Every election year has a moment when talk becomes commitment. In Alabama, that moment is qualifying — the window in which candidates pay their fees, file their paperwork and become, officially, candidates. In early March 2008, the window was opening, and Mobile County’s ballot began to take shape.
Crenshaw enters the school board race
Reginald Crenshaw, a two-term former Prichard city councilman, announced his Democratic candidacy for District 3 on the Mobile County Board of School Commissioners, seeking the seat held by Commissioner Hazel Fournier, who had said she would not run again.
“I’ve been campaigning for two years,” said Crenshaw, 51. He had managed campaigns for a state representative and for Prichard’s mayor, and reportedly had their support. More than two decades earlier he had made an unsuccessful run for mayor of Prichard himself.
His credentials were academic as much as political: a doctorate in higher education administration from the University of Southern Mississippi, a bachelor’s in economics from Morehouse College, a master’s in public administration from the University of South Alabama, and 30 years as an educator. He taught at Bishop State Community College and, as an adjunct at Alabama State’s Mobile campus, encountered Mobile County public school teachers regularly — an experience he said gave him insight into the system’s failings.
A graduate of Blount High School, Crenshaw was one of eight siblings who attended the Prichard school. His three children went there as well.
“I think it’s time for a change,” he said. “Things have happened that really disgust me in terms of being a citizen.”
An assistant superintendent in the Mobile County system was also said to be weighing a run for the same seat.
Who was not running
Former County Commissioner and ex-state Sen. Gary Tanner took a hard look at a Democratic campaign for his old District 3 county commission seat, then decided against it. The numbers, by his own account, did not work. “I’m not going to be on the ballot this year,” he said, adding that he did not consider his political career finished.
Mobile City Councilwoman Connie Hudson, approached about running for license commissioner, declined. She had run for state Senate two years earlier. “Although I think it would be an interesting challenge to initiate across the board improvements to that office in terms of efficiency and customer service, I am making no plans to run for the position,” she said.
Party switching at the courthouse
The most telling development involved Revenue Commissioner Marilyn Wood, who had won the office as a Democrat with the backing of her retiring predecessor — and who would seek re-election as a Republican. Her party switch was one of dozens across Alabama in those years, as courthouse officeholders read the trend lines and moved to the side of the ballot where the votes were heading.
A Republican who had fallen short in an earlier bid for the office said he was strongly considering another run but had not decided. The retiring predecessor’s daughter was reportedly weighing a Democratic bid for license commissioner, and supporters were encouraging the former revenue commissioner herself to seek the Democratic nomination for county commission — an overture she was not expected to accept.
Why courthouse races matter
License commissioner, revenue commissioner, treasurer, probate judge: these are the offices most voters never think about and most encounter constantly. They tag the cars, assess the property, collect the taxes and hold the records. In Mobile County, they also represented the last redoubt of the county Democratic Party, and the 2008 cycle was the moment when that began to change in earnest.
Within a few election cycles, nearly every countywide office in Mobile County would be held by a Republican. The qualifying period of March 2008 — with its party switches, its declined invitations and its long-shot Democratic bids — was where that transition became visible.