Scales Beats Back Corrupt Marion County Republican Party

The corrupt Marion Co. Republican Party fell short in its efforts to oust the most conscientious and hard-working Republican member of the City-County Council. Despite a barrage of false and negative mailers the party dumped into the District 3 City-County Council race in the final days of the campaign, Christine Scales defeated the slated Republican candidate, Tim Craft, by 110 votes, or a 54%-46% margin. The 839 votes Scales garnered was still more than the 784 votes her fall Democratic opponent, Pamela Hickman, captured in the Democratic Party primary running unopposed.

Unfortunately, Democratic incumbent Councilor Angela Mansfield was unable to turn back a challenge from At-Large Councilor Leroy Robinson in District 1, who only moved into her district last September. Robinson beat Mansfield by a 26-vote margin. Robinson's campaign was bankrolled by lobbyists for the billboard industry who offered large sums of cash to the Marion Co. Democratic Party to slate Robinson over Mansfield. The slated Democratic mayoral candidate, Joe Hogsett, also supported Robinson over Mansfield.

The countywide turnout in Marion County was abysmal. With over 95% of the votes counted, fewer than 50,000 votes appeared to be cast in the primary election, less than 8% of the registered voters. That's well below the nearly 75,000 who cast votes in the 2011 municipal primary election when only about 12.5% of the voters participated in the election. As expected, both party's slated candidates for mayor easily won their respective primaries. Democrat Joe Hogsett captured about 89% of the vote over his lone opponent, Larry Vaughn, while Republican Chuck Brewer captured 76% of the vote over his four primary opponents. Jocelyn-Tandy Adande captured about 10% of the vote in the Republican mayoral primary followed by Terry Michael, who captured about 7% of the vote. About 56% of the people who voted in today's primary took a Democratic ballot compared to the 40% share represented by voters who cast votes in the Republican primary. Voters in Beech Grove, Perry and Wayne Townships all voted in favor of property tax increases for their respective school districts, which will result in substantially higher tax bills for property owners in those school districts well in excess of the now meaningless constitutional caps.

The borrow and spend madness in Hamilton County will continue unabated. All of the RINO mayors easily won re-election, including Carmel's James Brainard and Westfield's Andy Cook. Cook's opponent, Jeff Harpe, ran one of the most incompetent campaigns this year. For whatever reason, he chose not to use the most explosive issues that would have ensured Cook's defeat in the election. He either didn't want to win too bad, or he just had the worst campaign manager advising him. Other incumbent mayors weren't as fortunate. Unless federal prosecutors start prosecuting public corruption happening in plain sight in these communities, the residents of Hamilton County are going to pay dearly for the irresponsible spending by these communities' mayors to reward their political cronies and campaign contributors. Hamilton County is rapidly moving in the direction of DuPage County, Illinois, the once overwhelmingly Republican suburban county in the Chicago area that has now become fertile ground for Democrats to win elections. Incumbents mayors lost in Columbus, Martinsville and Lebanon. Voters in Brownsburg rejected an astronomical property tax increase sought by the school district that might have shut down development in this growing suburban community.