BoS member David Slutzky is considering running against Del. Rob Bell, Brian McNeill writes in Sunday’s Daily Progress. Bell, a Republican, is up for reelection next November; he had no challenger last year. Slutzsky, a Democrat who represents the Rio district, says that he hasn’t made his mind up, but that what Bell does in January’s legislative session will affect his decision.
Slutzky is upset that the state isn’t funding transportation (hence no roads getting built anytime soon), and would like to have a Charlottesville/Albemarle referendum on raising taxes to fund a regional transportation authority. Bell is threatening to oppose that referendum—that is, to lobby against allowing Charlottesville to hold one at all—which led Slutzky to declare the following in an October 31 regional transit authority working group meeting: “We will pillory him in the press. Then we run against him and we kick his ass out. Not to be subtle.”
Bell hasn’t faced a significant challenge since his 2002 election, allowing him to build up one of the state’s largest campaign war chests. his campaign has $94k on hand, he also runs the Piedmont Leadership PAC, which exists solely for him to donate money to and to give money to him, and he’s got $312k squirreled away there. The common assumption is that he’s planning a run for a higher office, since otherwise there’s just no need to sit on that money, though earlier this year he announced that he wouldn’t be running for attorney general in the 2009 election.
Coincidentally, I crunched the numbers on the the 58th district earlier today and found that Democrat Tom Perriello beat Republican Virgil Goode in the 58th with 55% of the vote, a significant move leftward from past election results in this district. That’s the sort of demographic shift that’s got Del. Bell vulnerable at the polls. But with his fundraising advantage, anybody running against him will have to fundraise as few in Virginia ever have.
Given that Bell has initiated and accomplished exactly zip, Slutskys challenged should be as welcome as it is difficult.
If he sits on a complacent butt like Goode did then chances are he could have a shot. A war chest is good stuff, but heavy incumbency is worth a lot of jack.
Godspeed Slutsky, Godspeed
Hey Waldo your 58th number crunching link doesn’t work- I got Error 404
Oops—I forgot to include my domain in the link. Thanks, perlogik!
Assuming Waldo’s numbers, the US 5th has a more Republican slant than the VA 58th. Assuming Perriello’s lead survives the recount and given that a Congressman’s toughest re-election fight is his first, any chance Bell takes the opportunity to run for Congress?
Brian,
I think Bell will consider it, if he doesn’t have a real fight in 2009. A full campaign in 2009, followed by another full campaign in 2010 would tax even the most enthusiastic campaigner. Plus, with redistricting on the way, he may have to introduce himself to an entire new constituency in whatever the 5th district will look like for 2012. That would be a third major campaign in four years. That would be an epic journey I’m not sure anyone would want to take on.
Stormy,
Yeah, that’s too much for anyone. I had been assuming for purposes of my scenario that Bell would skip the 2009 race, because a first-time challenger needs more than a year to make a Congressional run. Of course, in Bell’s perfect world, he would have no opponent in 2009, allowing him to, in effect, run for both seats at once and have the state seat to fall back on. But that seems highly unlikely now, given the Dem numbers in the 58th district and a substantial challenger testing the waters.