Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, April 25, 1994 TAG: 9404260023
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Republican Garry Lautenschlager just might deliver on that.
Incumbents Mac Green and Sonny Tarpley are both independents with long records of conscientious public service. Both seem genuinely mystified by Lautenschlager's assertion that Salem government needs to be more open to citizens. Both point out that their businesses sit right on Main Street in Salem - Green's Valley Mattress and Tarpley's Salem Bank & Trust - and say anyone is welcome to come in and talk to them anytime.
But there are pitfalls as well as advantages to longtime government service, particularly on the local level where the issues are narrowly focused and grow as familiar as old friends. Discussion can be reduced to a sort of shorthand that inadvertently threatens both to leave fresh faces feeling like outsiders and fresh ideas unspoken.
Granted, controversy is hard to come by in Salem. All three candidates support having a referendum to approve a new ballpark, for instance. Granted, too, that Lautenschlager's candidacy reflects a resurgence of partisanship in a city accustomed to nonpartisan government.
Salem voters have put Green and Tarpley on City Council for 20 years. Either is worthy of re-election May 3.
One of the two seats available in the race, however, should go to Lautenschlager. At 38, he promises to bring energy, enthusiasm and new blood to a council in danger of being too clubby, each member so well-known and predictable to the others as to make vigorous debate unnecessary.
A former employee of the Salem recreation department and currently deputy chief of the city's volunteer rescue squad, Lautenschlager understands the ways of this pleasant, fiercely proud community. Even when officials have differences, he concedes, Salem presents a united front. But he stresses that council members ought to listen to residents carefully and question officials closely, and sacrifice neither obligation to a show of solidarity.
Lautenschlager also questions, with good cause, whether the council in the past has been as open as it should be to opportunities for regional cooperation.
But he mostly talks about the future. Salem may be comfortable, even complacent, with itself and with its current council. But Lautenschlager recognizes that many issues the city will face in years ahead - solid waste disposal, water treatment, etc. - have no political boundaries.
He also acknowledges that the city of Roanoke has a point when it complains it is shouldering the region's poverty burden, and Salem has an obligation to be less hands-off. He offers no specific solutions, but says he's open to examining cooperative approaches to issues with valleywide impact.
Such openness will be essential for the continued well-being of a city whose fortunes, like it or not, are tied to the fortunes of the region.
Lautenschlager, who is president of the Western Virginia Emergency Medical Services Council, is frank in saying he got interested in running for City Council after he applied unsuccessfully for appointment to the Salem Planning Commission - and was not even notified of council's decision to name someone else. Yet his council campaign does not appear to be a grudge match. Just as he says Salem needs to be more open to the outside, he thinks its boards and commissions need to be more open to its own residents.
Green and Tarpley are affable figures who have contributed much, and undoubtedly will contribute more, to the city they love. One is assured re-election in any event, which is fine. But Salem would be well-served to add Lautenschlager to the council and, if not exactly shake up the status quo, at least give it a gentle nudge.
Keywords:
POLITICS ENDORSEMENT
by CNB