BREAKING: Carney Files Committee To Run For Mayor Of Wilmington
This is not The Onion, this is real life.
He filed his campaign committee today. It’s obvious that this Delaware Way fix was in for some time.
He promises to bring his same paucity of vision and unquestioning support for the Chamber of Commerce to Wilmington that he’s inflicted on the State of Delaware for the past eight years.
Personal to Wilmington city employees: You might want to make sure that your health insurance and pensions are suitably protected. And/or find find a real Democrat to run.
Carney said he was going to lay out his vision for the city as soon as he finished washing Rob Buccini’s car.
WTF?
But realistically, a choice between VJP and JC is no choice at all.
Exactly. Wouldn’t make my list of most intriguing races.
In fact, I’m more interested in whether Colin Bonini can bring his ‘leadership style’ to the office of Kent County Register Of Wills.
I’m betting no.
Someone registered a committee to run a primary against Bonono so I’m hoping we won’t have to find out the answer to that question.
It’s time to end the city residency requirement. For one thing, there is plenty of affordable housing, it’s just in crummy areas with crummy feeder patterns. So much housing has been unoccupied for so long that it is falling apart from neglect-whole blocks on the east side are razed to the dirt.
For citizens and small businesses alike, the main point of contact for city services (311) is a microcosm of the deep-seared problems plaguing the city. Need to get a someone out to look at a water leak or need a shoulder closure on a street? Expect to make multiple phone calls and leave a lot of voicemails at the desks of no show/remote workers. No one knows what is going on, and will try to shuffle you off to the next department. Trying to schedule an inspection? It’s the inspector’s world, you are just living in it.
These are not high tech or high skill, degreed positions. They only require a baseline level of attentiveness, diligence, and motivation. The city county building is clearly understaffed, and it seems like Shane and others would rather keep the status quo for ideological purposes. If there were enough qualified city residents ready to take the open jobs, they would have been filled already. The whining about lack of training is a red herring. As previously stated, these jobs only require someone who can consistently show up at 8 AM five days a week, work a full day, and take responsibility. If that’s too big of an ask, the city deserves another carney or purzycki.
Someone should be talking to Logan Herring.
Registered D, grandson of a minister who remains a Wilmington legend.
Taking the lead in rebuilding Riverside. Lives on the East Side.
Cares for the city’s neediest but connects well with Buccini and the rest of the power structure.
Most importantly, he speaks the language of the vast majority of city residents.
Side note: having a mayor who can connect personally with those most in need just might make city residents more willing to take jobs in city government. Promotions that scream “Uncle Mike needs you” or, in 2025, “Uncle John needs you,” just isn’t the way to get your typical Wilmington resident to apply for a middle-income city job.
Also Executive Director of the Kingswood Community Association.
That’s a GREAT name right there. Lots of networks in his resume.
The idea that having the “right kind” of mayor will fix the understaffing and poor quality of city services is a joke. Working for the city is a cushy job compared to the private sector. People would rather do piece work like meal delivery or ride share because they don’t have the personal responsibility needed to work a normal job.
So, what’s your point? Are you saying that people who live in the suburbs are more likely to want to work for the city than drive for Uber or Lyft?
Everyone who lives in the city, and is willing and able to work for the city, is already filling those roles.
I disagree with the notion that there is an untapped pool of applicants just waiting for the right mayor to hire on. They may be unemployed or underemployed, but they are not willing or capable of filling those roles. If you want to get the city staffed to where it should be, you will have to expand your hiring pool to the suburbs.
“People would rather do piece work like meal delivery or ride share because they don’t have the personal responsibility needed to work a normal job.”
Perhaps they simply have a preference for schedule flexibility. If you’re juggling two different gigs it helps if one of them is on your schedule. If you’re a 30-year-old today, do you really want to sign up for a safe job and build slowly towards a retirement 40 years down the road?
You’re a responsible person, do you work at one of those jobs, LL?
“If you’re a 30-year-old today, do you really want to sign up for a safe job and build slowly towards a retirement 40 years down the road?”
Yes.
Let’s be clear, these discussions about the supposed applicant pool are really about unemployed and underemployed young black men. This isn’t about a single mothers juggling childcare and 2-3 jobs. These young men aren’t beholden to an elementary school schedule or daycare hours and have all the time in the world to pursue a 9to5. The city isn’t a jobs program, let people who are willing and able to work do so, regardless of their residence
Yeah, I sensed a racial subtext all along. Thanks for clarifying.
Word on the street is that for the last year, Carney and Mike P. were trying to recruit a few of the more established, respected, young, african american leaders in WIlmington to run for mayor, including Herring. Seems like all of them who were smart and respected enough to be “recruited” said “Hell no! You people crazy af”.
So Carney said “F—- it – Hold my beer. Go Birds!”
I think this tells you all you need to know about carney. he would rather have a lower position than work to have a higher one.
