Candidates gathering for mayor's chair

As Mayor David Fischer remains mum on whether he'll run again, competition for his job is heating up.

By LEONORA LaPETER

© St. Petersburg Times, published August 6, 2000

ST. PETERSBURG -- He tramped through muddy streets to show support for downtown businesses flooded during recent heavy rains. He appeared with African-American activist Omali Yeshitela and others at a rally in support of Police Chief Goliath Davis.

Mayor David Fischer, often considered low-key and inconspicuous, seems to be more visible these days and, well, just happier to be at the helm of the city. He seems to be more like a man planning to seek a fourth term than someone who's looking forward to filling his days with sailing, tennis and golf.

"He's acting like he's having fun with it again," said City Council member Bill Foster, a probate and estate lawyer. "A year ago, he didn't act like he was having a good time. But now he's acting like somebody who's running."

Fischer won't say whether he'll take another stab at the job that pays him $100,000 a year. He points out that he's never announced his candidacy before November.

And if he's not running, he would have good reasons for not revealing it.

"As soon as he says, "I'm not running,' he immediately goes into lame duckism," said Karl Nurse, a neighborhood activist and former Planning Commission chairman who announced in June that he was running for Fischer's job.

Yes, it is still early to be thinking about the city's strong mayor race. With so many political battles taking place this November, next March seems like a storm that hasn't even materialized.

But candidates for the 2001 mayoral race are starting to line up like kids waiting for the lunch counter to open, and they're curious.

"Does it look like the mayor's going to run?" asked Bill Klein, a retired U.S. Army major general who lost to Fischer in the 1997 race by 3,793 votes.

Klein, 68, had vowed not to get involved in politics again after that defeat. But the Caya Costa resident has had a change of mind and is at least considering another run at the office.

"Frankly, I think if I ran against David Fischer, I could beat him," said Klein. "There are a lot of things he hasn't done, a lot of things he hasn't fixed in this city."

Corporate lawyer Rick Baker, 44, who worked on Fischer's last three mayoral campaigns and has served as chairman of the Chamber of Commerce, is still unwilling to commit that he will run, but he acknowledges he's still "looking real hard at it."

City Council member Kathleen Ford, 43, also a lawyer, is also considered a possible mayoral contender. Asked about it, she said: "I didn't hear that question," and "I'll talk when I'm ready to talk."

Another Council member, Larry Williams, 55, is more vocal about his plans. Williams said he intends to run for mayor assuming he can get his two sons set up to help run his 5-year-old diagnostic imaging business. The City Council member would have to cut short his current term, which expires in 2003.

Foreshadowing the political rhetoric that will probably bedevil Fischer if he does seek a fourth term, Williams pointed out that it's time for a change: "We've had the same leadership for 10 years now," he said. "It's time to get some fresh ideas and new momentum going and turn a good city into one of the best cities in the country."

Ronnie Beck, 46, who was defeated by Bea Griswold for the District 2 City Council seat in 1997, also confirmed he planned to seek the mayor's job. Beck, the owner of a drafting business, has been on the city's Board of Adjustment for the past three years.

Beck said he hopes Fischer runs because he would join a number of potential and announced candidates -- Foster, Williams, Baker, Ford -- who would draw slivers of the downtown vote in the Feb. 27 primary. That would leave a candidate like Beck, who lives in Riviera Bay in northern St. Petersburg, with the possibility of making it to the two-person runoff March 27.

Foster, 37, said he will run for mayor only if Fischer doesn't -- and even then he'd need certain people's support. Foster, a Shore Acres resident, said he's been asked to run but the field is too crowded at this stage for him to consider it.

If Fischer runs, Foster said, he'll make it to the runoff, which leaves only one other slot for the rest of the field.

Likely to have an effect on the race is the Coalition of African-American Leadership, which for the first time is searching its ranks for a credible mayoral candidate to represent the views of its community.

"The problem is that in the last two instances this community voted for Mr. Fischer out of fear for his opponent, and it didn't necessarily result in any greater influence or power for this community," said Yeshitela, political action committee chairman for the coalition. "The idea is that we should run a credible black candidate who would run on issues that are crucial to this community."

The coalition plans to have a candidate in place by Aug. 19, when it will hold an electoral convention revealing its slate of candidates for a variety of offices.

Yeshitela would not say who the group was considering but said there were several names. Former City Council member David Welch said he'd been lobbied heavily to run for mayor, but he was concentrating his energies on his son's bid for County Council. Still, he acknowledged it was not out of the question.

"I'm just undecided about going into politics anymore," said Welch.

Mary Repper, the longtime political consultant who is running Karl Nurse's campaign, pointed out that a strong African-American candidate could score the city's large block of black voters and a trip to the runoff.

"Obviously if it's some fringe candidate, that wouldn't be the case," Repper said. "But if it's a respected African-American, they're a player."

This could make it more difficult for Fischer if he were to run. He has traditionally won the city's black vote. And he also has to contend with Nurse, who lives in the Old Southeast and has been active in the black community, Repper said.

Fischer, for his part, said he sees the next election being about keeping the city on the course he chartered: the development of downtown, low taxes, neighborhood revitalization and economic development in poor neighborhoods south of Tropicana Field.

He hints at a desire to control the future.

"There are so many things going well in this city, I'd hate to see it sidetracked," said the retired municipal bond broker. "That time for a change slogan -- what would you change when things are going so well? It's hardly much of a slogan."

Political insiders point to other signs that Fischer is going to run. If he wasn't going to, Foster said, he would have let people know so that he could help his wife, Margo Fischer, with her campaign for the state House against Republican Rep. Frank Farkas.

Farkas has continually linked Margo Fischer with her husband, who ran poorly during the last mayoral election in the parts of St. Petersburg that fall inside the district. Pulling out might remove that attack rhetoric from Farkas' arsenal.

And with the crowded field of potential candidates getting more cluttered by the day, some think Fischer would have announced if he wasn't going to run so that his supporters could gravitate toward other candidates. Already, he lost his political consultant, Repper, who signed on to manage Nurse's campaign.

Repper points out that although Fischer has been a successful mayor in many respects, he faces a tough challenge if he joins the next race.

"I think people just believe after . . . years of public service it's time to move on and try a fresh perspective or a fresh approach," Repper said. "I don't think people are tired of David Fischer. It's just a matter of getting a fresh look, a fresh face."

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.