The Consequences of Local Political Parties
A look at the foundation of healthy state and national political parties - the local or county party. Just ask the folks in Grand County, Colorado, or Chester County, Pennsylvania
While visiting Colorado this month mostly to speak this week at Grand County’s “Constitution Week,” commemorating the anniversary of the ratification of the US Constitution in 1789, I was asked to participate in a separate training session last week for the local GOP.
I was humbled to be asked and honored to accept. Not because of anything special I had to contribute, but that a relatively small, mostly rural county GOP in the mountains about a two-hour drive northwest of Denver was conducting training sessions for precinct leaders and potential candidates.
A great friend and former national GOP campaign committee coworker invited me to join him while here for one of the training sessions. As an itinerant blogger, former daily newspaper reporter and editor, and long-time congressional and campaign press secretary, I was happy to impart what I knew (remembered) about campaign communications, a rapidly evolving field.
Some of what I’ve mentioned has already been imparted in a few of these pages. And I’ve never been a county party leader or activist, other than writing a few checks and working the polls as an election official (Virginia) or poll watcher (Pennsylvania). But just being asked led me to think what a strong local political party really does, and how important it is for local good governance. They are increasingly valuable and deserve support, financial and otherwise. And we pay a price when they atrophy.
The consequences of not having strong local parties who help recruit and elect effective officials can be severe. Just ask Loudoun County, Virginia, and Chester County, Pennsylvania.
To be sure, generally speaking, government at the local level other than the growing cavalcade of failed or failing big cities (see: Detroit, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Washington DC, San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, etc.), is less contentious and partisan than than the national or state levels. Fixing potholes, operating public schools, parks and recreation, snow and trash removal, and controlling storm water runoff aren’t exactly partisan issues except when they are when officials get caught unaware (see: Chicago snowstorm of 1979) or engage in a coverup of high school sexual assaults (see: Loudoun County, Virginia, schools 2021).
Sometimes, those local issues trigger national reactions.
Take what’s happening as I write near my former environs (until late 2020) in lovely Chester County, Pennsylvania, one of those “collar” counties outside deep blue Philadelphia that has turned Democratic in recent elections. Perhaps you’ve heard about the week-plus long manhunt for the second escaped convict this year - this one an illegal immigrant and convicted murderer originally from Brazil. Guy Ciarrocchi, a blogger at Broad and Liberty and former GOP congressional candidate, tells the story and summarizes it well:
Sooner or later, suburban voters have to recognize that too many local Democrats have the same priorities as those left-wing politicians they see on TV and social media. They do not focus on outcomes or impacts. To them, politics is about ideology, intentions, and feelings.
This latest failure was not “one of those things.” It’s a result of years of changes in priorities and policies led by Democrats. Actions have consequences. Bad actions — bad policies — have very bad consequences. Time to think about the consequences, who’s responsible, and how to respond.
My fear is that people begin cheering for this creep as his travails increasingly embarrass local and state officials and law enforcement. If only he’d turned south from the iconic Longwood Gardens, the exquisite former DuPont estate, a few miles south across the Delaware border towards Joe Biden’s tony Greenville, Delaware estate. THAT would be interesting, as the Secret Service and the FBI would certainly have fully engaged. How ironic, given Biden’s open border policies.
I’m waiting for the memes of illegal alien and murderer Danelo Calvacante driving up Route 52 in Biden’s Corvette towards Longwood Gardens, top down and smiling. Complete with aviator sunglasses.
This scandal might have similar national resonance as my past-and-future-home of Loudoun County experienced with their transgender public school sexaual assault. With respect to local political parties, Chester and its neighboring counties used to have strong local GOP political parties and strong, competent Republican office holders. The local GOP organizations atrophied and are all gone now, replaced by Democrats, and the locals are now paying a serious price. Unlike most federal government hiring, local government hires are more frequently political patronage, especially in southeast Pennsylvania.
In fairness, the warden - now on leave pending investigations - at Chester County’s correctional facility had been on the job since 1983. It does not, however, absolve the elected partisan county officials from their ultimate responsibility, and public safety is Job One. After all, most of the leverage voters have comes via the ballot box.
Watch this space, since crime rates and controversies around local “non-prosecutors” grip cities and jurisdictions such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and even northern Virginia’s and Philly’s wealthy and bluish suburbs.
