Why I am Voting for Mick Cornett

Coming to Oklahoma

My wife and I moved to OKC from the state of Oregon in the late summer of 2012. We knew about the move long before then, in the fall of 2011 when I was offered the position that would be waiting for me here upon my graduation. So I had a lot of time to tell people about moving to Oklahoma. A lot of time to field bemused questions. A lot of time to defend our decision to move here.

          

And what I generally said was this: that OKC was a dynamic place, with a ton of energy and a lot of momentum. That they had the Thunder and were (gasp) building a streetcar! That there were in fact cool young people there and they were not all Sally Kern. As an aside, most Oregonians have not actually heard of Sally Kern, but yet on a deeper level they have, and whenever the word “Oklahoma” comes up in conversation Sally’s abhorrent politics drift across their minds like a wraith. That summer the Thunder made the finals and that helped my cause somewhat (for propaganda piece on this see here). But still, folks were skeptical.

After I moved here I fielded more questions from back in Oregon. “How are you liking it?” said with the intonation that they were, prior to hearing my answer, preemptively cringing in an anxious, at times hopeful way, knowing that whatever it was I was going to say would either confirm their stereotypes about Oklahoma or else be a bald-faced lie. Still I told them that I mostly liked it. The weather sucks but then again it does everywhere north of Santa Barbara. Other than that things were cool. Marilee and I found a (cheap by Oregon standards) rental in a charming old house within walking distance of one of the awesomest record stores around (Guest Room). We could walk to restaurants along Western. I could bike to work (if properly motivated). I worked in a kick-ass skyscraper downtown with a whole legion of 20-something professionals. My brother flew out to see Jeff Mangum at the Diamond Ballroom with me and, after meeting my friends, he confessed, “If you had told me you’d go work for an oil company in Oklahoma and end up working with a bunch of Indie Rockers I would never have believed you!”

And people were friendly. So friendly it was almost unbelievable! Night and day different in the level of friendliness between here and anywhere else I’ve ever lived. Much friendlier as a species than Oregon. Much much friendlier than Houston. There was an unusual sort of gung-ho attitude about everyone also. A “we’re all in this together” vibe that is really infectious.

I like Oklahoma City. I like its energy. I like the direction it seems to be moving. I understand that it was not always this way.

Let me now tell you, up front, what sucks about Mick Cornett

He won’t debate Ed Shadid. This is a low-class move. Similar was that time in 2011 when he went ahead with the MAPS 3 timeline vote in spite of delayskeeping two council members away from the scene.  Also not classy.  Why this was done is uncertain, as a delay in the vote would not have affected the outcome of the vote either way.

I’ve never met Mick Cornett, but he seems arrogant and cocky, and if in real life he’s a complete asshole I wouldn’t especially be surprised. There is no secret that Mick Cornett didn’t want to run for another term as mayor but that the prospect of Shadid winning and the lack of another mainstream candidate scared him and the local power brokers enough that he threw his hat in for 2014. He seems a little lazy with his campaigning. I’ve already had two opportunities to meet and talk with Ed Shadid. Zero, thus far for Cornett. There was a large event I was invited to, but I had a conflict, and in any regard it will not be the intimate occasion that Ed Shadid has found time for.

In 2006, Mick Cornett apparently thought that these three issues were the biggest problems facing America. His record on LGBT issues is not great (although he is no Michelle Bachmann). In 2011 he did vote in favor of (Ed Shadid’s) motion to explicitly ban discrimination based on sexual orientation in city offices. So there is that. Also this last fall when certain local churches attempted to manufacture a scandal over a production on city property of “The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told,” a gay reimagining of the birth of Jesus, Mick politely kept silent. So at least we know the gay-baiting phase of his career is behind him.

Then there is the matter of the embarrassing implementation of MAPS 3/Project 180. I don’t know where to begin. There was the time that someone involved with the budgeting of MAPS3 simply did the math wrong, and just like that the city would only afford to build 35 of the promised 70 miles of sidewalks (additional money from the general fund were eventually allocated to build all the promised sidewalk ).This was embarrassing. So too was the half-assed implementation of Project 180, with streets torn up for months at a time with no visible progress. The fact that project 180 tore up and rebuilt streets which will, in the course of the next 18 months, be torn up and rebuilt again for the streetcar line. Imagine the savings if the work had been consolidated. 

