A popular two-term Democratic supervisor in Amherst, NY was recently upset by Satish Mohan, a University at Buffalo engineering professor. This was one of the few GOP victories in a general local sweep for the Democrats.
It turns out that the GOP can't take much credit for his victory. Satish Mohan not only upset the endorsed Republican candidate in the primary, but almost ignored the local GOP in his drive to victory. He didn't even show up at party headquarters on election night.
As detailed in
this article in the Buffalo News Satish Mohan broke a lot of conventional political rules and may work as a model for Democrats to use the grassroots to break through in some nominally red districts.
According to the Buffalo News, the campaign started with a few local families discussing what they wanted lcoal government to do, and they honed in on three issues that both parties seemed to ignore or give lip service to -- taxes, overdevelopment and homes that have sunk into the ground (many of the neighborhoods in Amherst were built on wetlands).
He then took out full page newspaper ads, outlining his plans to reduce spending without cutting services, reduce property assessments and combat the sinking home problem.
Mohan then began drumming up community support:
After Mohan's primary win, he took another unorthodox step--presenting himself to be "interviewed" by neighborhood leaders and activist from across Amherst. The list ranged from opponents of development and supporters of historic preservation to citizens who have been lobbying the town for more effective rat control.
"These are people who have worked with the town on issues and have not gotten a good response," [community activist and Mohan adviser Colleen] Bogdan said. "All we did was bring them in, and everybody was able to ask questions. Then they went out and kind of did their own thing in their own neighborhoods.
I don't recall Mohan running a single TV or radio ad during the campaign. There may be lessons here, both for Democratic insurgents who are facing an unresponsive local Democratic organization, and for Democratic candidates looking for alternatives to the usual massive ad buys that soak up so many campaign contributions.
What do you think?