Those shudders under your feet might just be the start of a political earthquake. At least a reawakening.
While some will no doubt rush to claim that many county positions are non-partisan, especially school boards, there is no such thing as non-partisan elected officials, whether for school boards or judges, where they exist. Just gander at some of the groups who support various candidates. A partisan or deeply ideological political agenda is often lurking just beneath the surface.
While the media loves to focus on presidential and major statewide offices, such as US Senator or Governor, the backbone of society and good governance, other than the nuclear family, is local government, including township and county commissioners, local prosecutors, and of course, school board members. While many of complain about the growing size, scope, and intrusion of federal programs into our lives, we all deal every day with public water and sewer systems, running elections, public safety (police and fire protection), zoning and housing costs and availability, storm water runoff, and local infrastructure, from schools to parks. And, of course, property taxes and bonds to pay most if not all of that.
A slim but growing majority Americans rely on at least one federal program, whether food stamps, over 40 million and counting, subsidized school meals, or Social Security and Medicare retirement and health benefits, 70 million strong. Millions more depending on federally-subidized Medicaid and Section 8 housing assistance. Over two million civilians are employed by Uncle Sam, not counting another two to three million military personnel. And then there are all those retirees who collect pensions from federal employment (disclosure: I am one).
But while not everyone relies on direct federal benefit programs, We all rely on local (including county) governments and experience often harmful consequences when they don’t perform. Even if you’re “off the grid.”
This is your reminder that thanks to an explosion of federal spending since the Covid Pandemic, the federal deficit this fiscal year will reach $2 trillion. Our public debt is now well over $31 trillion and growing, fast. That is unsustainable.
But local and state governments, by and large, do not have the luxury of deficit spending. They have to balance their budgets, other than the occasional indebtedness they incur through bonds for things like new school construction, many of which require public approval. Sometimes those campaigns fail at the ballot box.
Which gets us back to the value of local political parties.
The most valuable role of the local party is, first, to give public spirited citizens a place to go to learn and mobilize on important local issues (at least with the GOP. Democrats may have a different objective). The local party’s primary responsibility is to help recruit and support candidates for local positions consistent with their philosophy, and support those candidates to compete and win.
A good political party will make sure the best candidates are recruited and elected to jobs that often don’t pay much, if anything, but are essential for the cost-efficient delivery of local services and the lowest possible fees and taxes to pay for them - good government. Local parties will invest in the maintenance of clean, up to date voter files to help candidates communicate and identify voters to turnout. They will help train and support candidates in other ways, including making sure they follow the sometimes-arcane rules for getting on the ballot, or hosting events.
Local party organizations smartly research their local jurisdiction for demographic trends and reach out to voter groups and community organizations, including religious leaders, for support and coordination where interests converge, resulting in effective coalitions and growing party registration and support. They speak to local media and sometimes fend off the inevitable slings and arrows from opponents. That’s not always fun.
Parties can also help hold the Other Party’s elected officials accountable when they do things that run afoul of good governance. Nonpartisan officials, too.
Local political parties deserve your support. Their leaders often serve with very little if any financial assistance. Often, they’re the ones who pony up personal dollars to support party projects. They are public servants and patriots in the true sense. Unlike to many others, they aren’t willing to leave often tough local issues and governance to chance.
Politics, like nature, abhors a vacuum. And if the right people don’t step up to lead and participate, the wrong people will. And as Chester County is now learning, the hard way, elections have consequences.
While Grand County has a full slate of Republican incumbents for every county wide position, an influx of new voters from Denver and its left leaning suburbs in recent years - much of pandemic driven - is making it more competitive. Kudos to them for working to meet the challenge head on.
Other counties, like my own in deep-blue Arlington County, Virginia, have a more formidable challenge where Democrats run the show and trends aren’t very favorable, politically. The same may be true for less-blue Chester County. But the value of these local parties is no less critical. Strong GOP county leadership ensures voters have choices at the ballot box this year, polling and communicating with party members on crucial issues ignored or miscommunicated by the local media and holding opponents accountable.
Perseverance will eventually pay off, and these leaders, win or lose, deserve our active support. And if you aren’t engaged, you’re leaving the fate of your family and property to others. You might not like the result. And whose fault will that be?