Columbia election notes: Charlotte’s mayor backs Devine in capital city race
The race for mayor in South Carolina’s capital city recently crossed paths with North Carolina’s largest city.
Vi Lyles, the mayor of Charlotte, endorsed at-large Columbia City Councilwoman Tameika Isaac Devine in the Columbia mayoral race. Devine is battling former District 3 Councilman Moe Baddourah, Sam Johnson, a former aide to mayor Steve Benjamin, and District 4 Councilman Daniel Rickenmann for Columbia’s top political spot.
Lyles, who is a native of Columbia and attended A.C. Flora High School, expressed her support for Devine in a Twitter video.
“I’d like for you to vote for Tameika Devine for mayor,” Lyles said. “We need Tameika in Columbia. She’s going to do the right things for all of us.”
Devine, an attorney, has held a citywide seat on council for 19 years.
Ending months of speculation as to who he would support, Benjamin, who is not seeking re-election this year after three terms, announced Wednesday that he would endorse Johnson in the mayor’s race. Johnson was Benjamin’s chief of staff for a number of years.
“We have innovated together, we’ve worked to build consensus and push Columbia to think big and dream big,” Benjamin said of Johnson at a Wednesday news conference. “And we’ve worked together to imagine a city where every single child ... has the opportunity to live up to his or her God-given potential, to imagine a city where every single one of our babies has the chance to do great, great things.”
To read more of The State’s coverage from that news conference, click here.
Residents who have lived in Columbia for some time are likely familiar with the steel plates used to cover busted patches of roadway in the capital city. Rickenmann recently got an up close look at one, as he cut a campaign video standing atop one of the plates. The mayoral hopeful said he wants to improve infrastructure in the capital city.
“We’ve gotten a lot of questions on social media if we are ever going to run out of steel plates,” Rickenmann said in the video, standing on a steel plate in the street, surrounded by orange road cones. “My hope, my answer, is ‘yes.’ We have an opportunity to work with small businesses to help us better perform and fix these type of projects in a timely manner, so folks don’t have to listen to cars run over a steel plate for six months at a time.”
Rickenmann, who represents District 4 in the northeast part of the city, has been on city council for three terms across two different stints.
The city’s elections are set for Nov. 2, with runoffs on Nov. 16 if necessary. Aside from the mayoral race, there also are elections for an at-large post, District 1 and District 4.
The field for the at-large seat is the most crowded. The seven candidates are attorney Tyler Bailey, IT professional Heather Bauer, public health researcher Dr. Aditi Bussells, attorney John Crangle, environmental lobbyist Deitra Stover Matthews, photographer Aaron Smalls and activist John Tyler.
District 1 is in the northern part of the city and includes neighborhoods such as Earlewood and Greenview. Current District 1 Councilman Sam Davis chose not to seek re-election after 23 years. Two candidates filed to pursue the seat: attorney Tina Herbert and state Department of Corrections worker Christa Williams.
And in District 4, which is in the northeast part of the city and includes neighborhoods such as Kings Grant, Lake Katherine and Gregg Park, only businessman and former state Secretary of Commerce Joe Taylor filed to run. Though he faces no opponent, Taylor has continued to campaign, and is backing Rickenmann for mayor.