None of these execution issues were themselves Mick’s personal fault, but there has been no move to hold anyone accountable either. A depressing, self-defeating, “well, live and learn” vibe out of Mick on this stuff.

About Ed

About Ed Shadid. I know he inspired a passionate following when he ran for Ward 2 city councilor. I know he is inspiring a passionate following in his mayor’s race. Moreover he seems like a nice, thoughtful guy. As a city councilor I am impressed with Shadid on several points: (1) he was quick to jump on the bandwagon started by the Friends for a Better Boulevard in rethinking/redesigning the Crosstown Expressway to make it more pedestrian, bike and business freindly, (2) Shadid almost singlehandedly spearheaded the movement to change what was going to be a rather pedestrian sidewalk construction plan for North Western (see what I did there) into a much more dynamic placemaking initiative, (3) Ed led the drive to explicitly ban sexual orientation discrimination from city offices (see above), (4) Ed seems like a really sharp guy who cares a lot about civic issues. (5) He cares a lot about public transit. He might be the only city politician who truly does (although this point does make his opposition to the streetcar more frustrating). (6) He is a constant devil’s advocate on the council. This is probably my favorite thing about him. He is the only person to publicly chastise City Manager Jim Couch for the repeated epic failures in execution of city projects (see above). He asks tough questions and challenges assumptions and group think.

So, now that I have at the onset laid out my counter-arguments, on with my main point, which boils down to this:

OKLAHOMA CITY HAS A WEAK MAYOR”S OFFICE

Oklahoma City has a weak Mayors office with very little real power. The mayor is little more than a glorified city councilor. Whoever is elected mayor will have one vote on the council. Day-to-day decisions are made by the City Manager, Jim Couch, who serves at the pleasure of the council. The only additional power that a mayor has above the council is to nominate citizens to serve on various boards and committees, and even then these nominees must be voted in by the full council.¹ Beyond this nominating power, the Mayor is not much more than an ordinary city councilor with additional powers as a figurehead or a cheerleader

Mick Cornett’s time as Mayor is a case study in how to use the soft powers of the office to build coalitions and be a champion for Oklahoma City.

 

(1) Mick Cornett has been a strong advocate for walkability, urbanism and physical fitness. 

During Mick’s time as mayor walkability has dramatically increased in Oklahoma City. See his TED talk on the subject here. We have bike lanes now. Not enough, but we have them. We are building sidewalks, not enough, but we are making a start on repairing a problem which took 60 years to create. We are beginning the construction of a streetcar network.

All this is impressive, because well, Cornett is a Republican. The OKC mayor’s office is non-partisan, but the fact is Cornett is a Republican. A Republican in Oklahoma. A Republican in a GOP world where being anti-bicycle and especially anti-rail has become a litmus test almost as sacrosanct as opposing the Affordable Care Act. The fact that he can get away with this in and of itself is amazing. The fact that he can get buy-in from the local powers-that-be is even more astounding. In 2008 the City hired Jeff Speck (Jeff Speck!) to assess walkability issues in Oklahoma City. A few years Larry Nichols basically insisted that a TIF district be set up around the Devon Tower in order to implement Speck’s recommendations. This project came to be known as Project 180.

The fact that Mick Cornett can be so pro-walkability, so pro-urbanism, so upfront about the overbuilt, too car-friendly infrastructure of OKC and not only has not been tarred and feathered but also has achieved buy-in from the local community is a testament to something about the man. His ability to build coalitions. His personal persuasiveness. 

 

(2) The Thunder.

