Kensington Mayor Peter Fosselman will become the new Deputy Secretary of State in mid-April. He'll remain mayor as he takes on his new post. Congratulations, Pete!
Showing posts with label Pete Fosselman. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pete Fosselman. Show all posts
Monday, March 28, 2011
Monday, May 17, 2010
Is Pete Fosselman Running Against Valerie Ervin?
Yesterday, our spies came out of the woodwork to report that Kensington Mayor Pete Fosselman, who is currently a candidate for Planning Board Chair, is considering a run against Council Member Valerie Ervin for the District 5 seat. We emailed Fosselman for comment and he has not yet responded. However, the noise is so loud on this that we are convinced that something is going on.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Carrier Aces Interview, Likely to be Next Planning Chair
Multiple council building sources report that Francoise Carrier, the Director of the county’s Office of Zoning and Administrative Hearings, hit a home run in the interviews for Planning Board Chair yesterday. One Council Member said she was "head and shoulders" above the other three candidates, who are former Planning Board Member John Robinson, Kensington Mayor Pete Fosselman and Housing and Opportunities Commission Member Tedi Osias.
"People are going to like her," said another Council Member. "People will see that the Planning Board will be in good hands." Yet another Council Member said, "It was off the charts how good she was." This person praised Carrier's offer to provide alternatives to the council along with master plan drafts, something which has not been done before. "She demonstrated that she would be our partner in that. She knows her job is to work with us."
At the moment, we believe Carrier has at least eight of the council's nine votes. The council will select the next Planning Chair on Tuesday.
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Next Planning Board Chair will Likely be a Woman (Updated)
Five candidates are vying to succeed Royce Hanson as Montgomery County’s next Planning Board Chair. We can not predict who will win, but our sources in Rockville lead us to believe that the County Council will make history by appointing the first woman ever to lead the Planning Department next month.
The two leading candidates at the moment are Tedi Osias, who is a lobbyist for the county’s Housing Opportunities Commission and has worked as Chief of Staff to former Council Member Howie Denis and with the Board of Appeals, and Francoise Carrier, who is the Director of the county’s Office of Zoning and Administrative Hearings. Both have experience with one of the most critical duties of the Planning Chair: dealing with community members on land-use issues. Both are well-known to Council Members because they have worked directly with them.
The other three candidates – Planning Board member and developer Joe Alfandre, former Planning Board Vice-Chair John Robinson and Kensington Mayor Pete Fosselman – have been lobbying the council for the job for months. Robinson has wanted it for years. If any of these three had five votes, the council would not have extended the deadline in March.
Part of the reason for the council’s delay is that no one is seen as an ideal candidate to replace Hanson by many Council Members. When your author asked one Council Member who was looking good for the position, this person replied, “No one – on any level.” Another remarked, “None of the candidates have broad management skills which is a challenge with a $120M, 800+ person operation that has been operating too autonomously for too long.” Osias and Carrier are not managers while Fosselman hired a town manager to run Kensington.
Both Osias and Carrier have supporters but neither has locked it up. We believe that neither Alfandre nor Robinson has any support. Council Members are divided as to whether Fosselman is in the mix. Two said he was, another called him a “possible dark horse” and a fourth said, “Pete doesn’t stand a chance although he thinks he does.” Fosselman’s testimony on the Purple Line, which called for continued study of alternative routes to light rail on the Georgetown Branch, was spotlighted by rail opponents and may be a problem for some Council Members. Slow-growth civic activists have begun emailing the council on behalf of Carrier, which will bolster her in the eyes of some Council Members but hurt her in the eyes of others.
We believe the council is split down the middle between Osias and Carrier. At the moment, one Council Member favors Carrier, one favors Carrier with Fosselman as a second choice, two favor Osias, two see the job as between Osias and Carrier, one sees it as between Osias, Carrier and Fosselman and two have not indicated an opinion. That is about as up in the air as it gets.
Whoever gets the job as Planning Chair may regret it. The Department faces years of budget cuts, continuous demands for master plans, project reviews and growth policy reviews, a possible merger of its Parks Department with the county’s Department of Recreation and the ever-complicated relationships on the County Council. The council could very well make history by picking a woman as the next Planning Chair, but that does not mean the next chapter in the Department’s own history will be an easy one.
