With local activist Michael Johnson in one corner and UW campus politico Analiese Eicher in the other, the District 5 County Board race presents a choice unique enough in the political realm to allow voters to make a difference.
Besides their differing political camps, with Johnson from the far-left Progressive Dane and Eicher from the center-left College Democrats, both candidates differ greatly in personality. While Johnson may not be the most charismatic person, he does exude experience. At every opportunity he has made sure to whip out his resume of community activism, and it's not too shabby. Eicher, on the other hand, had to be convinced by friends to actually join the race and has not been nearly as involved in local issues, but she has made sure to advertise her vast amount of work in student political efforts and her ability to get in touch with the student mindset.
As such, the District 5 race creates a clear-cut set of contrasts. Far-left vs. moderate liberals. Local experience vs. relatability. Activist vs. student.
Gut instinct would tell us to go with the experienced candidate. But all apologies to Stephen Colbert, sometimes it's best to let your gut stick to digestive duties and let your brain make the decisions. We have taken a look at Johnson's experience, and we were not entirely fond of what we saw.
Much of Johnson's past work lies in his activist roots, particularly those roots tied to Progressive Dane. And in the past, local officials like Austin King and Ashok Kumar have taken up the Progressive Dane mantle and represented the campus area well, even if some of their policies were less than agreeable.
But from what we have seen of Johnson, we do not feel he can continue this tradition. To us, it does not appear Johnson will be able to balance the agenda of Progressive Dane with superior representation of students. He has not provided any real plan to make the position of county supervisor more visible or accessible to his student constituents––which is one of many problems that made current District 5 Supervisor Wyndham Manning's tenure such a miserable failure.
In addition, the issues Johnson has campaigned on do not seem to match the concerns of his constituent base. Chief among Johnson's issues has been affordable housing, which is a noble endeavor for which he has a reasonable financial plan. But this plan does not concern creating affordable housing for students moving out of the residence halls.
Meanwhile, Eicher has made her most important concern human services and finding ways to get students in touch with the county resources already available to them, which many students don't even know about. That is the kind of outreach and student connection sorely lacking from the County Board today, and we need more of it.
Our choice must be Eicher. She is more inviting and open to student contact through offered office hours and a blog and seems more in touch with the needs of student constituents. She has shown herself to be a little green in terms of governing know-how, and she will definitely experience a learning curve on the board. But we think she has the ability to learn and adapt to her constituents' needs, something we cannot say for Johnson.
It is worth mentioning that we would have reached the same decision even without knowledge of Johnson's previous comments about the Jewish community. While the comments did factor into our decision somewhat as a bearing on Johnson's judgment, in our minds Eicher's attitude and priorities put her ahead of Johnson regardless. At the end of the day, the candidates' work over the past several months was enough to portray their current character and ideals, and based on the party talking points presented and, more importantly, their strategies for representation, we support Eicher's run for the Dane County Board District 5 seat.
