By Ann E. Marimow and Nancy Trejos
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Isiah Leggett's landslide victory in the Democratic primary for Montgomery County executive, and the success of two new slow-growth County Council members, offers a mandate to ease the pace of development in Maryland's largest jurisdiction, the candidates said yesterday.
Democrats overwhelmingly picked Leggett, a professorial consensus-builder, over Steven A. Silverman, an assertive dealmaker, for the county's top political job. Their choice suggested that residents also are looking for a shift in style after 12 years of the hard-charging, pro-growth leadership of Douglas M. Duncan (D).
"This is an adjustment from a very good record, rather than any kind of repudiation," Leggett said yesterday, before leaving to teach his Wednesday torts class at Howard University School of Law.
After polling place foul-ups delayed results on election night, Silverman called Leggett yesterday to concede.
"The pendulum has swung the other way on growth," said Silverman, speaking from his cellphone en route to the beach. "The electorate that showed up was far more concerned about slowing the pace of development than building roads and transit."
Leggett's final step to office is a three-way Nov. 7 general election campaign against Republican Chuck Floyd, a former State Department employee, and independent anti-tax activist Robin Ficker. Because the county is overwhelmingly Democratic, Leggett is strongly favored.
The two leading Democratic candidates tried to tap into voter discontent with Montgomery's crowded roadways and schools, and concerns about lax government oversight of development in the wake of last year's controversy about the Clarksburg Town Center. Leggett, a former County Council member and state Democratic Party chairman, vowed to "slow growth." Silverman, an at-large council member, said he would "manage growth," but emphasized the need for the county to be more aggressive in building roads and mass transit.
With all precincts reported yesterday, Leggett was leading Silverman 61 to 36 percent. Thousands of provisional and absentee ballots remain to be tabulated, but both campaigns said Leggett's margin was wide enough that the results would not change the outcome.
In the contest for four at-large council seats, Democrats picked two candidates who, like Leggett, restricted donations from developers and campaigned to put more controls on growth. Duchy Trachtenberg and Marc Elrich finished closely behind council President George L. Leventhal and ahead of incumbent Nancy Floreen.
If they are successful in the November election, they will succeed incumbent Michael L. Subin, who was defeated in the primary, and fill the seat left open by Silverman's unsuccessful race for county executive. Subin and Silverman, along with Floreen and Leventhal, were part of Duncan's 2002 slate that has largely supported his business-friendly agenda.
Subin, whose council tenure covers two decades, attributed his loss to a low voter turnout and anti-growth sentiment. In a phone interview, he said he considers the county's current growth rate "moderate," but "clearly the majority of the folks who showed up at the polls yesterday felt it was too fast."
Council member Phil Andrews (D-Gaithersburg), who easily won his primary, said the ascension of Elrich and Trachtenberg would mean "big changes" in the balance of power on the nine-member council, including the potential for a new majority that shares Leggett's views on growth.
"I think it's clear that the council will move in that direction and maybe by an overwhelming margin," he said.
Leggett said yesterday he would seek to convince the council to restore building restrictions that it loosened three years ago. That year, the council increased impact taxes but eliminated a traffic-review standard that restrained construction, effectively lifting building moratoriums in some areas.
A new slow-growth majority on the council would have the votes to implement Leggett's plan.
"You have to respect the will of the people," Leggett said. "It would be irresponsible to deny what I consider to be such a clear mandate from the citizens."
Tractenberg said: "It would seem to me the majority of the people elected yesterday are probably supportive of that idea."
In assessing the election, Leventhal said Elrich and Trachtenberg benefited from the message they shared with Leggett. But he played down the importance of the issue of growth in the election. Leggett, he said, was a formidable candidate even before he took up the slower-growth mantle.
Sen. Brian Frosh (D-Montgomery) agreed that voters were drawn to Leggett's personal story of rising from a childhood of poverty in Louisiana and his long history in the community with 16 years on the council. He compared Leggett to former president Bill Clinton, in that he is difficult to pin down ideologically, but able to talk to everybody on every side on an issue.
"This is a guy who everybody likes," Frosh said. "I don't think Steve Silverman lost because he was too this or not enough of that. I think he lost because he ran against Ike Leggett."
The challenge for Leggett, if he prevails in November, said former planning board chairman Gus Bauman, is to translate his talent for massaging divergent viewpoints into consensus in the chief executive's role.
"When you're the executive, at the end of the day you have to make certain decisions that make some people unhappy," Bauman said. "The trick will be to continue to be the great dealmaker that he is, and be able to convince the folks he's leading that this is a good deal for everybody."
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