I don’t think it’s his unwillingness to work (although I’m sure there isn’t much ambition there). I believe it’s more about accumulating power, big fish small pond kinda deal
Or maybe he just loves Wilmington and thinks the Potters are bad news. If he didn’t want to work, there’s a lot more that a former Governor with a friend in the Whitehouse could do. He could probably spend the next few years as Ambassador of “enter random country with a coastline”. Or get on paid boards of banks, corporations, and major non-profits. Have a book ghostwritten about leadership during Covid. I can think of a million things that require less work than being the Mayor of Murdertown, USA.
There’s absolutely no way to make your case any less credible than referring to Wilmington as Murdertown, USA. Just say you’ve never been there before and move on.
Slur aside, his point stands. And I don’t think it’s about accumulating power. I think that, like Purzycki, who certainly didn’t want to cut his salary 50% for a much harder job, he had his arm twisted by the business community – and I’m not talking about Buccini.
Care to elaborate? Mike is invested (monetarily) in Wilmington, and regardless of his mayoral salary being able to steer the ship pays big dividends. We have seen time and again how taking a supposed pay cut for public service is a shortcut to personal enrichment (as im sure jack markell would agree)
Jack Markell was rich before taking any government job. Mike got rich running the RDC. He already lived on Red Oak Road. You really think he needed the money? Don’t be dumb.
I know more about it than I’m going to elaborate for an internet rando, sorry. Suffice it to say that it wasn’t Buccini-Pollin who twisted his arm. They are not one of the entities keeping jobs in the city that they could move to the suburbs, and threatened to if he didn’t run.
Name an entity that doesn’t already have one foot out the door? Chase, dupont/chemours, wsfs have a presence in the city but a significant portion of their de workforce isn’t working in town. All the big money gets made in our int the county.
You can’t look at the profit motive from the lens of a normal person-after all, I think most of us would retire after our first million. Mike’s mayoral run was to protect his financial interests tied up in the ongoing development of the city. Markell was using the governorship as a stepping stone (lucrative, I might add) for a cushy handout position from the Obama administration the ultimately never materialized.
Carney is a lost soul, who probably saw himself filling carper’s seat at the end of his term. He doesn’t stand to gain anything financially, but I bet he believes he could have a shot in congress if he parks himself in a job that allows him to stay relevant.
See, your problem here is that I actually know both these men, so who do you think I’m going to listen to, them or your seat-of-the-pants riffing?
My 2023 seat-of-pants riffing is better than your 2008 seat-of-pants riffing, and I’m sure the station management agrees.
I’m full time Delaware, full time Wilmington. If you want to serve up some actual facts the floor is yours, but all I’m hearing is outsider speculation
What part of this don’t you get? I know them, as in know them personally. You don’t. I’m not basing this on 2008 you dipshit.
Al, if you are so clued in, name the names of all the big execs twisting Mikes arm and quit stalling. Convince us that you are really an insider and not just repeating something you overheard at a party a decade ago
I’ve known Mike Purzycki for 45 years. I had dinner with Jack Markell in Paris a few months ago. I’m under no obligation to name sources of information told to me in confidence just because some racist asshole on the internet thinks he knows stuff he just makes up.
Jack Markell was worth $70 million before he ever ran for office. He didn’t need to run to enrich himself. Mike Purzycki’s real estate holdings extend well beyond Wilmington – I don’t know if he still owns the Ivy Hall complex in Newark, but the idea that his personal fortune depended upon him becoming mayor is laughable.
In short, you don’t know what you’re talking about. Take your swinging dick and go somewhere else.
Yo, this is not your personal insult space.
Stop it or we’ll stop it.
What’s your point?
It seems he likes projecting his personal motives – money appears to be at the top of the list – to people he knows nothing about. All Democratic politicians are in it for the money, even the ones who already had money, and young Black men in Wilmington are to be condemned for failing to be in it for the money.
Seems contradictory to me, condemning some people for being motivated by money (even if they aren’t IRL) and others for not being motivated by money (even if they are IRL).
Oh, throw in a little resentment of me for once having a radio show.
Seems like the sort of thing chatbots will be doing pretty soon.
Ummm lets be clear… Not a slur. Literally just quoting a major article about Wilmington from a few years ago and the book written by Yassir Payne and two community activists about Wilmington and the structural problems. https://www.amazon.com/Murder-Town-USA-Structural-Wilmington/dp/1978817363 If you didn’t understand that connection there’s actually no way to make your analysis about Wilmington less credible.
It was just an example of how difficult the job is based on that book and a response to the idea that being mayor is somehow the path to less work. And for your infomation I’ve lived in Wilmington for decades… AA so respectfully, shove it.
To be fair, the Murdertown trope was based on a short-term spike in the murder rate caused by about a half-dozen more than in an average year. Vastly overblown.
I know this. This is also the reason the author’s of the book used this as a title; tongue and cheek. You just have to read the book to get it. But again, we’re missing the point here people. This isn’t an easy job. End scene. Jeezus
Agreed, which is why I didn’t belabor the point. Mine is that neither Purzycki nor Carney is doing this for some selfish motive, though I suppose some vanity has to be involved for the wooing/arm-twisting to work.
“I bet he believes he could have a shot in congress if he parks himself in a job that allows him to stay relevant.”
So you think Carney might have a shot at winning a congressional race?
(Who’s gonna tell him?)