It’s fall and Pensacola turns to football and politics. While many are looking forward to the Florida vs. Alabama football game, minor skirmishes are developing around town. The feelings of the Downtown Rotary Club are hurt because mayoral candidate Ashton Hayward turned down a debate with Mike Wiggins at their weekly meeting. Meanwhile Superintendent of Schools Malcolm Thomas apparently has refused to let Pensacola Firefighters on his elementary school campuses to promote their Fire Safety event on Saturday.
In an email to Rotary membership, Hayward wrote:
First, my campaign evaluates every speaking engagement I am invited to. As you can imagine, with a mayoral campaign of this nature there is no shortage of event requests. I’m balancing several demands on my time – from
fundraising, to knocking on doors, to speaking to groups like yours, and other general campaign work, not to mention being a husband, father, and businessman.I was concerned to learn that Jerry Maygarden was going to be the moderator for the forum you had planned. I’ve known Jerry a long time, but I also knew he was very outspoken against the charter campaign last fall, which I supported. Jerry was also one of Mike Wiggins’ campaign contributors. As you can imagine, this felt a little like watching the Florida-Florida State game with Jimbo Fisher or Urban Meyer as the referee…it just didn’t look quite fair. This circumstance, combined with another scheduling conflict (I was invited to also attend a meeting of the Pensacola Ministerial Alliance) convinced me to decline this invitation.
More troubling, however, was the very partisan comments made by Jerry Maygarden in an email to some of you after my initial response. In short, Jerry’s email commentary, as well as comments by a few others forwarded to me, made it clear that I made the right decision not to be in a forum moderated by a campaign contributor to my opponent and the city’s lobbyist under Mike Wiggins.
I’ve been copied on emails being sent out by angry Rotarians that defend Maygarden. A Hayward supporter wrote saying that “this wasn’t one of Hayward’s finest moments;” Another: “To me the email, forwarded from a Downtown Rotarian, comes off as juvenile and lame.”
Hayward may the first candidate to ever pass on the oldest Rotary Club in Pensacola – and one of the oldest in the nation and the second club formed in Florida. They aren’t accustomed to being shunned, especially for a meeting with the Pensacola Ministerial Alliance.
I believe you walk into “enemy territory” and take on all challengers. However, others don’t. In 2006, Save Our City nearly backed out of a forum televised on WSRE because our editor Duwayne Escobedo was on the panel –not the moderator, just on the panel.
There are plenty of debate and forum opportunities for the mayor’s race. The Downtown Rotary meeting wasn’t the only one:
7 p.m. Friday, Oct. 15 at First Baptist Church downtown
6 p.m. Monday, Oct. 18 at the Zion Hope Primitive Baptist Church
7 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 19, which airs live on WSRE, the PBS affiliate
5:30 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 26 Pensacola Chamber at the Pensacola Civic Center
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The buzz on Thomas vs. Pensacola Fire Department is the superintendent wouldn’t allow firefighters on his campuses because that hadn’t gone through the required fingerprinting and security clearances. So PTA moms, who have the proper security clearances, are scrambling this morning to get announcements over the PA systems at the schools.