Posted on 06/17/2007 8:36:17 AM PDT by devane617
DALLAS -- In the most expensive mayoral race in Dallas history, wealthy retired businessman Tom Leppert was elected Dallas mayor by a sound margin in Saturday's runoff election to lead the nation's ninth-largest city.
Voters chose Leppert -- an admitted outsider to Dallas politics -- over openly gay City Councilman Ed Oakley, a political insider.
Capping a swift rise from political unknown to the city's top office, Leppert received about 58 percent of the vote in complete but unofficial results in the runoff, winning by more than 13,000 votes.
"I understand the trust and confidence they've placed in me," said Leppert, 53. "I am eager to fulfill that trust and confidence."
Oakley, a three-time city councilman, fell short of making Dallas the largest city in the country to elect an openly gay mayor.
"I can't tell you what it's been like ... to serve Dallas, change Dallas and put Dallas on a path of greatness," said Oakley, who received 42 percent of the vote. "I truly believe I've been part of that."
Leppert, the former chief executive of construction giant Turner Corp., had never run for elected office and never voted in a Dallas mayoral election until this year.
He acknowledges that he had scant name recognition when he decided last year to enter the race to replace Mayor Laura Miller, who was not seeking re-election.
The runoff ends the most expensive political race in Dallas history. Oakley and Leppert were the top fundraisers before the May 12 election.
Oakley had raised about $685,000 from early May to early June. Leppert raised $855,000 and spent about $1.1 million in that period, compared with about $833,000 for Oakley.
Color may be off but what is with the 70?s nerd haircut?Yeah, I notice that everytime I see him; he needs some 'layering' on that side cut instead of that sharp 'drop-off'.
No, it just jumps out at you when you first see the pic. Curious people ask why.
You can't be suggesting that anyone working for a newspaper, with a sense of responsibility to the public, would deliberately distort anything in print?
Thus he changed his mind rather quickly.AS I said, he had a chance to see how the competion was (wasn't) stacking up.
AND -
I'll bet that wasn't the 'answer' he gave close friends and family (implying he gave the NEWS MEDIOT a blow-off leave-me-alone-for-now answer).
I guess the meaning of "Big D" has changed since then : oMost of us moved out better than a decade ago; migrated north out of Dallas county proper to the likes of Denton, Collin or Rockwall counties ...
The Mayor before Laura Miller was ablack Dem Ron Kirk and he actually ran for the Senate and lost, he had a businessman's vision for Dallas and turned some really bad parts of Big D into upscale condos and built the AAC. Miller shows up and we lose the Cotton Bowl and the Dallas Cowboys. We need Leppert and hopefully Dallas will become a powerhouse again.
CindyDawg..I got it too...
The county sheriff is a lesbian, which has nothing to do with the fact that she is also incompetent.
Give Kirk some of the credit for that. He's the one that killed the Cotton Bowl renovations so he could concentrate on the Olympic bid. (He claimed all the venues would be within 50 miles of downtown. I guess the ocean racing would have taken place on White Rock Lake.)
And, of course, he blocked additional flights out of Love while his law firm was taking buckets of money from American Airlines.
LOL
Nobody knows what he is going to do.
I voted for him...probably the lesser of two evils. At least Mr. Leppert is not a flaming homo. We have enough of these in our "elected leaders" here...Our esteemed Sheriff of Dallas County is a little latin lesbo lady.
Appears that a majority of the voters of Dallas are not ready for the rainbow flag flying at city hall...
These 'non-partisan' Mayoral campaigns here in Dallas throw off my sense of direction. I want to vote Republican, but they don't run as Democrat or Republican for this office.
Appears that a majority of the voters of Dallas are not ready for the rainbow flag flying at city hall...
Unfortunately, they voted out all the Republican judges during last year's election, which means in several more months, the crime rate is gonna skyrocket here in Dallas county.
Given this backdrop, it'll be interesting to see how Leppert will be able to turn the city and county around, especially if he is Republican.
However, the massacre of Republican judges at the polls last year made me decide to move out of the county by October. I'll watch how Dallas does from one of the other more worthy counties in the Metroplex.
Good for Dallas, the flaming homo lost.
Yep, crime rate is already going up, and the new Dim DA and judges are letting criminals go as fast as they can be processed. Untold amounts of damage is being done here in Dallas by the Lib judges and DA that the people of Dallas County elected.
General Savage from 12 o’clock high.
The EXIF information has been removed before publishing, but it looks like the white balance is off and was shot at high ISO...
That’s why I made the crack about him looking too white for Al Lipscomb voters.
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