Transition

Congratulations to Ed Fitzgerald, Kevin Butler, Tom Bullock, Mike Summers and Mary Louise Madigan on their victories last night.

Now comes the hard part, transition to the Fitzgerald Administration.

Mayor-Elect Fitzgerald earlier today announced that Lou McMahon will head up his transition team.

Tom Bullock and Mike Summers are now going to have to catch up to what has been taking place in Council so that they can be ready come January for making decisions and leading this city.

Kevin Butler can now relax for 4 years as he has had to run two Ward 1 campaigns in two years. Although this time around was fairly easy compared to the first one.

Mary Louise Madigan becomes the Senior Ward Council person for Lakewood, Bob Seelie having retired from Council was the senior position.

With At-Large Mike Dever the only other Council member with more than 4 years experience it will be interesting to see if MLM becomes a helmsman to Council or will she continue to be a strong paddler for the Council Boat.

There is one other undercurrent with the Fitzgerald victory, who will take over Fitzgerald's seat come January when he assumes the Mayoral position.

There is talk of perhaps giving to maybe Dan Shields or get Ryan Demro back on council. Although, I am leery of Shields getting that post as I think it would tick off some of the Bullock supporters.

Joe Dangelo who lost to Mike Summers in Ward 3 is the VP of the Lakewood Democrat Club here in Lakewood, a case could be made for him to get it, but I would put that in the same category as giving it to Shields.

There are a couple of ways to handle it:

1) Upgrade one of the Ward Council person (i.e. Madigan or Butler) to the at-Large spot and then pull someone from that Ward as a reward for service to the City/Party.

Let me say this right now, I am working on the presumption that it will be a Registered Democrat or an Independent getting this gig, because I just don't see anyone willing to cross the aisle and pick a moderate Republican. I think it would just annoy too many loyalists.

With that said lets look at the other option and probably more logical:

2) Bringing in someone from the community. Several weeks ago I started contemplating this scenario and trying to come up with a list of names that might be amenable to the people.

Here is my list with notes on each:

1) Lou McMahon - With him being named as Transition Chief it would certainly put him a position to get know a lot of people and vice versa.

2) Jay Foran - Move and shaker with Lakewood Alive and other community groups, the only draw back may be the Cliffs project and its involvement with the City.

3) Gayle Wellman - Fitzgerald's treasurer, possible pay back for service to Ed and Lakewood

4) Mark Stockman - Lawyer and Fitzgerald supporter - Possible long shot

5) Dan Brennan - Longstanding Lakewood business owner, candidate for at-Large seat in 2005

6) Suzanne Horrigan - Lawyer and another 2005 at-Large candidate

7) Stan Austin - Heavily involved with the Lakewood Observer, big supporter of Mayor George, could be the olive branch to Tom George

8) Tom George - Could be interesting, but I am unsure if this would take place.

I am sure there our other names, some that I have thought of but have dismissed for various reasons. I am sure their are names I haven't even thought of, but we shall see.

The one big caveat I have for the Fitzgerald and the people making the decision about a replacement is, Fitzgerald made a big deal in his literature about Tom George's proclivity to hire his cronies, I really hope that everyone thinks about that when they are making the choices. I will say up front that it won't surprise me, but sometimes you have to reward those that are faithful.