How could I get elected on this platform?

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Hello,

I am considering running for mayor of the city I am living in eventually, and I think both Republicans and Democrats are incompetent, so that is why I want to run. But how to I get elected on this platform?:

-lower property taxes
-privatization of education (slowly)
-market based pollution controls
-legalization of drugs
-elimination of any ordinances that prohibit people living freely
-streamlining zoning into industrial and non-industrial
-privatization of government enterprises
-balanced budget
-selling of government land


How could I put this in a positive light?

Probably lie and change your views once your in office or be very vague/run on a single issue.

If your city government has partisan elections, run as a libertarian. Expect powerful resistance from unions and the environmental lobby though, maybe even some outdoor groups if they like using the land, so you'll have to take that into consideration. Once you are in office you would have to fight all the interests the city council has long since sold out to, and some of the laws you want to change will likely have state and federal preemtions that would require long and costly court battles.

Make sure to promise everyone armbands. People love getting things for free

I think if you legalize drugs to any degree (non enforcement?) you'll lose any state or federal help ($). They'll put the screws to you. And it would be difficult to both lower taxes and balance the budget. You could say you lowered taxes and then jack up "fees" to compensate.

And of course it's unlikely a city council would sign off on most of that in most cities.

Not to sound Machiavellian, but isn't there such thing as executive orders on a local level ? I could be wrong. I know it would be a tough uphill battle. But I am tired of these incompetent individuals rolling over and playing dead.


Actually I am trying to get a chapter of the Libertarian Party to start in my city. I tried connecting with like minded people through friends of friends, I tried calling the party office in my state and they have not replied., I tried to put up an event on Facebook, and to no avail for anything. On top of that, the people I do hang with (with one exception) would probably not be interested. So as far as "reaching out to the community" is kind of out of the question. I have a few years to thing, so I am taking my time.


In regards to federal aid, I know I could not do that stuff all at once, but once certain things are in place (balanced budget) I would work on the others. And with education, for instance, I would first sell schools that are not being used, maybe privatize the hiring of teachers, then move to vouchers, and so on.


The main problem I have is that it seems like a lot of people (at least the older people) want this town to be a retirement town or anti-growth town. To demonstrate my point, one of the mayors at one point said when a factory wanted to come in "You can take you and your n*ggers back to Detroit". And still, there is a lot of people wanting their monopolies, but at the expense of others. Prime example is real estate companies. They keep zoning in place and keep ordinances really restrictive, and they kill building, since growth is organic and does not come in one size fits all. So to say you can build that here is to deny human ingenuity. So anyway,s off the rant. I guess I am wondering if I could win with people like this in our town.

All well and good. Where are the expenditure cuts that go along with it?



Are you talking vouchers? Or are you talking about eliminating mandatory primary and secondary education free at the point of delivery? If the former, fair enough. If the latter, you might have a jurisdictional fight on your hands.



Matters outside the jurisdiction of municipalities.






This is the one that will kill you. Absolutely kill you politically. People who live in neighborhoods with tree lined streets, and big lots on which only single-family homes can be built, do not want developers coming in and building muliti-unit low rises. They do not want 7-11's opening up on every streetcorner. They do not want a half-way house on the next street over. They want and expect their council to use the tools at their disposal to preserve the character of their neighborhoods.



Which ones?

Road maintenance? Most municipalities do this already--but the municipality still has to pay for it.

Education? You still have to pay for the vouchers.

Welfare? Many municipalities are principal delivery agents--particularly in the area of housing. You're going to turn that over to private hands? Google the words "Vancouver SRO" and see what the impact of that is.

The police? The fire department? The library? What services does your municipality deliver that could be delivered more effectively by private interests without increasing the cost to the consumer.



I don't see how you're going to do it. You have to provide services--most of which are mandated by senior levels of government, and you have committed to reducing your tax revenue. So where's the money going to come from to do the things that you are legally obliged to do?

And what about the things that you are politically obliged to do, like parks and road repairs?



All land? Generally speaking most of the land that municipalities own is either occupied (e.g. City Hall, police and fire stations, etc.), programmed (e.g. parks and other recreation land), or inalienable (public rights of way along streets, for example). Many cities have long since liquidated the land that they could get away with liquidating, and that piggy bank is now empty.



You need to start looking at the larger picture. How much money does your municipality raise from its various revenue sources? What are its obligatory areas of spending (what are you legally required to do, regardless of your political interests)? Of the balance that's left, what can you simply cut, what do you have to pay to have delivered by a private, third party, and what can you devolve to the private sector on a purely commercial, user-pay basis?

To be frank, I don't see that you would have a slightest chance of election on such a platform. Municipal politics is the coal face--people know their municipal councillors, and they have much greater access to them than they do to legislators in the senior levels of government. When municipalities cut services, people don't just email their councillors, they ambush them at the grocery store.

Good luck on getting the public to agree on all that and accepting someone from the outside. People tend to distrust outsiders.