candidate’s district of residence. In part this is why I chose Gajewski (for the North West) and struggled between Martin and Van Balgooy (for the South East).
Bill, judging by the number of registered voters the districts are ranked from larges to smallest as follows…2,7,10,8,>4,,1,6,5,3,9
Perhaps, what you are thinking of is some conglomeration of Twinbrook (in district 5) and Twinbrook Meadows (in district 4) which are formally spearated by Viers Mill Road?
Regardless, I don’t endorse district representation because it codifies a granular disparity in representative (kind of like the US senate). Voters in district 9 would be 2.5 times more potent than voters in district 2.
Sorry, # voters…2,10,7,8,4,1,6,4,3,9But by total votes…2,7,1,10,9,8,5,4,3,6And % voters…9,2,1,7,5,3,4,10,8,6
Here’s a link that shows all the voting districts by geographical location:http://www.rockvillemd.gov/election09/voting-districts.htm
and their polling placesDistrict 1 Elwood Smith Recreation Center 601 Harrington Road (at Mercer Road)District 2 Rockville Municipal Swim and Fitness Center 355 Martins LaneDistrict 3 Lincoln Park Community Center 357 Frederick AvenueDistrict 4 Social Hall at the F. Scott Fitzgerald Theatre 603 Edmonston DriveDistrict 5 Twinbrook Community Center 12920 Twinbrook ParkwayDistrict 6 Montrose Community Center 451 Congressional LaneDistrict 7 Ritchie Park Elementary School 1514 Dunster RoadDistrict 8 Thomas Farm Community Center 700 Fallsgrove DriveDistrict 9 Rockville Senior Center 1150 Carnation DriveDistrict 10 King Farm Community Center 300 Saddle Ridge Circle
Mr. J. Smith Beg to differ on Mayors from East Rockville, Richard Weddle resided on Grandin Ave. LeMar Kelley resided 200 block Baltimore Rd. in the 40′s-50′s. But the community was known as Croyden Park back then.
Theresa,I’m sorry I didn’t catch your post earlier. I think the problem with a district representative solution is the uneveness of application. There is also the technical challenge of balancing district populations which affords and opportunity for gerrymeandering. With the at large system, districts are really just a way to manage the logistics of voting.The data generated lends an extra apparent importance to district assignments where in reality it is the Civic Organizations that are the political machines. Is it a coincidence that Henn, Newton and Pierzchala have all been ranking officers in large civic associations that are the largest in their districts?
Ms. Poole - Thanks for the interesting tidbit. I bought into the City in 1999 on Croydon Avenue. That area is still technically called “Croydon Park”. I think Phyllis and others grouped and branded several smaller neighborhoods as “East Rockville” to give that area more clout.
The outcome of Rockville election has much to do with name recognition and civic involvement. However, heavy campaigning and large mailings certainly helps get one elected. Remember Giammo who got elected with spending the largest amount of money in the history of Rockville and produced great mailings to all registered voters. Money is a big factor. Review the spending of the candidates and tell me what the result tells you.The analysis of the district votes is most interesting and we all have different conclusions. The bottom line is we have a new City Council who has their work ahead. Let’s support them where we can and move on, the election is over. I love Rockville and want it to get better.
I agree that name recognition is a factor in Rockville municipal elections. I suspect it aided the successful candidacies of Bridget Newton and Mark Pierzchala, but probably not as much as them having been active in civic association with recent controversies (which definitely boosted their district name recognition so they kind of go hand in hand, yet are not the same thing).I suspect, Laura Berthiaume’s mailer on Bridget Newton’s behalf certainly helped her name recognition.Of course, incumbant candidates Britton and Gajewski had a big name recognition advantage that I suspect Hoffman would have had if she weren’t challenged by another incumbant. So it is hard for me to think name recognition was a big factor in the Mayoral election of 2009.I am interested to see what other conclusions will be derived from the available data, especially by Roald Schrack. What patterns have you discerned in the data?
Roald Schrack has sent along an analysis and we hope to post it early next week.
I’d like to make an observation on post number 37 by Erik Read. I can’t speak for the Hungerford Civic Association or WECA, but the College Gardens Civic Association has never tried to be a politcal machine. But a greater point: if these are large and active civic associations, then it has something to do with the efforts of Henn, Newton, and Pierzchala over several years to make them so, and it’s a lot of hard work.
