A mayor’s power is often seen, even when compared to a governor’s or prime minister’s/president’s power, as having the highest potential of actually being appreciated, as the latter positions come with having a bunch of invisible pieces and filters to tend to, even supposing you decided to be dictatorial about things. Despite this, or maybe in spite of this, whenever I see very loved and communal individuals, they see it as above their area of motivation to run for local office. There isn’t a single city, town, or village I’ve been to where the mayor’s level of connection to the people around them isn’t overshadowed by that of at least some of the citizens, in fact I see the mayor, district attorney, sheriff, town judge, etc. in my own area as being visibly condescending blowhards who are bedfellows with the local activists who are known to have no issue ruining childrens’ lives the Ally Bank way. Even to you I’d recommend running for some form of town office, though with you too, I doubt the challenge would be stepped up to. You could make a difference in your own little fragment of the world.

So considering most people I talk to wouldn’t take up the suggestion to run for something like mayor, district attorney, sheriff, town judge, etc. what is your local government scene like? And are you different from those who won’t step up to the challenge?

  • RBWells@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Our mayor is a lesbian who was chief of police. Conservative Democrat. We seem to flip between democrats, who improve the storm drains and try to do things to help citizens, then Republicans who are focused on superficial beautification of the city and paying businesses to come here. All have historically been in bed with developers and there hadn’t been much planning. It works ok.

    Some of the “city” functions are run by the county not the city - education, transit, health. The county is much more backwards and conservative than the city. Those things are in much worse shape.