Assessing the candidates: Mike Debranski for Suffolk mayor

There will be six names on the first ballot to elect Suffolk’s mayor, but a few of those names stand out.

Linda Johnson, who was elected two years ago by her peers on the City Council, hopes to have that decision ratified by the city’s voters on Election Day.

For her to win, she will have to persuade voters to see past intense turmoil and secrecy at City Hall, and past a City Council that has made some surprisingly bad decisions.

Politicians suggest that a November municipal election favors the candidate with the greatest name recognition. While Johnson has that, there is a crowd of folks who would like to take her post.

Among them, the qualifications of Mike Debranski, a former high school principal and current member of the School Board, demand careful attention. We are also impressed by the persuasive passion of Dwight Nixon, a minister and a member of the city’s Economic Development Authority.

This page takes the privileges of incumbency seriously. Johnson has the finest command of the issues of any candidate in the race. She knows the city and its people, and she was a comforting presence when a tornado tore through parts of town.

But it is impossible to ignore missteps over her two-year term.

Since she took office, the city has shed a series of accomplished and respected professionals from high positions, destroying continuity and breeding discord. Whether those employees were fired or chose to leave (and there was some of both), the fact that so many subsequently found positions in nearby cities says something about Suffolk’s choices, what it lost, the motive for them and the atmosphere in City Hall.

Indeed, the building on Market Street has become the most closed municipal headquarters in Hampton Roads, all the more frustrating since Johnson ran on a promise of openness.

When challenged on the secrecy at City Hall, the mayor has repeatedly pointed to the opening of an office to fulfill requests under the Freedom of Information Act. But that’s the equivalent of arguing that someone is innocent of jaywalking because they don’t speed on the highway. It’s nice, but it’s not the same thing.

Add to that the administration’s furtive opening of coveted burial plots at Cedar Hill, its bungling of the process to site a new social services building, and the fact that two members of the City Council were given a pass after meddling in the assessment process. And now, according to reporting by The Pilot’s Dave Forster, even the mayor’s contention two years ago that the city’s finances were in disastrous shape has been called into serious question.

Given all that, this page cannot endorse Johnson’s election as mayor of the City of Suffolk.

Among the contenders, there is much to recommend both Debranski and Nixon.

Debranski, a former principal at Suffolk High School, has absorbed the support from the downtown and smart-growth base. His service on the School Board gives him a solid understanding of the largest part of the municipal budget, and an appreciation for what it will take to improve the city’s struggling school system.

Debranski has promised to attend to the accelerating needs in the city’s north without neglecting its downtown, which has been left too much to fend for itself in recent years.

Nixon, senior pastor at St. Mary’s Church of God in Christ, is at his best when talking about the children of the city, their needs and the hopes of their parents.

Nixon reserves some of his emphasis for job creation in the city. He has endorsed the enormous CenterPoint project off a congested Holland Road, deciding that job creation compensates for the inconvenience. Debranski has said he would oppose the project until he is satisfied that traffic will be dealt with.

That attitude toward growth is a fundamental difference between the two men, and an important one in a city facing Suffolk’s pressures. Though it has slowed, development will return to the city as the economy rebounds. If Suffolk does nothing to constrain it, the entire city may one day look like the crowded corridors near U.S. 17.

Debranski’s philosophies seem more in line with smart-growth champions who have led the city in the past, while Nixon said he would like to see more growth in areas that can accommodate it, an almost certain recipe for sprawl.

That’s a telling difference, one we believe makes Debranski the best choice to become Suffolk’s first elected mayor.

City Council The choices here are easier, but hardly simple.

In the Nansemond Borough, Leroy Bennett has been an able representative and a sure and independent voice on the City Council at a time the city clearly needs one. His wide and deep experience is unrivaled, and his dedication to the city is unquestioned. He has clearly earned a third term.

In the Whaleyville Borough, Vice Mayor Curtis Milteer — on the council since 1980 — also has deep experience in city issues. That long experience has led him to occasionally borough-centric views of politics, and a frustration with the city’s widely respected growth-control measures. Even so, Milteer’s constituent service and his appreciation for the sweep of history in the city argue for one more term in office.

In the Sleepy Hole Borough, Rob Barclay, a lawyer and member of the Virginia Port Authority’s Board of Commissioners, shows great promise. He is running unopposed. School Board The incumbents, James Perkinson from Sleepy Hole and Sharon Harris from Whaleyville, have their priorities in the right places on both security in the schools and on the need for continued improvement. That and their expertise argue conclusively for their return to the board.

In the Nansemond Borough, Thelma Hinton has been an absolutely tireless advocate for those who have less and need help. She is not an educator, and would bring a fresh voice and perspective to the School Board.