Update: We made a mistake in this post. One of our sources tells us that Caroline Freeland was Planning Chair from 1963 through 1971. So Osias or Carrier would be the first female chair in thirty-nine years.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Whispers of the At-Large Race, Part Three
Today we will begin looking at rumored candidates for the at-large race. Some are actual candidates, some are potential candidates and others probably will not run. We examine them in three parts, all in alphabetical order, and supplement our remarks with comments from our all-seeing spy network.
Jane De Winter, Kensington
De Winter is the former President of the Montgomery County Council of Parent Teacher Associations. She has been a civic and education activist in the county for over a decade. Her position with the PTAs gives her access to other education activists throughout the county, a thorough understanding of one of the county’s premier political issues and an acquaintance with the school unions (including the ever-critical MCEA).
De Winter has not run for office before, has not contributed to other state or county candidates and is not known to be affiliated with one wing or the other on the existing council. Her advantages are intelligence and experience. Her fundraising capability is a question. De Winter is running now, with an appearance at Valerie Ervin’s recent fundraiser and an early version of a campaign website online.
Spy: Jane will have an advantage of name recognition county-wide, at least with the PTAs, which will help her some. She has a Ph.D. in Economics from UPenn and could really be an asset on the council as someone who truly understands the economic impact of decisions (and looks at things through this lens). She could really help on the MFP Committee, as well.
Spy: She is off and running and is lining up the MCEA folks - she hopes. She kicked off in February with an exploratory committee. Does not have the repartee needed nor the easy way with a crowd - but her PTA experience and Rolodex could well pay off.
Spy: I don’t know her personally, but she has made no secret of her desire to run. She has been attending D16 events, the Spring Ball, etc. She is ready to go.
Spy: Could also be a strong contender if she sharpens her message and targets one or two specific incumbents and their records. Will be very competitive for the Apple Ballot endorsement.
Spy: Jane De Winter generated some buzz earlier this year, when her name was floating around. That seems to have died down and most political insiders have moved on. She has no name recognition, no known fundraising prowess, and unless she can muscle together some support from incumbents, she will have little chance. The Apple Ballot could provide a lifeline, but it will likely be unavailable unless one of her other cons changes (ie: incumbent suport or money). A strong bid by Jane De Winter could, however, pose problems for other women running at-large.
Pete Fosselman, Kensington
Fosselman has been the Mayor of Kensington since 2006. He ran for Delegate in District 18 in 2002 and finished last of seven candidates in the Democratic primary. He is a principal of Rodgers Consulting and has owned more than one small business in Kensington.
Fosselman is a popular Mayor, has many friends (including your author) and is a major player in District 18. He would be a favorite for any open Senate or Delegate seat in the district. He is also one of a very small number of Montgomery politicians who backed Martin O’Malley for Governor when Doug Duncan was still running. His job at Rodgers and experience as a business owner could help him raise money from the business community. But the Town of Kensington, with its 768 households, is a very small base for an at-large campaign. Fosselman would need a lot of help to compete county-wide. He is not a confirmed candidate for any office other than his current one.
Spy: Nice guy, very approachable and would bring a mixture of common sense and pragmatism to the Council.
Spy: I would describe him as “universally liked and respected.” He has a great temperament for governance.
Spy: He shows up in many places - attended a forum on how to run a campaign in January; could be the first gay candidate for council - but I think he is more Delegate inclined. But what has been his showcase in Kensington - a hot bed of controversy? Street lights were the only thing I can think of - the Safeway and the flower pots on Connecticut - come on - what could he run on?
Spy: He has shown he can actually govern, but the last time he ran for anything larger than the Town of Kensington he came in last. Does a county wide campaign make sense? On a personal note, I really like the guy and he is a great supporter of the county party.
Spy: Pete is energetic, likeable, very popular in Kensington and could pull gay support away from Duchy Trachtenberg.
Spy: Would make a great Councilman. Unknown outside of Kensington. Can raise some $ but enough?. Works hard. In my very humble and unsophisticated opinion he could win but only with a lot of $ and work. I also don’t think the desire is there.
Spy: Pete Fosselman has been spotted around town more times than Elvis. This can only mean that he is at least considering running for another position. At-large council is what seems to come up the most. He definitely has going for him that he's photogenic and sometimes even mistaken for our Governor. Nevertheless, his name recognition is probably not high, and his fundraising prowess is not yet clear either. Most importantly, it is difficult to comment on Fosselman without knowing more about his politics and where he fits in the County political spectrum. Some consider him a protege of Sen. Madaleno, but the only evidence we've seen of this is his opposition to the Purple Line. Does he have backers on the Council? Not that I have heard, but let's wait and see.
