Political showdowns in the Steel City

While Pennsylvania’s hotly contested U.S. Senate and gubernatorial elections will likely… While Pennsylvania’s hotly contested U.S. Senate and gubernatorial elections will likely dominate the media spotlight this fall, a few smaller elections are expected to have a more direct impact on Pitt students.

Daniel Wiseman and Melissa Haluszczak are a pair of Republicans running largely grassroots campaigns in Pittsburgh against Democratic incumbents. Wiseman is taking on state Rep. Dan Frankel, D-23, and Haluszcak is challenging Congressman Mike Doyle, D-14.

Together, their campaigns will seek to bring the nation’s strongly anti-establishment attitude to Pittsburgh in an attempt to combat what Republicans across the country have called the state and federal governments’ out-of-control spending policies.

Doyle has held his seat, which represents Pittsburgh and parts of Allegheny County, for the past 16 years. Frankel, who represents Squirrel Hill and parts of Shadyside and Oakland, has held his office for 12 years. His district includes most of lower campus, including Towers and the dorms in the Schenley Quadrangle.

Both Wiseman and Haluszczak are campaigning on fiscal conservatism, and both are going up against comparatively well-funded incumbents. Both challengers have relatively little cash on hand for their campaigns, according to public campaign finance data.

Before deciding to run for the state legislature, Wiseman worked as a financial adviser full-time, and Haluszczak worked as a paralegal. Today, they both run grassroots campaigns, meaning they focus on door-to-door canvassing and other low-cost means of public outreach.

Democrats make up more than 60 percent of the voters in Allegheny County, and the numbers are higher in city neighborhoods. Republicans have about half the registered voters that Democrats do, according to the county elections website.

Wiseman and Haluszczak have both said that, while going door-to-door, they have encountered many people who register as Democrats just to vote in the primaries. When it comes time to vote in the general election, many voters go red.

G. Terry Madonna, a political analyst and professor at Franklin and Marshall College, said people vote against their party in almost all elections for a variety of reasons.

Madonna pointed out that more than 200,000 people registered as Democrats just before Pennsylvania’s 2008 presidential primary to vote either for or against then-Sen. Barack Obama.

“Some people do it for employment reasons,” he said. “Some do it when they move to an area with a dominant party.”

But the effect of voters crossing party lines is not typically large.

He said, “I’ve never heard of it influencing an election result.”

Melissa Haluszczak

The fiscally conservative Haluszczak grew up just outside of Pittsburgh in a borough called Carnegie. She graduated from Pitt before getting her paralegal certification from Duquesne University and an MBA from the University of Phoenix.

She said that she has been involved in her church community and several local youth programs ever since earning her degrees.

Haluszczak first experienced the anti-establishment feelings that would eventually drive her to run for office about 10 years ago, she said. She has since become gradually more dissatisfied with the federal government’s approach to spending and the way Doyle runs his office.

Visitors to the office will often be met by a closed door or a curt dismissal from the staff, she said.

Her final decision to run came from “outrage” over the lack of discussion about the health care reform bill in the district.

“You’re supposed to represent your constituents,” she said. “There were no town halls, no public discussion. We have not been given a choice.”

One of her first priorities as a legislator would be to repeal the health care reform bill that Congress passed earlier this year.

On a larger scale, the federal government, Haluszczak said, needs to get its spending under control. The stimulus programs haven’t been effective, and she said that it is time for the government to downsize its spending.

Haluszczak also said the federal takeover of student loans, which took the banks out of the picture, hasn’t benefited anyone, either.

“It isn’t helping people with jobs, and its not helping people pay for college,” she said.

She said she opposes excessive federal aid for state governments, especially when state government spending has grown while the state’s population has shrunk.

“Pennsylvania needs to start taking care of Pennsylvania,” she said.

Her last FEC filing showed her campaign operating at a $1,500 deficit for the period of March 31 through June 30.

Mike Doyle

Doyle, a Penn State alumnus, was born in Swissvale, Allegheny County. He took office more than 15 years ago, after serving in the office of then-state Sen. Frank Pecora, according to the congressional biography website.