So much has been written on this that I won’t really wade into it more than I have to. Many many pieces went into moving the Sonics to OKC. Most of these pieces have little to do with Mick Cornett. It cannot be ignored, though, that it was Mick Cornett’s personal lobbying that moved the New Orleans Hornets to OKC for those pivotal post-Katrina years. This was Mick busting his hump, pestering David Stern, working a phone. This is a mayor acting as booster and salesman for his city. Whatever your feelings about professional sports, the Thunder have done so much for the morale of this town. The Thunder, and their successes, have single-handedly erased a huge part of the negativity which always surrounds discussions of Oklahoma City out on the coasts. Maybe that won’t matter to the natives, but to people like me who are struggling with the decision to relocate, it is huge.

Now ask yourself, can anyone legitimately envision Ed Shadid pulling this off? Honestly, if Shadid was the mayor in the 90’s we probably wouldn’t even have the Thunder’s arena, and would instead have been treated to a sober conversation about the “Downtown Interests” who were trying to get a playground built for the rich.²

 

(3) Ed Shadid is a polarizing candidate. 

The things that I like about Ed (and there are many) I can keep liking about him on the council. Seriously I hope he stays on the Council after losing the Mayor’s race. But his personal divisiveness, his “us against them” campaign message, will not make for a mayor who can wield the soft power of the office.

Shadid is running a campaign based, as its central premise, on resentment by the suburbs against money being spent downtown. This is an old technique and often an effective one (see Cincinnati). For Oklahoma City this is sad, in that if effective it destroys the esprit de corps I so much enjoy about this place. Win or lose, that genie will probably not be going back into the bottle.

Ed is not a coalition-builder. Yes he inspires passionate crowds, but he excels much more at inciting populist outrage than in building coalitions with his colleagues on the horseshoe³.

Shadid is paranoid, always quick to point out the forces arrayed against him. He lacks a filter and cannot seem to hide his contempt for his political enemies. For an example of both of these phenomena, see his bizarre rant in the comments section of the Daily Oklahoman  in which he attacks Cornett for, among other things, getting an MBA in his spare time, for planning to take a seat on the board of Chesapeake Energy (a completely unsubstantiated claim) and for relying on “Poll-driven chameleon-like marketing by anonymous big money.”⁶ Honestly, anyone who uses the internet ought to know better than to post anything in the comments section of a newspaper. That is the province for the crank, conspiracy theorist and the crackpot. For a mainstream candidate to lower himself to this level shows a remarkable lack of self-control. As for the content of the posting, well, see above (crank, conspiracy theorist, etc.).

Shadid simply seems to lack the political skills required to advance a vision for the city. Shadid has made a habit of swooping into an issue in which he had previously not been engaged, quickly determining that he knows more than folks who have been working on the issue for years, and seeks to implement his vision at the expense of others’. It was a description of this arrogance by a member of the Modern Streetcar subcommittee which was first to sway me Cornett’s way. Indeed I have encountered many people who volunteered for Shadid’s 2011 Ward 2 City Council campaign who have since turned against him.

And since I started this all off by saying that Mick Cornett is probably an asshole in real life, I will not be too unfair is making this character judgement: while Ed Shadid honestly seems like a nice guy, he also strikes me as a man so convinced of his own genius that he is not particularly interested in the ideas or perception of those he disagrees with. Not even interested in pretending like he is. In many cases I am convinced that he is in fact right on the issues. OKC needs better buses, OKC needs better sidewalks, more minorities ought to be nominated to city committees, etc. But a man so arrogant in the treatment of those he disagrees with will never win over an entire city. Mick Cornett—mega church attending, good-old boy backslapping Mick Cornett--has managed to win over a large swath of the young, urban, progressive population of Oklahoma City^7,8. Can anyone in their wildest dreams imagine Green Party member, atheist-friendly Shadid winning over both conservatives in the sprawly OKC hinterlands and moneyed corporate leaders downtown?

 

(4) Shadid has run a campaign that is highly disingenuous.

