There's a saying in Houston politics that local elections don't start getting any traction with the public until after Labor Day. This year, that would be September 7th which means that we're getting close. Houstonians are going to start paying attention in less than two weeks. Give or take.
The latest news to come out of the Mayoral race is that the first round of local television ads are about to drop. Since most people get their local election information from ads of this type, particularly from the candidate who can afford to run them in prime time, Steve Costello is someone to keep an eye on over the next couple of weeks.
We're also sure to have ads running in key spots from Ben Hall, who is mainly self-financing (again) but who seems to have a lot of money available to do so, Sylvester Turner, who has done nothing to lose his position as the odds-on favorite (who really hasn't done much honestly except spout platitudes that sound like deep thoughts but are really just superficial political pap), and Adrian Garcia, who's base of support is so-far proving to be unfailingly willing to overlook his lack of leadership as Harris County Sheriff.
Furthering the four-horse race meme is the Daily Cougar, who purported to pen an overview of the election but omitted two of the main candidates from their coverage entirely...
Mayoral Race to cover top community issues. Leen Basharat, Daily Cougar
With Mayor Annise Parker’s final term ending and the new Houston mayoral election just around the corner, tension rises as ten candidates race to become the next mayor.
According to the Houston Chronicle, during the last mayoral election in 2013, only 13 percent of the city’s registered voters actually voted in the mayoral election. This stems the concern of whether Houstonians may know what the mayor’s role really is.The article never mentions exactly who the ten candidates are. Instead it takes statements from Ben Hall, Sylvester Turner, Adrian Garcia and Chris Bell, mentions Sylvester Turner near the end and omits Bill King, Stephen Costello and Marty McVey entirely. To be fair, it's a college newspaper who's reporter clearly gets her information mainly from the Chronicle so there's that.
Meanwhile, we've started to see a steady stream of tweets from Bill King on road conditions and funding but there's scant evidence, to date, that this tactic is drumming up any support.
In fact, it seems as if he's losing small chunks of the Republican vote and that his back to basics appeal has slightly backfired, leaving the contrarian Republicans to view him as a hollow "conservative". I'm not entirely sure that "conservative" was the look Mr. King was going for here. I think he's trying to cast himself as the moderate in the race, running on common sense in the face of Liberal overspending and misplaced priorities. The problem he's having right now is that I just don't see any path to victory for him at this point.
There's always the possibility that television ads can change the game. If that is the case then Mr. King is going to have to knock those ads out of the park to move up in the ranks to become a first tier contender.
The same logic holds true for Stephen Costello. Who has amazingly not been attacked strongly by his opponents for being the mastermind behind the crudely constructed Rebuild Houston program, in part because I think that Progressive politicians such as Turner, Garcia and Bell understand the value of having in place a large slush-fund in order to move money to the politically connected. Costello's still suffering from a name identity deficit in relation to the big two candidates in the race.
Chris Bell (perennial candidate) is amazingly on a little bit of a surge right now. He's gotten some favorable publicity from the Houston Chronicle, and he seems to have taken a populist (from a well-to-do, Caucasian, inside-the-loop perspective) tone that seems to be playing well with his target audience. With that in mind, for him, he's on a winning streak. We expect this to last until voters go to the polls. (again)
At this point Marty McVey has to be considered among the "also-ran" candidates despite still getting invites to most of the forums. His campaign seems to be running on fumes, lacking original ideas and the candidate himself appears to be resigned to the fact that he'll be running for City Council in a couple of years.
Without further ado, here are the updated sports book odds for each candidate to possibly make it to the run-off (complete with summary)
Sylvester Turner (5/9) - Still the favorite and still doing nothing to prove otherwise. His election has a coronation feel to it, in the manner of Hillary Clinton, which means that he's anything but certain. It will be interesting to see if he can maintain his favorite status once the barbs start flying and if he has to offer actual policy positions instead of empty platitudes.
Adrian Garcia (3/1) - Bell attacked Garcia for the jail issue, and Houston yawned. Any attack against Garcia needs to be made in Sept and (even better) October leading up to the election to stick. Football season is starting and the Texans have not yet been eliminated from playoff contention. Again, it will be interesting to see if he has the legs to reach the line considering his shortcomings while in office.
Ben Hall (10/1) - I think Hall rises just a little because he's positioning himself to be the "Anti-HER Ordinance" candidate. No other candidate has struck out a position against HER Ordinance as strong as Halls. I'm not sure any of the other candidates care to court those voters leaving him a better path to making the run-off.
Stephen Costello (20/1) - I think his money and his presence on TV mean that you have to keep him in the running. He's also taking away key votes that other candidates need to compete. I still think Costello is going to fall under the weight of Rebuild Houston, but if no-one successfully ties him to that.....
Chris Bell (50/1) - I probably have Bell too high here but I've learned to never underestimate the ability of the Houston Democratic vote to back this bag of silliness that continually reminds us he's here. Oddly, I think Sylvester Turner would love to face Bell in a run-off, he'd appear like a moderate in comparison.
Bill King (300/1) - My big dive has been taken by the King campaign. There are signs that he's losing the conservative vote to Costello and Hall and his campaign seems to be floundering on issues such as HER Ordinance and Houston METRO. If anything, King's attempts to position himself as a "nuts and bolts" type has failed due to some of his Chron columns rubbing the social conservative vote the wrong way.
Others (Infinity-1/1) - I lump McVey into this group now, he's pretty much the same non-entity as are the other candidates. Should something happen to all of the six major candidates listed above, I might start breaking these out.
So, that's how I see it at the starting gate. As we sneak up to Labor Day and school gets back in session the race is just about to be fully engaged. To quote horse racing.....Aaaaand....They're OFF!!!