He hasn’t “seen the need to change” the campaign strategy that he has used for the past eight elections this time around. While he does campaign — his last FEC filing showed that he had more than $400,000 cash-on-hand at the beginning of June — he said that he mainly emphasizes his record in Congress while stumping in the district.

Once the House goes into recess, Doyle said he will start campaigning in the district for the fall election.

His decision to hold off campaigning comes after some legislators from more competitive districts have been campaigning for months.

One of his goals in Congress, he said, is to continue stimulus spending.

“We need to get this economy moving again,” he said. “We need more stimulus spending, not less.”

He hopes to bring more alternative energy to Pittsburgh, too, and said “alternative energy could provide a future for people to stay in Pittsburgh and work.”

While regulation of the natural gas industry is technically a state issue, Doyle said that it is still a concern for him as a representative of his constituents.

There is a need, he said, for Pennsylvania to take a comprehensive look at the issue.

“The gas in the Marcellus shale isn’t going anywhere. We shouldn’t rush and do this willy-nilly.”

While the voter registration numbers in Allegheny County favor Democrats at about 2-to-1, Doyle said he doesn’t take his seat for granted.

From Jan. 1 through June 30, Doyle’s campaign took in about $500,000 in contributions and spent more than $300,000.

Daniel Wiseman

The New York native grew up in the Big Apple, before graduating from Colgate College with a bachelor’s degree, according to his campaign website. He has worked as a journalist and community activist before becoming a financial adviser, according to the website.

Wiseman, from his perspective as a financial adviser, has been bewildered by the growth of the state’s budget and how the increased spending has not greatly helped the state.

That growth, he said, is a large part of what has motivated him to run for office.

Wiseman also wants the state to institute a spending and hiring freeze “until we have a different tax climate” to limit the “exponential growth” of the state’s budget.

That budget, which he said is propped up by some “not-so-business-friendly” taxes, is driving people — especially college graduates — out of the state.

“People are leaving the state in droves,” he said. “The state’s job creation has been depressing.”

A budget freeze, Wiseman said, would include contributions to state-run and state-related universities, including Pitt.

“Spending on education is very generous from the state perspective,” he said.

While a freeze might seem like a poor method of avoiding tuition increases, Wiseman said that potential students need to look at universities with big infrastructure spending and research budgets and question how much actually goes toward their education.

The financial-adviser-turned-political-candidate said that students would vote for him once they educate themselves on the issues.

If they don’t vote for him, or candidates like him, he said, “They’ll be the ones paying the bills.”

His last campaign finance filing — from May — showed $500 in the campaign coffers.

Dan Frankel

Before becoming involved in politics, Frankel was “very involved in the Jewish community in the district,” serving on the community relations committee of the United Jewish Federation, among other positions.

Frankel was elected to the 23rd District in 1998, after winning a primary that he called “tantamount to winning the general election.”

One of his priorities, Frankel said, has been to push for LGBT rights. While he hopes that Pennsylvania will eventually allow same-sex marriage, he said he’s being realistic and trying to end “the last legal form of discrimination” first.

Frankel said that the size of the state’s budget — which Wiseman took issue with — has grown partly because the role of the federal government at the state level has shrunk.

“Thirty years ago, the federal government did a lot of what the state does now,” Frankel said.

At the same time that people have been talking about budget cuts, he said that Republicans have had “a lack of willingness to find additional revenue.”

“It can’t be all budget cuts. There has been an unwillingness to find a balance,” he said.

Ideally, Frankel said new taxes would include an extraction tax on drilling for natural gas in Marcellus shale and taxes on smokeless tobacco and cigars.

“In both cases, we’re the only ones that don’t do it,” he said. “And it’s also a public health issue.”

Frankel said he was eager to engage with his opponent, and given what he has heard of Wiseman, there should be “quite a contrast.”

Frankel’s last campaign finance filing showed that he had more than $190,000 cash-on-hand.