Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Election prep: County races could use competition

Published in the Portland Phoenix


All five Cumberland County posts up for election this year have unopposed candidates — and four have incumbents seeking reelection. That's a verdict of sorts, though a surprising one, given that at budget time municipal officials regularly complain about the burden of county taxes and lament their inability to reduce the cost of county government.

But if the only person who could be called a newcomer for a county post is Kevin Joyce, who is running for sheriff after serving as a deputy here for a quarter-century, then citizens, at least, must be moderately happy about the job being done. Otherwise, someone would have run for something.
Still, it's not too late to run a write-in campaign if you want to challenge Joyce, judge of probate Joseph Mazziotti, treasurer Diane Gurney, register of deeds Pamela Lovley, or district attorney Stephanie Anderson.