The Republican primary between Dr. Judy Stout and John Holland for a seat on the Mobile County Public School System’s Board of Commissioners was, by almost any measure, an unusual contest — and perhaps fittingly so, given that the winner’s prize was six years of service for less than $1,000 a month.
It was odd, first, because the challenger was the candidate with the winning track record. Holland had succeeded at the ballot box before; Stout, the incumbent, had never run for or won public office. She had been appointed to the board rather than elected.
A resignation, and a return
Holland was seeking the very seat he had won in the previous election, only to resign it after an ethics complaint. He said he regretted stepping down, comparing his offense — voting in favor of projects involving Volkert Engineering, where his son-in-law was employed — to “a speeding ticket that didn’t get expunged.” After his departure, Stout was selected to fill the vacancy.
There were other quirks. Stout was running as a Republican in the same cycle in which her husband, Circuit Judge Rick Stout, was set to keep his seat on the bench, unopposed, as a Democrat. And Holland, who billed himself in campaign materials as “The Republican,” was drawing more than half of his financial support from political action committees tied to the local teachers’ union — an organization whose longtime leader, Paul Hubbert, ranked among the most powerful Democrats in Alabama. Hubbert served as executive secretary and treasurer of the 94,000-member Alabama Education Association.
The District 2 primary was scheduled for June 6.
The money race
Campaign finance disclosures underscored the gap between the two candidates’ war chests. Holland reported an ending balance of $19,634.80. He listed itemized cash contributions totaling $19,375 and a $4,000 loan to his own campaign, and after $3,740.20 in spending he had just short of $20,000 available in the weeks before the primary.
His contributors included Mobile Auto-PAC, at $5,000; Mobile County Vote, at $9,000; and ESP Vote, at $1,000 — two of the PACs listing an address of 1916 Duval Street, the headquarters of the Mobile County Education Association. Other donors included E. Crosby Lathan Jr., Ray Odom, Nicholas H. Holmes Jr., Dr. Sam Eichold, Delaney Development and Hardy Insurance Co., among others. Holland’s expenditures included $3,057.45 to ABC Signs and $163.02 to the MCEA for postage.
Stout’s filing told a leaner story. She reported an ending balance of $2,033.74, built on just $1,000 in cash contributions and a $1,500 loan to herself, against itemized and non-itemized expenditures totaling $666.26. Her contributors were Ferrill D. McRae, Robert and Ann Smith, Lily Woolford, and Pat and Royce Ray, each giving $250. Among her costs was $171.20 to Rant-n-Raven for tee-shirts.
For all the money and maneuvering, the office at stake carried a modest salary and a long term. As the old joke about thankless races goes, the loser might be the one who got off easy. Voters in the District 2 Republican primary would settle the matter on June 6.