Tuesday’s elections

All elections in Utah this cycle are municipal and non-partisan. There are no Utah Greens running for office this year.

I live in West Jordan, UT which is a very “red” community of about 100,000 people, about 12 miles south of Salt Lake City. Tom has run for state house here as a Green twice. The last time he garnered about 10% of the vote. So maybe voters are starting to “wake up”.

Tuesday’s mayoral election will be interesting in West Jordan. The Republican incumbent is being challenged by four other candidates: Jeff Haaga, Richard Jackman, David Newton, and Brian Pitts.

In my opinion, incumbent Holladay is pro-business of the large corporation type. Just in my neighborhood, tiny businesses have gone out of business (or are in the process of such) and strip malls have been emptied due to the impact of the larger mega-malls that have been built about a couple of miles west of here. The area in which I live is an older one, although a new development was built across the street from our 100 year old home and all the older homes on the corner south of us were bought out last year and leveled. The land now sits as an empty field, up for sale.

I’m not sure who I will vote for yet, but it won’t be Holladay. One deciding factor, among others, will be mass transit issues. The bus I used to take regularly had its route completely cut. It is now somewhat of an inconvenience to take mass transit from where I live. Busses also do not run on Sundays outside of Salt Lake City. My neighborhood has quite a few low income, elderly and hispanic residents, many whom depend on mass transit for transportation.

Here are positions by three of the other mayoral candidates, according to the Salt Lake Tribune (linked article above):

Jeff Haaga, 49, says the city isn’t making sound financial decisions. He points to city debt, property-tax rates and impact fees as places of concern.