McDonald poised to push his picks

Erin Neff

Wednesday, Sept. 1, 1999 | 11:38 a.m.

City Hall observers say Councilman Michael McDonald is ready to fill two new City Council seats with his top choices. And it's likely he has the other votes he needs to ensure he will have five supporters on the panel once the Las Vegas redistricting process is over.

Although his City Council colleagues are weeks away from adopting the final redistricting map, McDonald is already talking up the virtues of Lawrence Weekly and Orlando Sanchez for seats in wards that are not yet official.

It seems -- if recent events are any significance -- that Councilwoman Lynette Boggs McDonald and Councilman Gary Reese are the two other votes McDonald needs to fill the new seats with his choices.

Because the state Legislature mandated that the new council seats be filled by the first of January, the council is on a fast track to get the job done.

And a typically sleepy summer has turned into a political free-for-all with McDonald quietly promoting his picks among a field of at least 15 others.

Last week McDonald not-so-subtly requested changing the city's residency requirement for candidates seeking office. But that increase -- from 30 days to one year -- requires the state Legislature to authorize a change in the city's charter.

Although the Legislature doesn't meet again until 2001, City Hall observers say bringing up the residency question gave McDonald a chance to denounce four experienced candidates who want to serve so badly they are willing to move their families in order to be considered.

At least that's how candidate and Planning Commissioner Michael Mack describes his planned move to a new home in the proposed Ward 6. "I'm making a sacrifice," Mack said.

But in McDonald's eyes Mack and the three other candidates who will have to move to be considered for the appointments are simply "carpetbaggers" unworthy of serving the residents in the proposed Wards 5 and 6.

McDonald didn't specify that Mack, Assemblyman Tom Collins, Hispanics in Politics President Fernando Romero or Nevada Partners Executive Director Mujahid Ramadan were his targets when he attacked carpetbaggers during last week's council meeting.

"Why are you going to take somebody who's a carpetbagger and put them in (office); because they know somebody or because of the color of their skin?" McDonald said.

Mack isn't taking the criticism lying down. He's forging ahead with an all-out bid to win the seat.

Not only has he moved his residence and changed his party affiliation to the Democrats, but he also is counting on a little help from his friends.

McDonald's nemesis, ex-Councilman Arnie Adamsen, appointed Mack to the Planning Commission.

And Mack has gotten everyone from Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa to District Court Jack Lehman and the Neonopolis developers to write letters of support on his behalf.

Mack also suddenly began appearing on a television commercial touting his family's Maxters store. It's also a chance for him to promote himself.

As for Sanchez, he says "somebody" put the bug in his ear to seek the appointment. He refuses to say who it was, but it's suspected throughout City Hall that McDonald gave him the idea and said essentially, if he wants the seat, it's his.

Weekly attended Western High School with McDonald and formerly worked with Sanchez in McDonald's pet department, Neighborhood Services. Weekly said the decision to seek an appointment was his alone.

The appointment of Sanchez and Weekly is very defensible. They are smart, motivated, well-educated men who understand the city's issues and already live in the proposed ward they are seeking appointment to represent.

And by appointing them, McDonald can deflect criticism from minority communities, satisfying in one fell swoop, residents' requests for a more diverse council. Sanchez is Hispanic, and Weekly is black.

But don't think the other candidates are giving up hope that Councilman Larry Brown and Mayor Oscar Goodman will offer alternative selections for the two new seats in hopes of swaying either Boggs McDonald or Reese into their camps.

Certainly both Boggs McDonald and Reese are free-thinking individuals, but they are also politicians who remember how they got where they are.

When Boggs McDonald was appointed this past July she thanked Michael McDonald for helping her. And when Reese narrowly escaped his June general election by 139 votes, it was McDonald he hugged first for sending his campaign team to rescue Reese's then-stagnant efforts.

Brown laments having to make the appointments because he says it is a decision that belongs in the hands of voters.

McDonald, who was re-elected to the Ward 1 seat in May with 64 percent of the votes, considers his support at the polls as a mandate to continue doing his brand of politics.

With two more friends on the council, it will be even easier.