Many of the MAPS3 initiatives are based exclusively in the suburbs (i.e. sidewalks, trails, senior wellness centers). A sizeable portion of the money people see being spent downtown is from TIF districts; the district is funding a lot of its own momentum. The Shadid campaign makes claims that the City will be on the hook for a $250 Million conference center hotel, when no plans for such a thing exist, no proposals have been made to construct or fund one, and previous public-private partnerships (such as the Skirvin) were both relatively inexpensive to the taxpayer and also wildly successful⁴. He makes frequent mention of the lack of police officers without mentioning that the OKCPD has added as many officers as it is structurally-capable of adding for each of the last two years. Shadid’s public safety mailers make hay out of the number of abandoned buildings in OKC without mentioning that the complete Council, Cornett included, have begun taking steps to address the issue. Shadid campaigns both as the champion of the suburb and the enemy of sprawl.

A 2011 City Council campaign in which he believed that “MAPS3 should be completed as it was promised to voters”⁵  turned into a 2013 Mayoral campaign based on disassembling it, even if it means revisiting the 2010 MAPS referendum.

~

            So here I am, 18 months into being an Oklahoma City resident. Being such a newcomer I’m feeling more than a bit self-conscious about posting this. But I’m going for it anyway, and I’m anxious to hear what you have to say.

I will close this by saying that I live in Mesta Park, near downtown Oklahoma City. I like living here. I like being close to things. I like the feeling of being a part of a city and a part of a community. Cornett has not been shy about his goal to build a downtown that people, particularly young people, want to live in. As one of these young people, I appreciate that. Shadid, on the other hand, has used this to stoke suburban resentment.

But building a nice downtown is not a zero sum game. People are moving to the city and they are choosing to live within the city, largely because of increasing amenities. If people didn’t want to live in OKC we wouldn’t have seen the rise of the Plaza District or the resurrection of Deep Deuce or Midtown from their vacant-lot purgatories. This is a virtuous cycle which benefits those in the suburbs with rising tax intakes for the city, more civic pride and more engagement in the city’s schools. Put another way, every young, involved person who chooses OKC over Edmond is a win for the entire city.

My first day at work in OKC everyone assumed I lived in Edmond. Every last person. “Where do you live?” actually meant, “Where in Edmond do you live?” Devon’s corporate relocation people seemed mystified that I was looking for a rental in the urban core (and in fact they seemed hesitant to even drive by the house I found on Craigslist to check it out for me). So much was the hangover of the 80’s-90’s crappiness of OKC proper that to entire generations living within the city limits was unimaginable. But here we are.

Footnotes:

¹ It appears that voting in a Mayor’s nominees is du rigueur for the Council. At least I am unaware of any of Cornett’s hundreds of nominees being rejected by the council. This fact itself has become a social media battleground as it pertains to one of Shadid’s talking points about Cornett overwhelmingly nominating white people to city positions. Cornett supporters waste no time pointing out that they can find no record of Shadid opposition to any of these nominees.

²Honestly this point may not be entirely fair. I have no record of Shadid’s opinion on the construction of the Chesapeake Arena.

³ ”Horseshoe” being the quaint insider term for the OKC City Council.

⁴And were a taxpayer-funded convention center hotel proposal to be brought to the Council, Shadid could as easily oppose it there as he could as Mayor. Of course, his ballot measure might render the whole thing moot.

⁵And also implied in 2011 that his opponent could not be trusted to implement the streetcar project http://i.imgur.com/10wScU6.jpg..

⁶Make no mistake, there are forces arrayed against Shadid. Any reader of the Oklahoman Editorial page can see this for themselves. But Shadid has a deeply-ingrained conspiratorial worldview (completely in line with other Green Party members that I have encountered) which is out of proportion to reality and indeed a little sad.

⁷Of course this population is also Shadid’s base. For an interesting perspective on the irony of young people both enjoying the fruits of the OKC renaissance and siding with Shadid against the primary face of this renaissance, see http://www.capitalcityok.com/2014/02/is-cornett-the-right-mayor-of-citys-20-somethings/

⁸Cornett has also won the support of Wayne Coyne, which is kind of bizzarro in itself. But come to think of it Flaming Lips LPs are always like $5-$10 more expensive than they seem like they should be. Does this make Wayne Coyne one of Shadid’s reviled “Corporate Interests”?