New party bosses focused on winning elections

Wayne Holland Jr. is the new chair of the Utah Democratic Party.

And James Evans is the new chair of the Salt Lake County Republican Party.

Both men say they want to get their political organizations focused on winning elections.

Both have internal arguments among — well, what's the best word — . . . zealots? who seem to worry more about internal procedures or political philosophy than recruiting candidates, fund raising and get-out-the-vote efforts.

Evans, a former state senator from Salt Lake City's west side, inherits a party that's been on rough times.

Salt Lake County has elected some big-name Democrats in recent years. Most county voters picked Scott Matheson Jr. as their governor in 2004, although the Democratic nominee lost badly in most other counties, and Republican Jon Huntsman Jr. won the seat.

County government has been unraveling for more than a year now, and most of the scandal casualties have been Republicans.

The county GOP lost the mayor's seat and one council seat in the 2004 elections. In 2006 if Democrats win one more council seat they will control the council and the mayor's office, too.

Meanwhile, the state Democrats made some big gains in fund raising in the 2003-2004 election cycle, but not a whole lot to show for it.

While they did win two important posts in Salt Lake County, that may have been due more to the Republicans' self-destruction than good Democratic work.

Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, won an impressive victory in his 2nd Congressional District re-election. But as both Matheson and party officials admit, he did that much on his own: New federal election finance laws prohibit local parties from providing as much monetary aid to federal candidates as they could before McCain-Feingold.

Democrats picked up Evans' old Salt Lake City-based Senate District 1. But the district had been Democratic for 40 years before Evans' upset victory in 2002.

And Democratic numbers in the 75-member Utah House stayed the same after the 2004 elections, a paultry 19 seats, most in Salt Lake County.

This summer's municipal races are officially non-partisan. But both Holland and Evans say their parties will get involved, backing good party members, if the situation presents itself.

For example, in Salt Lake City, council members Dale Lambert and Jill Remington-Love are well-known Democrats up for re-election this year (Lambert is a former party chair, Remington-Love a former vice chair); council member Eric Jergensen is an identifiable Republican.

Down in Provo, retired fire captain David Bailey is running for mayor. Bailey was introduced at the State Democratic Convention last weekend with the promise of help from state party leaders.