Yes, it’s been somewhat calm since Mayor Slater “took control,” but not particularly because of his leadership.

Marty Knollenberg had no such stirred-up controversy while serving six years as our state rep. The others have an unknown public record, but that seems like an unjustified smear of them too, Sue!

Of course she endorses him. While not as openly partisan as former Mayor Schilling, they are both cut from the same political cloth and vote the same way. She is one of his political mentors.

The others could easily have collected signatures but it was simpler and quicker to file the $100 filing fee. Marty Knollenberg had more than that number of yard signs (harder to get than petition signatures) when he served Troy and Clawson for six years as State Representative.

After serving as a very partisan “non-partisan” mayor, Louise Schilling ran unsuccessfully as a Democrat for County Commissioner. Her true colors.

(There’s nothing wrong with that, except Slater has criticized Knollenberg for being too partisan to represent Troy because he served us as a Republican in a district that has elected Republicans since at least 1980.)

We’ll see if this appointed mayor can keep his seat in a fair fight five months after the duly elected Mayor Daniels was narrowly recalled after a 100% negative year-long campaign.

Yes, Mayor Slater is your “non-partisan” choice. Based on his past behavior he’s not mine.

Exactly how should a recall be run? Should it point out the positives of the person supposed to be recalled? That would be a ridiculous thing to do even if there were positives to dwell on. It is incredibly silly for Dale to be calling the recall "100% negative", repeatedly. He has been 100% negative about the voters who duly recalled the former awful mayor who was elected by an extremely narrow margin in an off election, and who used extremely deceitful campaign materials.

The incredibly unlikely recall is over Dale, get over it. I know divisiveness is your thing, but some if us would like to get past it.

I must say, Dale's endorsement may certainly help sway my vote, in the opposite direction. If he is going one way, I will be looking very hard the other way.

Sue It's the calm before the storm wait until I go into the archives of at least six newspapers about the stolen 40k that I supposedly made up.If it was made up MR.Slater could ask for a retraction or he could sue for slander but hasn't done neither.RED FLAG.

Dale - He has avoided controversy? Remind me again who was behind the Right to Work legislation? That's right...it was Knollenberg. Not sure you could find a more controversial topic than that, regardless of your opinion on RTW.

No, I meant it’s easier to get people to sign a petition than to agree to put a lawn sign in their yard. Planting a yard sign usually shows a higher level of commitment than signing a petition to put an issue on the ballot.

Neither are foolproof predictors of how many votes a candidate will get, but rather show how strong their campaign organization is.

Some of the Recall Janice Daniels signs were planted in yards where the property owner didn’t even know the mayor was a woman. Kudos to the Recall Janice Daniels organization.

The proof comes on Election Day.

I’ll be announcing my endorsement when my research is complete, but it’s doubtful that it will be Mayor Slater. He’s too “non-partisan” for my taste.

I'll be sure to quote you if my candidate wins by that margin. It would probably sound outrageous to some people – a conservative landslide at a mere 52%.

Yes, endorsements matter. Birds of a feather flock together. Some people have said they will vote opposite of my recommendations. I tend to do the same for people and groups I disagree with on issues.

Sometimes I go out of my way to ask someone I respect if I’m undecided.

It’s especially helpful in city elections where people can be deliberately vague and don’t have party affiliations.

For me, the endorsements won't particularly sway my vote, but I think it's interesting to do a side-by-side comparison of the endorsements each candidate has received (maybe a future Patch article?). Slater has announced endorsements from the police and fire officers associations, a former mayor, local business owners, and three of his fellow six councilmembers, among other endorsements. Knollenberg has been announcing his own endorsements and apart from Senator Pappageorge I had never heard of any of the people mentioned.

I haven't been a Schilling fan, either. But the facts are that as Mayor she made tough budget decisions and did NOT kick the can down the road in terms of the difficult decisions that had to be made. I see that, in hindsight, the millage cap was a bad decision that put our AAA bond rating at risk. (Schilling warned of that and I didn't believe her.) I look back and see that the operating millage proposed in February 2010 (I think) was hardly out of line and would have only slightly offset the property value plummet. (Schilling tried to explain that to the community but we all wrongly believed Janice Daniels and the TCU.) And Martin Howrylak's "letter" urging voters to vote "no" on the Proposal 1 to save the Library was, in hindsight, so wrong on so many levels this community should be outraged. (Turns out Schilling was correct about that, too.) Howrylak, Fleming and Team Troy Repubs kept saying we should just keep spending down the Fund Balance; if you look at the facts of the matter now it turns out that would have been the wrong approach. (Schilling was correct about that, too.)

It's odd. But those who claim to be fiscal conservatives wrongly wanted to spend down savings. (The same behavior that got us in trouble in Lansing under Granholm.) Meanwhile, the so-called "libs" in Troy (who seem more and more to me now like moderate Republicans) were making the fiscally sound decisions for the long term.

I find it very telling that the newest councilmember has endorsed Mayor Slater.

The 3 who have not are closely associated with extreme right wing tea party ideology (like Dale). In my book that does not make them (or Dale) conservatives".

Personally, I don't find anything particularly partisan about the other members of council, except that they do not appear to be extreme right wing ideologues (like Dale). Of course being that they are not extreme right wing ideologues some people (like Dale) will view them as socialists. I take that for what it's worth.

Seriously, why is this condescending bit of preaching here? The gist is "gee Pastor Bob, it must be rough having faith that is inferior to mine". Why put it here? Why write it at all? I wish Dale would spare us his crusade. There are religious sites, where he could deal with people who are interested, and not deal with people in his community in an insulting way.

He wrote this comment to a blog posted in 2012 written by Pastor Bob. How it posted here is a curiosity, but why he posted a comment to a year old blog when, I believe, no one has posted to it in a year, is even more curious.

Sorry, everyone, way off topic. I posted it after posting some other comments on this thread and apparently forgot to switch to Pastor Bob's article. I thought it had gone off into the ozone, so I posted it again on his article.

It's well written and people are still reading it:

http://troy.patch.com/blog_posts/a-reflection-for-holy-week

It's now up to #3 on Most Popular Blog Posts. Holy Week comes every year so articles about it are of interest to people of faith.

I thought it was a good article and was asking a thoughtful question of Pastor Bob, not attacking anyone's faith.

Hopefully this answers your question, John David.

Hmmmmmm. Up to #3? With a bullet?