A Broken Party, Local Edition- How We Dig Out

2016 was not kind to the Democratic Party's Presidential nominee in the Lehigh Valley. Hillary Clinton and Katie McGinty lost in Northampton County, even though most of the row office candidates did not (Eugene DePasquale lost narrowly to the county's own county executive). Clinton did carry Lehigh County, but her margin was paltry by comparison to President Obama's, and did not provide her with much of a bump out of this region. Eight years after President Obama carried Carbon County the first time, the county was a very dark shade of red this time. Monroe County, which had been trending towards the Democrats in recent elections, went to Clinton by just a couple of hundred votes, a minor victory where she needed a big one. The region, which started the year as an opportunity to win state legislative seats, provided Democrats just one victory (Maureen Madden in Monroe). While Congressman Cartwright did out-perform Hillary, he didn't win by the same margins as four years ago either.

The time to re-energize has arrived. Local Democratic politics has been on a long-term down-swing that sees it's roots in the fall of the "Bethlehem Steel" based party. A strong labor presence, as well as patronage jobs in the local governments, held the Democratic Party of the 1960's, 70's, and 80's together in the region, and it began to break apart in the 1990's and 2000's. "The party" of today is smaller in membership, and lesser in control of it's elected officials, compared to yester-year. While the population has grown, and that should have helped Democrats, the party is largely confined to the cities currently in 2016. One of the problems outside of the cities is that the Democratic Party is not present to them, it is not visible to them, and it is not speaking about relevant things to them.

A lot of people like to assign blame, but I don't think there's a good reason to assign blame to any one person. Political structures change, and so does the future of them. The issues that resonate now in the Lehigh Valley are not what they were in 1985, and neither are the politics. Re-building and re-branding the local Democratic structure is going to take new focus, new ideas, and an emphasis on things that hit home here. Some areas of focus I would like to see the party focus on:

1. Quality of Services- As we saw in the fight over Gracedale, voters in the Lehigh Valley still want to see quality services from their government. Voters here want the most bang for their buck in services, and they want government officials who will stand up and fight for them. Innovating, thinking of new ways to provide better services without massive tax hikes are important.
2. Rebuilding like Bethlehem- I was going to call this "urban renewal," but I realized it's not just in the three city downtowns. The Lehigh Valley has an industrial heritage, and Bethlehem has shown the way to rebuild after the factories leave. Go around to any of the boroughs and towns in the region, and you can find opportunities to build nice things, and attract people into the downtown areas. Being pro-development, while not either building thousands of new houses or giving away the bank to the developers is possible for the Lehigh Valley. Easton has based it's renaissance around new restaurants, Bethlehem rebuilt the old Steel property and Main Street, and Allentown at least has a nice new arena to show for itself. All of this happened under Democratic Mayors, and Democrats have to continue to be the party of innovation and bringing jobs to once economically depressed places.
3. Environmental quality of life- In Palmer Township, where I've lived most of my life, the period of politics dominated by development and housing is over. Now the questions facing most of the Lehigh Valley are moving towards protection of green spaces, protection of clean water, air quality, soil quality, and generally making our environment a bit better for the residents. It's not so much about the "urbanista" agenda of ending car usage, or even fighting global warming, it's about a much easier to sell vision of better air, better water, and better soil for us to live in.
4. Infrastructure Improvements- If you've ever driven on 22 at rush-hour, you know what a disaster it is. Obviously improvements to mass-transit systems would be well advised, if for no other reason than to clear up congestion. Infrastructure improvements on roads, bridges, and even mass transit systems would create jobs and improve quality of life in this region. We should push on this.

These four issues are just suggestions. We need a change in this party, and fast.