I took a quick look at the election finances and here’s one notion that can be extracted…For non-incumbant city council candidates, a buy in of $1000 gets you about 1000 votes, each $1.75 spent thereafter correlates with an additional vote for the candidate. This is based upon the combined October 2nd and 28th totals of money <strong.spent reported in the Gazette. Mark Pierzchala was an outlier from the rest in that he spent more money per vote than the other non-incumbant candidates.Incumbant John Britton, who apparently spent $328, demonstrates the value of incumbancy, although it looks like Gajewski opted for the safer $1000+ spending route.In the mayors race it’s hard for me to say for sure what the final tally will be, but as of October 2nd, Marcuccio had spent at least twice as much a Hoffman, which I believe was a factor in enabling Marcuccio to get her message out to a broader audience than she might otherwise have.
Councilmember elect Pierzchala,I never meant to cast aspersions by that observation. It is what it is…a very positive factor in the success of the mentioned candidates. Such influence and benefit need not be made by any conscious effort, it is the natural way of things. No doubt, hard work was involved.Another interesting observation, that I suspect will be made by Roald Schrack, is that a correlation coefficient analysis of candidate votes received, suggest that there were two loose unofficial “slates”.The interesting part is that both you and Carl Henn were independent of significant interactions with either slate or each other (at the district voting pattern level). Thus, I could make the prediction that you will likely serve the role of swing vote on the Council. Again, time will tell.
Thank you Erik. I have enjoyed reading your analyses and I don’t disagree with them. I confirm that I didn’t have any significant interaction with either ‘loose slate’.
Councilmember elect Pierzchala,At the risk of putting too fine a point on my analysis, the interactions I was describing are presumably from the perspective of the voters..en masse. To me this suggests the absence of an idealogical similarity that would cause the electorate to systematically vote for you (or Carl Henn) in conjunction with any particular candidate.Thus I am lead to reject a prior hypothesis from comment 8, wherein I suggested…>
My further analysis indicated this was not the case and that the rhetorical similarity I perceived was superficial (time will tell).
Having said all this, I must caution that the thoughts of individual voters cannot be plied with such tools as I have used. For example, you did not receive any of my votes. There were a variety of reasons, but it was in part a consequence of my rhetorical hypothesis and my regional voting strategy and of course, the issues. None the less, I find myself encouraged by the data with regards to your (independent) role on the Council.
One last note from me on this thread. With respect to the Montgomery College situation in College Gardens, any modest boost (if any) I received in the neighborhood from that issue, was (in my mind) much more than offset by the huge distraction that the issue represented to my campaign. I spent many hours on it, mostly but not entirely, behind the scenes. I was no longer the president of the CGCA when this erupted.I like to think that most support that Henn, Newton, and Pierzchala received from their communities extends from a body of work over several years, and not just from the hot issue of the day (and these can be divisive). In College Gardens I’m much more known for coming to a resolution on our park/pond situation while president of the CGCA, than for my mostly hidden role concerning the College, which represents a still unresolved situation.
Councilmember elect Pierzchala, I will finish my comments directed towards you..I have no doubt that the votes received within the home district of the candidates you mention stem from their years of hard work and not just the recent controversies. Mainly, I think these controversies drove more nettled voters to the polls and once they were there who were they going to vote for? Local leaders they already know is not an unreasonable assertion.
I’m intrigued by talk of “slates” — more than one — in this election. I’ve managed slate campaigns in the distant past, I think they’re not a bad way to get a governing majority elected, but I certainly wasn’t part of one in this election cycle, loose or otherwise. Was I just left out?
tom, i just posted about this in the thread about signs.
Tom,The “loose slates” of which I was speaking are basically groups of candidates that covary, positively, with one another, as judged by the correlation coefficients of their district vote percentages. In simpler terms, voters who voted for one of the candidates of a “loose slate” were more likely to vote for the other candidates within that slate. I qualify these statistical slates as loose because the correlations are not as striking as was seen for actual advertised slates in Rockville elections past.The voting statistics as analyzed above suggest you, Tom Moore, were part of unofficial Hoffman-Britton-Gajewski “loose slate” in the en masse opinion of the electorate.There is some evidence for a mild negative correlation between your candidacy and the candidacies of the other “loose slate” composed of Marcuccio-Martin-Newton-Onley-Ovase. However, only the negative correlation with Ovase was substantial.There was also a mild negative interaction with “unslated” councilmember elect Pierzchala.I have hypotheses for the genesis of these negative interactions but as there is no exit polling in our municipal elections they’re kind of difficult to test. Either, voters saw these candidacies as idealogically distinct or the candidates were competing for the last of the four council seat votes. Maybe both, maybe neither.