Time to Cast That Ballot!
Election Day is upon us and in just a few hours the ballots will be tallied and we’ll know about our local leadership for the next few years. Important races in South Bend and Mishawaka are soon to be decided.
Months of door knocking, phone calls, campaign ads and commercials have tried to inform you of the good and the bad of each candidate. Many of you had a chance to meet the candidates personally, and others had opportunities to hear them in a debate or public forum.
The business community has taken an active interest in this election. Local elected officials play an important role in creating the conditions that impact local businesses and their decisions to locate or grow. Public policy decisions made by these elected officials related to zoning, incentives, and budget priorities will influence investment decisions by companies.
This spring, we embarked on a process to get to know each of the candidates. We invited all candidates for South Bend and Mishawaka Mayor and Council races to participate. We know it’s nearly impossible to get to know candidates from a television ad, radio commercial, or mail flyer. Our plan was to dive deeper, dig below the sound bites, and really get to know the candidates.
We knew that not all of our business leaders would have an opportunity to get to meet and get to know all of the candidates, so we decided we would do that and report back to them. We created a process like a job interview process, thinking these candidates were going to be “hired” by the citizens of our communities to fulfill an important leadership post.
We had a group of business leaders with business interests in each community participate in the interview process. In all, more than six hundred man-hours were spent pouring through candidate information, reviewing questionnaires, and interviewing and getting to know the candidates. In the end, we held public forums for the community to also meet and get to know the candidates.
In the end, we endorsed candidates that best matched the ideals, philosophies and goals of The Chamber. We know it is up to the voters to do the hiring on Election Day, however, we felt it was important to make a recommendation to the business community based on our findings collected from more than 600 hours of process. The candidates were evaluated on their views on issues impactful to business and community growth, their interaction with the committee and the public.
These endorsements represent candidates that share in The Chamber’s ‘big picture’ vision for economic progress. If elected, we believe that these candidates will be well positioned to provide leadership and will work collaboratively with business and community groups to move Mishawaka and South Bend toward a more welcoming environment for business growth.
The Chamber has endorsed the following candidates. In South Bend, Pete Buttigieg for Mayor; Derek Dieter, Gavin Ferlic and Karen White for At-Large City Council; Mike Stack for 1st District City Council; Valerie Schey for 3rd District City Council; Kyle Chamberlin for 4th District City Council; and Dave Varner for 5th District City Council. In the 2nd District, the Chamber did not endorse as Henry Davis is unopposed. Davis did participate in the process.
In Mishawaka, The Chamber endorsed Dave Wood for Mayor; John Roggeman, Matt Mammolenti, and Dan Bilancio for At-Large City Council; Woody Emmons for 1st District City Council; Mike Bellovich for 2nd District City Council; Ross Deal for 3rd District City Council; Marsha McClure for 4th District City Council, and Ron Banicki for 6th District City Council.
We are appreciative of all candidates seeking to represent their neighborhoods and communities. We know all have them have sacrificed significant time and energy over the past few months for the office they seek. We look forward to working with each of them as I believe we all share common goals, for our communities and our citizens to grow and prosper.
By Jeff Rea, President & CEO of The Chamber of Commerce of St. Joseph County
