In the early fall, he and the other incumbents running for office, Democrats William M. Krebs and Warren S. Wallace, lashed out against a single GOP candidate. They criticized Harry J. Kennedy, a Delaware River Port Authority employee, for his role in scouting for dredge dumping sites. They plastered his mug shot over crossbones in campaign literature and posters.
Krebs, a manager for SmithKline Beecham in King of Prussia, is a Logan councilman. Wallace is an associate dean and assistant professor at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey-School of Osteopathic Medicine in Stratford.
In mere weeks, the race became one of the county's most contentious. It also became one that brought Republicans, the political underdogs, within the grasp of gaining representation on the all-Democratic freeholder board for the first time in two years.
Insiders had predicted a hot fight between Kennedy and Wallace for the unexpired term; Wallace was appointed to the vacant seat after James G. Atkinson died last spring. The battle caught the attention of the state Republican Party's chairman, Chuck Haytaian, who has vowed to empower the campaign with tens of thousands of dollars and predicted that the Republicans, for the first time, would raise campaign funds near the $600,000 that county Democrats collected last year. It would be the first significant donation from the state since the mid-1990s, when control of the board was at stake, he said.
Democrats have held a majority on the freeholder board since 1982. Of the 157,352 registered voters in the county, about 44,300 are declared Democrats. About 26,837 are Republicans, and about 85,300 are independents. Democrats consistently raise more funds than the opposition by a 3-1 ratio.
