Although the discussion of Council races will begin in earnest after the primary next Tuesday, it's worth noting a couple developments in the race for the 8th district, which is predominantly inhabited by students.
Today I stopped by a press conference for Scott Resnick, in which the 24-year-old software developer announced the endorsement of the incumbent alder, Bryon Eagon. The event was attended by about two dozen people, including Assembly Assistant Minority Leader Donna Seidel (D-Wausau), for whom Resnick interned as a UW student, Dane County Sup. Analiese Eicher, and most notably, Paul Soglin. However, Soglin said he was there to listen, not to lend his support.
Resnick delivered a very good speech. In addition to making an oft-repeated call for greater campus safety, Resnick also shared a plan to establish a Madison-only job fair for UW grads, which he says he hopes would allow more UW students to stay in Madison after graduation.
The other day Resnick's opponent, Kyle Szarzynski, announced the support of a variety of local leaders and activists, including Brenda Konkel, Alds. Marsha Rummel, Satya Rhodes-Conway and Brian Solomon. Very Important Sconz Commenter Peter Rickman delivered a ringing endorsement of my former Herald writer, calling him a progressive leader with "a vision for what local politics can be."
Perhaps Peter. But if he is, then would he please allow his former website, which contains a vast record of his interactions with other students, including political allies and opponents, to be open to the public? It's one thing for him to reject an interview request from The Sconz (sniffle, sniffle), but Invite-only ain't the way the Common Council is supposed to work. This is Wisconsin. Perhaps since we don't get enough of it naturally, we tend to promote sunshine as much as possible in politics.
In the following days I will be trying to talk with the other candidate in the race, Christian von Preysing-Barry. We both had the misfortune of taking Math 101 nearly five years ago, but other than that I know little about his candidacy. Here is his website.
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