I'm on vacation this week. That — combined with last week's holiday — has meant a break from blogging. Here's a quick update, though: State Representative Chelsa Wagner has announced that she's not running for Mayor of Pittsburgh.
The Post-Gazette's headline: "State Rep. Wagner says she won't run for mayor ".
The Trib's headline goes a step further with "Chelsa Wagner not interested in mayor's office", which may overstate the case.
Wagner's statement twice uses the phrase:
"not run for Mayor at this time" [emphasis added].
The Burgh Report has posted a link to the entire text.
As I write, there's no reaction yet from the anonymous Draft Chelsa Wagner fan blog.
When former President Clinton came to town for Mayor Ravenstahl's political fundraiser last week, I called Representative Wagner, Council President Doug Shields, and Councilman Bill Peduto for updates on the field of potential challengers to Ravenstahl.
My note to our newsroom from last Wednesday:
-Chelsa Wagner has not decided if she'll run. May decide over this coming weekend and tell us her decision next week.
-Doug Shields: hasn't decided yet. Flattered that some people have asked.
-Peduto: not running for mayor. Will run again for his council seat.
Today's Post-Gazette story closes with this update:
"Council President Doug Shields has said he's not currently in a position to make a run."
You'll recall this past summer Mayor Ravenstahl himself declared a Shields candidacy.
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6 comments:
The papers also announced the date of the council election for Deasy's seat. Teresa Smith versus Brendan Schubert. Two different candidate. You guys should do a story to learn more about these two.
The story is that Smith is the best candidate for this seat.
The story is there are three other Democratic candidates also, no?
The graphic you run for this post is intriguing. I see you ran a similar one in July, but this time a question mark takes the place of one of the four faces. And although the title is "Chelsa Wagner Not Running For Mayor", Wagner's face is not the one you chose to eliminate.
The original graphic appeared in this post -- http://thebusmansholiday.blogspot.com/2008/07/ravenstahl-declares-shields-candidacy.html -- and included an image of Patrick Dowd. I'd mentioned his name near the end of that entry as the topic of speculation about the race in 2013. (Yikes: 2013! How strange it feels to be writing about time frames that likely were the setting for sci-fi of my childhood.)
Since Dowd wasn't relevant to my latest post, keeping his face on what I'm now calling my Pittsburgh politics Christmas ornament wasn't an option.
Shields and Wagner both acknowledged having weighed the 2009 race, so I kept them in. With the likelihood Ravenstahl will run unopposed, the "?" seemed a good way to represent the question of whether anyone will step up as a challenger.
By the way, the terms used in my notes about Shields from last Wednesday are his. I even asked him specifically at the end of our phone conversation if his words -- 'hasn't decided yet' and 'flattered that some people have asked" -- were a fair summary. He agreed that it was. I'm not sure if his comments to the PG are an evolution or an additional perspective on the same frame of mind.
Maybe DeSantis should change his affiliation?
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