In 1998, when Dave Woodward was elected to the state Home at age 22, one of many issues that instantly separated him from different younger win-it
In 1998, when Dave Woodward was elected to the state Home at age 22, one of many issues that instantly separated him from different younger win-it-now political obsessives was his persistence. He noticed a pattern: Invoice Clinton had received Oakland County in 1996, the primary Democrat to hold it in many years. If they may simply persuade these individuals to vote Democratic decrease on the poll, that would change the whole lot.
Having grown up in Oakland throughout the ’80s and ’90s, Dave knew the county’s status as a spot for the rich and well-connected. He additionally knew that it bore little resemblance to the lives of many individuals within the county—himself included. “In Oakland County, notably, prosperity—in so some ways—is throughout you,” he says. “The opulence is throughout you.”
Born and raised in Royal Oak, one of many middle-class, inner-ring suburbs within the south finish of the county, his household was neither rich nor well-connected. His dad labored retail at Sears for 25 years—a working-class dwelling that put meals on the desk however wasn’t the sort of cash that created feather-bed consolation. Woodward’s curiosity in politics began in highschool, however when it got here time for faculty, he wanted to be sensible: At Wayne State, he set himself up for a profession as an actuary. However being an actuary didn’t excite him—not like politics. In 1998, Woodward ran for the open seat being vacated by his hometown state consultant, a Democrat. Woodward didn’t have an entire lot of cash or connections and Royal Oak was nonetheless a battleground with plenty of reasonable Republicans—and the 12 months was in any other case depressing for Michigan Democrats—however he received anyway, with almost 55 % of the vote.
He arrived in Lansing, 22 and impossibly boyish-looking, because the youngest member of the minority get together. And although he threw himself into constituent companies and bread-and-butter points like clear water and client safety, he rapidly discovered that minority standing imposed limits on what you might obtain by way of onerous work alone. Nonetheless, he believed the rah-rah angle of his extra skilled fellow legislators who vowed to take again the Home in 2000.
“And proper after that didn’t occur, I and a gaggle of individuals sat right down to say, ‘All proper, we’ve acquired to map this out,’” remembers Woodward.
On paper, they sketched out a 10-year plan to construct the Democratic Social gathering in Oakland County. On the time, the county get together was extra a unfastened confederation of native teams and elected officers’ campaigns than something resembling a coherent group.
“We needed to construct the whole lot from scratch,” says Woodward.
He began by figuring out native races the place they stood an opportunity of creating positive aspects. Initially, the mannequin for this calculation was crude. “It was like, ‘The place was the margin of loss lower than 10 %? Let’s begin there,” Woodward laughs.
“I’ll be trustworthy, there have been some people who acquired mad at me as a result of we didn’t assist everyone in the identical means,” he says. “However this was about profitable! It’s about profitable elections after which profitable majorities in order that we are able to truly govern. … The aim, for me, is not only to compete in an election for the sake of an election; it’s what you do with the facility after getting it.”
To begin, that meant discovering voters. Woodward knew Democrats existed in Oakland—Invoice Clinton received in there 1996 and Al Gore in 2000, which, on reflection, had been early indicators of a nationwide shift within the political preferences of school graduates—however he additionally knew that these voters both tended to not vote in down-ballot races, or cut up their tickets.
“It’s all so high-tech now, the modeling and all that kind of stuff,” says Woodward. “This was old-school: I wanted to search out us 5,000 extra Democrats. So we’re going door-to-door and asking, ‘Are you a Democrat?’ We discovered them. And we constructed a database and made sure to place power and sources into ensuring that everybody we recognized a year-and-a-half out from the election ended up voting. … It’s not rocket science. It was like, ‘This particular person ought to be voting with us, however simply hasn’t.’”
In November 2002, Woodward received his third time period within the state Home—his remaining one, because of time period limits. At 26, speak naturally turned to what he needed to do subsequent. In Oakland, Democrats made positive aspects, however the gap was deep: Republicans had a 19-6 supermajority on the county board.
Woodward had attended a type of 19-6 county board conferences, and remembers talking afterwards with Dave Coulter, a Ferndale Democrat elected to the board in 2002.
