THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, April 7, 1996 TAG: 9604050582
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MIKE KNEPLER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 87 lines
Fed up with political mudslinging?
Insulted by attack ads that avoid real issues?
Tired of holding your nose when you cast your vote?
Then check this out: Some citizens are working together to reclaim politics in Virginia Beach.
Welcome to their recent workshop. On a chalkboard you see some phrases: ``Campaign openly and fairly,'' ``Assume responsibility,'' ``No character attacks,'' ``Reject prejudice.''
Sitting around the room are 11 people trying to craft an ethical code for the campaign trail.
What you're seeing is something more than voluntary guidelines being shaped. It's citizens doing a brand of politics that harnesses community values.
The cooperative effort is a message to bickering politicians - and to frustrated fellow citizens:
Why can't candidates find positive ways to get their ideas across?
And, if citizens get politicians to improve the quality of their campaigns, does that encourage more citizens to get involved in community problem solving?
For 1 1/2 hours, the group wrestles with the concepts. They discuss their intentions, the meanings of words and whether their work will have any effect on candidates.
At the head of the room is Barbara Ballard, president of the League of Women Voters of South Hampton Roads. She's flanked by 10 others from the league and the Virginia Beach Council of PTAs, Virginia Beach Council of Civic Organizations and the Virginia Beach Division of the Hampton Roads Chamber of Commerce.
Listen to some of the discussion.
They're debating whether to apply the code only when candidates appear at public forums or throughout the campaign season.
``Wait a minute! Hold it! Why throughout the entire campaign?'' asks Kevin Cosgrove of the Chamber of Commerce. ``What gives us, sitting around this table, in this room, the right to tell candidates `This is the way we think, (the way) we are going to require you, for our purposes, to conduct your campaign?' ''
Donna Berg, of the PTA, responds: ``Citizens, I think, should come together, should say, `We want to have some standards by which all candidates conduct their campaigns' . . . That's what we're saying. `We're tired of this and we want some standards.' ''
Cosgrove, though, notes that Virginia Beach municipal elections are nonpartisan and that negative campaigns occur less often locally than at state and national levels.
Eileen Moore, a civic league leader, jumps in. ``But it all starts here,'' she says. ``It all starts at the local level.''
The give and take continues.
Would candidates try to manipulate the guidelines as a campaign tactic? Are these guidelines really necessary?
Jane Brooks, PTA council president, isn't dissuaded: ``I worry that we'll get so much into character assassination and mudslinging'' that ideas and issues would get lost.
``No one will be able to make an informed decision,'' Brooks says.
Berg backs her up: ``Are people too afraid to set some standards? . . . Is it time to go back and say, `Hey, we would like this? You can choose to operate whatever way you want, but it's time again that we had some standards of behavior.' ''
The group wonders whether to ask candidates to sign the guidelines to show commitment.
``People who put themselves in the position to serve people should make a commitment,'' says Helen P. Shropshire of the League of Women Voters.
John Moore, president of the council of civic organizations, ponders: ``Would you use this to coerce the people to sign the statement - the fact of the publication of their names, say `X' signed, but `Y' didn't sign?''
Ballard cautions that publicity about which candidates signed and which did not can be misconstrued as an endorsement.
The citizens unanimously vote not to seek candidate signatures.
Finally, they brainstorm a name for their product.
Standards for Campaign Conduct? Fair Campaign Practices? Suggestions for a Happy Campaign? Taking the Political High Road?
Then Cosgrove suggests, ``Voters' Expectations for Candidates.''
``That's what everybody was driving at. Nobody is trying to compel any candidates to do this. We're not trying to twist anybody's arm,'' he later explains. ``We're just saying, `Hey, this is the sort of thing we expect in political campaigns.'' by CNB