The Results Are In!

By Brian Long, Director of Practice Development

While many reports credit statewide trends for what has been termed dramatic 2007 municipal election results, a closer review shows that local issues determined the municipal elections and the results are not so different from four years ago.

Of the 120 mayors' offices in Indiana, 63 will be occupied by new mayors. When you consider that there are two new cities in Indiana (Austin and Westfield) with first-time mayors, the real turnover in mayors is 52.5%, which is less than it was four years ago when 64 new mayors took office.

In addition to the first-time elections in Austin of Doug Campbell and in Westfield of Andy Cook, some other interesting facts about this year's elections come to light. Six former mayors are returning after having been out of office, but only five are returning to their old offices. Again, Austin falls into this exclusive category. Mayor-Elect Doug Campbell, who previously served as mayor of Salem, may be the only person to serve as mayor in two different Indiana cities. The other five returning mayors are: Bob Hall of Charlestown, Tom Gallighan of Jeffersonville, Kathleen Chroback of LaPorte, Phil Deckard of Martinsville and Doug England of New Albany.

These six returning mayors are not the only mayors-elect with municipal and governmental experience. At least 15 incoming mayors have served on city councils. Another, Barbara Ewing, will move from the Tell City clerk treasurer's office to the mayor's office, repeating the experience of former Tell City mayor and former clerk treasurer Bill Goffinet. In the City of Clinton, sitting Vermillion County council member and former school superintendent Jerry Hawkins will be taking that experience with him to the mayor's office. Mayor-Elect David Bower in Salem has served on the Washington County council and as a township assessor. Two of the mayors-elect, Brazil's Anne Bradshaw and Crawfordsville's Charles Coons, are gaining on-the-job experience serving as interim mayors in their cities upon the resignation of the previous mayors.

One interesting feature of this year's municipal elections is that there will be three new mayors who ran as Independents in their communities: Shawna Girgis in Bedford, Chris Pippenger in Frankfort and Reid Paris in Franklin. While there may have been a time in Indiana history when Independents were successful in city elections, it has not been the case in recent history where virtually all successful candidates for mayor have run with party affiliations.

While election results for other municipal offices are not yet readily available, some initial results indicate that the turnover is not as dramatic as the mayors' races. Some cities and towns will see new faces in offices previously held by people who either chose not to seek re-election or were defeated. We know there will be new clerk treasurers in Clinton, Danville, Dyer, Fillmore, Frankfort, Hamilton Lake, Huntington, Kendallville, Monticello, Montpelier, Morristown, Scottsburg, and Tell City. However, in Frankfort, Marilyn Chittick, long-time Frankfort clerk treasurer, decided not to run for that office but will continue to serve her community as a member of the city council.

We at Umbaugh would like to congratulate those new municipal officials who take office January 1 and offer our best wishes and sincere thanks to those municipal officials who will conclude their service at the end of the year.