And Then There Were Two

Ginny Deerin may have been knocked out in the first round of last week’s Charleston mayoral primary, but did she hit Leon Stavrinakis hard enough to give John Tecklenburg a second-round victory?
Charlestonians stayed home in droves last week, as only a small percentage of voters turned out in the rain for a six-way primary election to replace Joseph P. Riley Jr. as mayor.
And the results were surprising. Stavrinakis, originally considered the prohibitive favorite after years of service in county and state government, came in a close second to Tecklenburg, who notched just fewer than 9,000 votes, or just over one third of the total tally, despite never holding a publically-elected office.
Deerin, despite raising hundreds of thousands of dollars, finished a decidedly distant third, with only 17.5 percent of the vote. The runoff between Stavrinakis and Tecklenburg will be held Tuesday, Nov. 17.
It will be the first mayoral election that does not include Riley in 40 years.
But time may prove that Deerin played a pivotal role in the election, as it was she who went on the offensive in the final weeks of the primary campaign, labeling Stavrinakis as a friend of both traffic and developers.
At a press conference held at Tecklenburg’s Fenwick Drive home in West Ashley last week, Deerin pledged to “do whatever I can” to help her “dear friend” Tecklenburg get elected.
“I don’t think what I did was ‘go negative,’” Deerin said on Tecklenburg’s front porch, responding to complaints about her attacks on Stavrinakis.
Rather, she claimed, her campaign accurately pointed out the current state representative’s nay votes on completion of Interstate 526, and donations he took from developers, coupled with an endorsement from the local Chamber of Commerce.
At the beginning of the press conference, Tecklenburg jokingly welcomed the media to his modest home, calling it the home of “the biggest developer in Charleston County,” referring to Stavrinakis’ latest volley of criticisms.
Days following the press conference, City Councilmen Aubry Alexaner, Marvin Wagner, and Dean Riegel issued a press release voicing their support for Stavrinakis.”
”I’m proud to have the support of these West Ashley leaders. I was born, raised, and educated right here in West Ashley and my wife and I are raising our three children here now,” said Stavrinakis
On Friday, Stavrinakis marveled how he had been painted with the dirty developer brush, considering the years Tecklenburg has worked for a major developer.
“It’s right there in his biography on his own website,” said Stavrinakis, a local attorney, asking how someone who has “profited from” development has any finger to point at him.
“I think John’s a great guy, and think what he does is a respectable line of work, but people who are anti-growth need to know that he’s been profiting off growth for the past 15 years,” said Stavrinakis, seemingly taking a page from Deerin’s playbook.
Sitting in a rocking chair on his front porch last week, Tecklenburg said his campaign would resume doing what it had been doing the entire campaign; knocking on doors, shaking hands, raising money, and getting out his message.
While the primary returns showed a win for Tecklenburg, it also exposed a glaring weakness: West Ashley. The former Riley-man did well downtown, but on Nov. 3 Stavrinakis took West Ashley, where more votes and city councilmen reside.
It comes as little surprise that Tecklenburg did so well on the peninsula, the home of Riley’s political power base. But now Tecklenburg has to campaign around one of Riley’s biggest perceived political failures: West Ashley.
Until the last few years, residents this side of the Ashley River groused that Riley was too focused on his beloved peninsula, with all roads leading to the Battery. West Ashley was the redheaded stepchild, left to fend for its own.
Award-winning urban planning never seemed to make the jump from the 29401-29403 zip codes to suburban West Ashley, despite recent “Riley magic” efforts to increase parks and water access here, and revive the struggling Citadel Mall-Sam Rittenberg Boulevard corridor.
So, now Tecklenburg may have to fight a potentially unfriendly fight on his own home turf. And so does Stavrinakis, who has to come from behind to win on Nov. 17.