Poll Shows Wild Card Lawson Puts Sutcliffe In Jeopardy: GRAY

Ottawa has a mayoral race.

That’s hard to imagine for just a few months ago it looked like incumbent Mayor Mark Sutcliffe had a walkover on his hands.

But now Sutcliffe has competition and it is mysterious from where it came.

The competition is Alex Lawson, who in a recent poll, shows he has seven per cent of the vote.

That’s competition? Only seven per cent? The competition is that the candidate of the right Lawson takes that seven per cent out of Sutcliffe’s hide, according to a poll by iPolitics’ Compass News Ottawa and Liaison Strategies and published recently in uOttawa professor Evan Potter’s blog.

Among decided voters, Sutcliffe has 24 per cent of voters while Kitchissippi Councillor Jeff Leiper has 19 per cent.

So why the importance of Lawson? Well Lawson is hardly known and yet has garnered a significant amount of the vote. And he will be strong in the west part of the city and rural areas. Imagine how many votes Lawson gets when people actually know his name? And that will happen as the campaign progresses.

Lawson is strong in areas that were formerly the domain of Sutcliffe and thus take votes away from the right-centre mayor.

Try Doing Your Job Well, Councillors: BENN

Can Lawson defeat Sutcliffe? Realistically, probably not. But he can take enough votes away from Sutcliffe that leftist candidate Leiper stands a real chance of becoming mayor. And if another centre or centre-right candidate enters the fray, Sutcliffe is in real trouble. Lawson could make Leiper mayor.

Another factor against Sutcliffe is the number of undecided votes. That’s 48 per cent, a very high tally at any point of a campaign. That means there are votes for the taking and enough to decide who becomes mayor. It’s an interesting race indeed … something municipal politics needs desperately … where colour, usually, is wearing your hat at a jaunty angle.

Potential candidate (and a very capable candidate) Neil Saravanamuttoo is buried in the Other category, which tallies in at two per cent. He’s not even a rounding error despite doing some outstanding community organizing and a great resume.

Other interesting facts emanate from the poll. Sutcliffe’s approval number comes in a 48 per cent … terribly low for an incumbent at this point. Why is that? Transit. Around 71 per cent of voters disapprove with how transit is being handled. That’s why Sutcliffe is promoting the fact that negotiations are beginning with the province to pick up the costs of transit in the city. It allows Sutcliffe to say, eventually if these negotiations ever end, that it’s not my fault now. Still Sutcliffe carries the burden of bad transit. Its failure happened on the mayor’s watch. This could be fatal to Sutcliffe’s campaign.

In other news from the poll, Sutcliffe, surprisingly given his law-and-order stance, has a split verdict on crime.

Sutcliffe Can Campaign Like No Other

Meanwhile Sutcliffe is being trounced for supporting Lansdowne. About 62 per cent of voters disagree with his stance. That’s amazing given football’s popularity in the suburbs where Sutcliffe’s support is strongest. Even more surprising is that a whopping 72 per cent of voters opposed replacing the Civic Centre arena with a new one.

Transit and Lansdowne are killing Sutcliffe. That makes the October election a race. Even more so if another centrist candidate pops out of the woodwork.

Ken Gray is editor of The Bulldog.

More Ottawa News:

Devine Protests Ottawa Bubble Bylaw

Speed Cameras About Speed, Not Cash: CULLEN

City’s Good At ‘Busyness’, Not Business: BENN

Bookmark The Bulldog, click here