Larry Giammo, Rockville
Giammo is the former Mayor of Rockville. We speculated last December that he might be running against District 3 County Council Member Phil Andrews. Since that time, we have heard very little about him. Giammo has been a longtime Independent who, along with Fosselman, supported O’Malley against Duncan. Mayors of Rockville tend to be big players in county politics, but Giammo’s silence indicates he may not be in the 2010 mix.
Spy: Never seemed content to just be Mayor of Rockville - I would guess he has a campaign in his future but he has been quiet since he left office; was never quiet in his disagreements with Duncan - could he be thinking about a county Exec run some time down the line? I don't see him anywhere - so if he is a candidate - he must be doing it in stealth mode.
Spy: Wasn’t Larry Giammo a Republican until recently? I have to believe that the days of party-switching opportunists easily winning seats might be over -- but only so long as his opponents are willing to raise that fact in a primary. If so, it would be a deal-breaker for many Democratic primary voters. The one thing that might save him from this is that it is unclear if people will use resources to call out a challenger on something like this. In any case, I thought Giammo was considering challenging Phil Andrews. If so, he might be more at home in that race, since Andrews seems to be imitating Republicans lately with his anti-collective bargaining, anti-early voting, fiscal conservative positions.
Spy: He is almost invisible outside of Rockville, where I think he is running his business.
Spy: Has support and necessary $ if he wants to raise it. I don’t think the desire is there but I for one will certainly urge him to jump in now that I know his name is in circulation.
Spy: Larry has to decide whether or not he is a Democrat. If he is not, he can’t get elected to the Montgomery County Council in 2010. If he re-registers as one, he needs to explain why he was registered Independent for so long. This will not be a trivial problem in a Democratic Primary. He has a strong base in Rockville and would be very competitive for the Gazette and Post endorsements.
More tomorrow!
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
No Spoils for MoCo (Reprise)
Back in February, my blog-brother Kevin Gillogly and I put up back-to-back posts on how MoCo was not getting a fair share of state appointments. Trying to be helpful, I promoted beloved Kensington Mayor Pete Fosselman for the Secretary of State vacancy. After all, the mayor was a rare and very early supporter of Martin O'Malley over then-Montgomery County Executive Doug Duncan in the Democratic gubernatorial primary.
But illustrating once again that the Governor does not read our blog [sigh...], the administration has decided that the new Secretary of State will be Prince George's County lawyer John McDonough, whose daughter works for Senate President Mike Miller. This is a wasted opportunity because the Governor could use a bit more good will in MoCo at the moment and Mayor Fosselman has many friends here.
Monday, February 18, 2008
Is MoCo Getting its Share of the Spoils?
Believe it or not, there are a few people in MoCo who believe that we are getting the short end of the gubernatorial stick from our ex-Mayor of Baltimore. The latest list of the Governor’s appointments will give them a bit of ammo.
Last Friday, Governor O’Malley released this year’s “green bag” nominations, a list of appointments to many of the state’s boards and commissions that require Senate approval. There are 165 nominees on the list, which you can view here. Obsessed as we are with numbers, we counted the nominees by county of residence. The leaders were Baltimore County (35), Baltimore City (26), Prince George’s County (18), Anne Arundel County (15), Montgomery County (15) and Howard County (11). No other county had more than five appointees. Caroline, Kent, Queen Anne’s and Somerset Counties, all of which are located on the Eastern Shore, had no nominees. Mysteriously, two "non-residents" appear on the list instead.
Let’s consider the populations in these counties. Baltimore County accounted for 14% of the state’s population in 2006. It accounted for 21% of the Governor’s green bag list. Baltimore City accounted for 11% of the state’s population and 16% of the nominees. MoCo, on the other hand, accounted for 17% of the state’s population and 9% of the nominees. Prince George’s fared a bit better than MoCo (15% of population, 11% of nominees).
Now we are all good Democrats on this blog and big supporters of Governor O’Malley. So I have an idea for how the Governor could rectify this unfortunate appointment deficit. How about appointing Kensington Mayor Pete Fosselman as our next Secretary of State? He would be a nice D18 counterbalance to all of the people from Takoma Park who seem to be taking over the state government these days.
Just a suggestion from a blogger who’s trying to be helpful, Governor!
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