Vote 2002
A kinder, gentler County Commission

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by Staff (Editorial@boulderweekly.com)

Tom Mayer (D) is considered by most politically savvy Boulder County residents as a shoe-in for Boulder County Commissioner, to fill the seat being vacated by term-limited Jana Mendez. Mayer's lock on the election came when he won the Democratic nomination in a county that elects only Democrats to the board of county commissioners (with the exception of moderate Republican Sandy Hume).

Mayer, a former Lousiville City Council member, swears he'll be more sensitive to property rights than the incumbent Democrats who are best known for stomping on little people in questionable county land grabs, smirking arrogantly while doing it. Let's hope Mayer means it, if he's elected as predicted.

James E. Murphy, like the other three candidates for county commissioner, wants the vicious and abusive land grabs to stop. Although Murphy's an underdog, by conventional wisdom that says we only elect Democrats to the commission, he has by far run the most visible campaign. His signs are everywhere. That, perhaps, has something to do with the fact that he owns a sign-painting business. (Last we checked, Mr. Murphy, signs were still unable to vote.)

Murphy, like former Republican commissioner Hume, is moderate and supports democratic virtues such as open space acquisition and more alternative transportation. He decided to run for the commission after witnessing a county land-use abuse near his home.

Tony Sileo (L) became a Libertarian after reading Ayn Rand's Fountainhead in 1995. He's typical of a growing political phenomenon in Boulder County: He's a highly educated engineer, who read Ayn Rand and became active in Libertarian politics. This is happening more and more every day, it's not going to stop, so get used to it. The phenomenon hasn't gained such critical mass yet, however, that a Libertarian is likely to land a cushy job as a Boulder County Commissioner.

If elected, Sileo would work hard to remove Boulder County's participation in the so-called War on Drugs. He would also work to restore property rights, made mockery of by the current board of county commissioners.

Randy Luallin (I) is a long shot for winning a seat on the Boulder County Commission, because his campaign has accepted no contributions and therefore only a relative few have heard what he has to say.

Luallin, who grew up in Boulder and graduated from Fairview High School, is a masonry contractor who would bring common sense, not experience, to the Boulder County Commission.

"I believe in open space, but people have got to come first," he told Boulder Weekly, explaining his outrage at the way the current county commissioners have treated property owners in an arrogant zeal to control or take property.

Luallin said he decided to run for a commission seat after commissioners refused to accept a common sense land trade that would have avoided the need to condemn properties for highway construction. When one landowner cried about losing her 200-year-old cottonwood trees for highway construction, Luallin couldn't believe what he heard.

"Jana Mendez (county commissioner) got this smug look on her face and said, 'Oh, those trees can be transplanted.' These are 200-year-old cottonwoods! Do you know how big those are? I decided right then and there that I was running for county commissioner."

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