By both, I mean this House…:
and this house:
https://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-detail/35759-Tarpon-Dr_Lewes_DE_19958_M62424-40232
Estimated value: $838,000. Not bad. I wonder if there’s a single residence in SD 13 that is worth that much.
McBride and his wife have resided in that house since 2005. It was a newly-built home at the time.
To be fair, Dave McBride maintains a residence in SD 13. He has to in order to legally run in that district. This is that house. I’m sure it’s just coincidence that there are no cars in the driveway.
Tom Sharp maintained a residence in SD 9 when in actuality, he had moved to Ocean View, or some other beach community. I forget the name. Even used suburban street money earmarked for SD 9 to pave streets in his new beach community neighborhood, two counties away from his district. Melanie George Smith contemplated renting an apartment after having moved away from her district so that she could technically run again. Some ethical watchdogs, including the State Chair, called her out on it.
Bill Oberle and I’m sure many others have done the same thing. Some, understandably, have beach houses. Not to be confused with an $838K manse in a gorgeous part of Lewes.
The voters in SD 13 now have the opportunity to decide whether they’d rather have a senator who, for all intents and purposes, is living comfortably in Lewes and has lived comfortably in Lewes since 2005, or a young professional woman who is deeply involved in the community.
Well, we started with the second house first. Let’s talk about Legislative Hall and view the quandaries facing the erstwhile President Pro-Tem. McBride’s hold on leadership becomes more tenuous with each election cycle as (a) more progressives enter the caucus, and (b) Nicole Poore, who has far surpassed Val Longhurst as Dover’s #1 backstabber, plots and schemes in the wings. She is abetted by Tony DeLuca’s Significant Other, who now works only for her. (BTW, there’s a subtext here. Neither DeLuca nor the ethically-bankrupt Nancy Cook have ever stopped seeking to influence events in the Hall. The influence of both would decrease precipitously if progressives took control of the Caucus. More about Cook tomorrow.)
So, even were he to run for, and win, reelection, he increasingly finds himself surrounded. If he runs for reelection, will he start this session by unbreaking the solemn promise he broke, and allow the gun bills to be voted on? Will he unbury the minimum wage bill he buried, and allow it to be released to the full body? Regardless of what he does, he will either piss off donors or constituents. Constituents, BTW, who he has already pissed off? Where does Stephanie Hansen’s sham ‘gun summit’ figure in all of this? Was this designed to be a fig leaf from Hansen to McBride and Poore, as in ‘We’re engaging in productive discussions, so any consideration of gun bills is premature’? Will his “#2”, Nicole Poore, abandon him if/when it looks like he’s gonna lose in September? That’s a rhetorical question. Of course she will. If she hasn’t already. Will progressives increasingly challenge his beleaguered leadership? The answer is a resounding ‘yes’.
Well. I’d planned to weave all of this into tomorrow’s (It’s ba-a-a-ck!) General Assembly Pre-Game Show.
Getting this off my chest gives me more space to set my sights on other deserving targets. That’s a tease, and this is a wrap.