UPDATED: Some thoughts about tonight’s Halifax County Candidates Forum…

(Originally Published on: Oct 30, 2009 @ 19:27)

Update #2: To reflect the Halifax County Chamber of Commerce’s reply to the update.

Update #3: Issuing retraction on “candidates being told not to say anything negative”

What if they held a forum for the candidates in Halifax County and nobody showed up? Well, it was damned close to that. Shame on you, Halifax County voters. I’ll clarify what I meant by that. Shame on the people that could have attended the forum but didn’t. I did not mean to impugn the people that had good reasons for not attending and I sincerely apologize for phrasing that in the way that I originally did.

Let’s go over some random thoughts about tonight’s event.

• First, I’m going to tell you what pissed me off. Riverstone Technology Park’s Wi-Fi signal is available for 30 minutes, and then you’re out of luck. What the hell? Yeah, I know that’s designed to stop people from hanging out in the parking lot leeching off the free signal, but nobody told me about it. @#$!@% Gotta get the aircard soon, I guess. That’s why the “Cover it Live” failed miserably.
• Now, to more pleasant talk. What a beautiful building!
• Back to the political talk now… I was totally wrong on one thing. I thought this year’s school board race would be a referendum on Paul Stapleton, but the forum turned out to be a Paul Stapleton slurp-a-thon. Fay Satterfield was the only candidate to say anything remotely negative about existing policies when she said that dual-enrollment credits were not accepted at some colleges. After seeing what I did tonight, I’m betting that the one incumbent (Arthur Reynolds) isn’t really at a disadvantage this year unlike recent elections when incumbents got tossed out of office. See below for an update on this.
• Since all four races for the Board of Supervisors were unopposed, the questions amounted to “garbage time”. That being said, Wayne Conner stole the show but showing his knowledge of running the county like a business. He does lose points for bailing out during the middle of the School Board segment, though. If you’re up for election and there’s a forum about the campaign, you need to stick around to the end and listen to what everybody has to say.
• Thumbs up to Joe Gasperini & Walter Potts. They were the only two elected officials that aren’t in this election cycle that showed up. Both Gasperini & Potts listened intently to what the candidates had to say.
• Since all of the candidates knew the questions in advance, the forum became a snoozefest of everybody reading off of their prepared note cards. Next time, it would be more interesting to have a few unexpected questions thrown at the candidates. Don’t get me wrong…I did learn a lot about the candidates, but it’s a lot more fun to watch candidates think on their feet.
• James Edmunds had the “Ready for Richmond” attitude in his mannerisms. If he keeps that attitude in his freshman term, he very well could move up the ranks quickly.
• Nancy Pool is a perfect representative of the Halifax County Chamber of Commerce. She’s got the outgoing personality that the job requires and the Chamber is fortunate to have her at the top. The Chamber does’t make political endorsements but needs to be congratulated for getting a forum like this together.
• All of the candidates really do want to serve the public (as they should) and nobody made any notable gaffes. I’ll be talking more about what was said in the endorsement article on Friday.
• Shame, shame, SHAME on all of the Halifax County blowhards who complain all of the time about the elected officials and then never show up at events like this.
• Hey, Nick? Just a reminder. There’s other media in the area now besides the N&R and GV.

Enough random thoughts for now. I’m working on SouthsideCentral’s endorsements and plan to have them posted at 7PM on Friday.

UPDATE #1: Some of the candidates have gotten in contact with me and said that they were instructed not to say anything negative and that they would not be allowed to comment on what anybody else said. These candidates said that they were told this was a “forum” and not a “debate”. So, based on what I’ve heard from the candidates, I’m retracting what I’ve said before. Not all of the candidates support Paul Stapleton after all, they just weren’t allowed to talk about it. Fooey. In a contested race, the voters deserve a real debate. This format made everybody look like cookie-cutter candidates. Let me make one point clear, I am not criticizing the Chamber of Commerce in this. The Chamber did a great job in putting this forum together… I’ve got a problem with the specific rules of the forum.

UPDATE #2: Nancy Pool from the Chamber has told me that “No one was asked not to make comments positively or negatively about anything” and wanted me to make that clear. Looks like we’re going to have to delve further into this and see what’s going on.

She also said that “They were told it was a forum not a debate and given the questions in advance. This was done so everyone would know what to expect. They were each given time to comment on anything they wanted to address.” I believe that Nancy is talking about the final question of “If there was a question or topic not covered in tonight’s session, what would it be and what would your answer or solution be?”

I want to make it perfectly clear that I am not criticizing the Halifax County Chamber of Commerce in any way, shape or form. The Chamber should be commended for being the only civic organization that’s willing to put an event like this together. My comments are clearly directed at the potential that an event like this could become, and not at what the Chamber did.

UPDATE #3: I am retracting the update about “candidates being told not to discuss anything negative” until I can check the story out in more detail.