Narrow Margins

Sunday’s editorial encourages the Myrtle Beach City Council to recognize the obvious message sent by the election - that the city is deeply divided right down the middle on the major issues they’ve tackled, and their duty now is to attempt to govern for all the people.

For a year and a half, a question that could only be answered by an election hung over Myrtle Beach: How did residents really feel about their City Council's controversial decisions to end the major May motorcycle rallies and to charge city shoppers an extra 1 percent tax to pay for out-of-the-area advertising?

The City Council has clearly always believed that by ending the rallies, it was doing the will of "most" voters who actually live in the Myrtle Beach city limits, and that the sales tax was an emergency measure designed to save a struggling local economy. Opponents of these measures, on the other hand, have argued vocally that the council was not acting on behalf of "most" residents, but rather following the whim of a small, privileged elite that had the council's ear.

Both groups, in other words, claimed the numbers were on their side.

The answer this election provides, though not one that anybody in such a deeply divided political environment likely wanted to hear, is that neither camp wholly speaks for a true majority of the voters. Instead, the results show victories on both sides from the same voting body, with razor-thin margins the only common factor.

Mayor John Rhodes - perhaps the single figure most closely associated with the council's actions - took about 47 percent of the vote Nov. 3, before prevailing by a healthy 56 percent margin in the runoff. Yet in the runoff Rhodes took only seven of the city's 13 voting precincts, and of those seven, only four north-end precincts gave him substantial margins. Likewise, Mark McBride had strong margins in four south-end precincts.

In the crowded Nov. 3 general election, only one member of the City Council was re-elected without a runoff: Wayne Gray, and even he only edged over the 2,531-vote runoff threshold by less than 100 votes. In the runoff, Randal Wallace garnered the highest vote total of anyone in either race, 3,548. Though his work ethic as a campaigner surely helped with those numbers, Wallace also represents the closest to a compromise figure of any incumbent because of his lone dissenting vote on the helmet ordinance - a vote the biker crowd surely remembered.

The challenger who won a seat, Mike Lowder, is a south-side resident who has run twice before, worked hard in the interim building relationships around the city, and consequently polled higher in north-end districts than he ever has before. He beat incumbent Chuck Martino, a clearly qualified and dedicated public servant who gave the city 12 years of solid representation, in a loss that seems attributable to no apparent fault of Martino's, but rather a slight citywide inclination toward change.

No one, thus, was a clear victor, and no one should enter this election claiming a mandate from the voters for his agenda. The current City Council should acknowledge it is inheriting a very different city than the tranquil Myrtle Beach of 2007 that breezily returned its three incumbents to office by 25 percent to 45 percent margins. Its decision on the bike rallies was not a choice between right and wrong; it was a matter of preference. Likewise, charging everyone more for every purchase they make in town was not the only way to fill more beds this summer - it was simply the method the council chose.

Voters may have clearly rejected a return to the discord of the McBride era, but the source of McBride's antics was his genuine belief that his positions were unfailingly correct. If the City Council now overlooks those many voters who voted for change in one way or another, they'll be making the same mistake McBride did - but perhaps even more oppressively, because McBride usually lacked the votes to make his outlook into law.

What this election showed is that the divide in the city is deep, and right down the middle, and its leaders must dedicate themselves to bridging it.

The City Council has clearly always believed that by ending the rallies, it was doing the will of "most" voters who actually live in the Myrtle Beach city limits, and that the sales tax was an emergency measure designed to save a struggling local economy. Opponents of these measures, on the other hand, have argued vocally that the council was not acting on behalf of "most" residents, but rather following the whim of a small, privileged elite that had the council's ear.

Both groups, in other words, claimed the numbers were on their side.

The answer this election provides, though not one that anybody in such a deeply divided political environment likely wanted to hear, is that neither camp wholly speaks for a true majority of the voters. Instead, the results show victories on both sides from the same voting body, with razor-thin margins the only common factor.

Mayor John Rhodes - perhaps the single figure most closely associated with the council's actions - took about 47 percent of the vote Nov. 3, before prevailing by a healthy 56 percent margin in the runoff. Yet in the runoff Rhodes took only seven of the city's 13 voting precincts, and of those seven, only four north-end precincts gave him substantial margins. Likewise, Mark McBride had strong margins in four south-end precincts.

In the crowded Nov. 3 general election, only one member of the City Council was re-elected without a runoff: Wayne Gray, and even he only edged over the 2,531-vote runoff threshold by less than 100 votes. In the runoff, Randal Wallace garnered the highest vote total of anyone in either race, 3,548. Though his work ethic as a campaigner surely helped with those numbers, Wallace also represents the closest to a compromise figure of any incumbent because of his lone dissenting vote on the helmet ordinance - a vote the biker crowd surely remembered.

The challenger who won a seat, Mike Lowder, is a south-side resident who has run twice before, worked hard in the interim building relationships around the city, and consequently polled higher in north-end districts than he ever has before. He beat incumbent Chuck Martino, a clearly qualified and dedicated public servant who gave the city 12 years of solid representation, in a loss that seems attributable to no apparent fault of Martino's, but rather a slight citywide inclination toward change.

No one, thus, was a clear victor, and no one should enter this election claiming a mandate from the voters for his agenda. The current City Council should acknowledge it is inheriting a very different city than the tranquil Myrtle Beach of 2007 that breezily returned its three incumbents to office by 25 percent to 45 percent margins. Its decision on the bike rallies was not a choice between right and wrong; it was a matter of preference. Likewise, charging everyone more for every purchase they make in town was not the only way to fill more beds this summer - it was simply the method the council chose.

Voters may have clearly rejected a return to the discord of the McBride era, but the source of McBride's antics was his genuine belief that his positions were unfailingly correct. If the City Council now overlooks those many voters who voted for change in one way or another, they'll be making the same mistake McBride did - but perhaps even more oppressively, because McBride usually lacked the votes to make his outlook into law.

What this election showed is that the divide in the city is deep, and right down the middle, and its leaders must dedicate themselves to bridging it.