“That was my first elected workplace, so I used to be a bit crestfallen to see how little you possibly can actually get executed in a minority that small,” says Coulter. He had labored to construct collegial, productive relationships with the Republicans on the fee—and with Patterson himself, for that matter. But it surely wasn’t sufficient to truly manifest the change he needed to see.
Woodward was providing to assist. “I’m like, ‘OK, clearly we’d like some extra Democrats elected,’” Woodward laughs. “He’s like, ‘Ya suppose?!’”
Within the means of recruiting candidates, the tables turned on Woodward: Dave, you’re term-limited. Why don’t you run?
It was not precisely advisable for a rising star to depart the legislature to pursue decrease workplace, operating in a seat the place he’d face a Republican incumbent whom Patterson was grooming to be the following chairman of the board. Plus, he would nonetheless be within the minority. However that was the place his work was: turning Oakland blue.
In November 2004, Woodward upset the Republican incumbent. A number of of his recruits received, too. The Republican majority shrunk from 19-6 to 15-10. Now it was time to slam on the accelerator. Woodward and Coulter got here up with a brand new plan.
“For the following six years that I used to be [on the board], we form of divided up obligations,” Coulter says. “He oversaw the ‘political’ aspect of issues [for the Democrats], and I form of oversaw the ‘caucus administration’ and ‘negotiating with [Patterson]’ aspect of issues. And that labored for us. … I might attempt to elevate points and insurance policies, after which Dave would attempt to translate these into votes.”
They picked points designed to distinction with Patterson’s Republicans, like transit, clear water, city redevelopment and ensuring middle-class areas weren’t uncared for in favor of wealthier communities.
“It was a mixture of elevating points that had been rising … after which getting candidates who had been credible,” says Coulter.
“It’s not simply a profitable system; these are issues that the voters need,” says Woodward.
Patterson noticed Democrats making positive aspects and it perturbed him. However he understood the reason for it sooner than most in his get together. “I’ve mentioned all alongside that the far-right wing of the [GOP] has executed a really efficient job of operating reasonable ladies out of the get together,” he advised the Free Press in 2004.
However what Patterson won’t have anticipated was that Woodward had his eyes on one thing that Republicans had taken with no consideration as theirs to manage: redistricting.
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It was a quirk of Michigan legislation: The state legislature managed the once-in-a-decade redistricting course of for federal and state legislative maps. New county fee strains, nevertheless, had been determined by a panel made up of 5 individuals: the chairs of the county’s Democratic and Republican Events, the county clerk, treasurer and prosecutor.
After the 2006 election, the Republican majority on the board was simply 13-12. Whoever managed the district strains after the 2010 census would probably decide the bulk. The entire countywide posts could be up in 2008—a presidential 12 months, which meant excessive turnout for Democrats—and a type of workplaces, Patterson’s outdated job of county prosecutor, was an open seat. In November, Barack Obama carried Oakland with 56.5 % of the vote. Patterson received a fifth time period as county govt with 58 % of the vote. Republicans held the clerk’s workplace, however Democrats picked up the treasurer and prosecutor posts—which meant they might management redistricting within the county for the primary time in generations. Woodward would get his majority. It was all going in accordance with plan.
However there was one factor Woodward hadn’t deliberate for: Patterson’s sway within the state capital.
At Patterson’s behest, the GOP state legislature rewrote the principles of county redistricting to strip management from the five-member bipartisan panel and hand it to the GOP-controlled county board. And lest there be any doubt about why this was taking place, the brand new legislation was written in such a way that it utilized solely to Oakland County—solely to counties with a inhabitants of greater than 1 million (there are two: Wayne and Oakland) that didn’t function by their very own constitution (simply Oakland).
“Brooks got here [to Lansing] and mentioned, ‘Hey, make this exception for Oakland County,’” one high Michigan Republican strategist who was concerned within the episode advised me. “He needed the board. When he was exec, it was extra like they weren’t an independently elected board; despite the fact that they had been, Brooks ran them. He gave them their agenda. … They did what Brooks needed. He ran that county like a king. He needed a compliant board. That mattered extra to him than [them being] Republicans, fairly truthfully.”
Republican Gov. Rick Snyder signed the invoice into legislation in December 2011.