2017 General Election Elected 54 – 46
Back to ol‘ Virginny
We are still working on flipping Virginia Blue. Virginia needs to flip seventeen seats this fall. This fall, because Virginia has its elections in odd numbered years. Every one of the one hundred House of Delegates seats is up for election this November. Seventeen is a lot of seats, but flipping that many is not impossible. It happens that Hillary Clinton carried seventeen HD seats held by Republicans in 2016.
Danica Roem danicafordelegate.com is one of the candidates who the website Flippable has targeted as a likely candidate for a Democratic victory over an incumbent. Eight or twelve years ago, she would have been an impossible candidate — not just because of the way Virginia’s voting habits have changed. Her election eight or twelve years ago would have been impossible because she is transgendered. Now she would not be the first transgendered person to be elected to a state legislature; but she would be the first elected who was open about her status. She would represent a Manassas area district southwest of the Washington, DC suburbs with a population that is 60% white, 15% black, and 10% Asian that has been represented by an incumbent who is so firmly opposed to transgendered people he insists on using the male pronoun while describing Danica Roem.
What is truly remarkable about Danica Roem, though, is the quality of candidate she is. A former journalist, she won awards from the Virginia Press Association seven times for her writing in two small newspapers. She describes what she saw and did in her newspaper career: I saw the best in people tackling poverty and homelessness and the worst in people killing each other. I wrote stories about schools, business, development, and, of course, transportation. Lots and lots and lots of transportation: Bi-County Parkway. Tri-County Parkway. Sudley Manor. Vint Hill. Linton Hall. That little bridge in Nokesville (Aden Road)….If you ran for office in western Prince William, we talked transportation. My job was to know enough about the issues to hold elected officials accountable for what they did, or didn’t do, about them.
Danica Roem describes two former Prince William representatives, one a Democrat, the other a Republican as her ideal of how legislators should do their work: You didn’t have to agree with them on every issue to see that they worked hard to build consensus,govern with a results-oriented approach and reach across the aisle to build a better Manassas, all while being among the most genial, well-respected and powerful members of the General Assembly. They weren’t bomb-throwers or ideologues; they were effective committee chairmen who secured the money to develop our local infrastructure.
Though her candidacy has attracted newspaper reporters from around the country, she says she is far behind in providing interviews to those who want to talk to her. What’s more, she wants to focus her candidacy on what her district needs. She says her district needs better transportation, improvements to Route 28.
While her views on transportation are not of much interest to journalists around the country, her proposals are important to the people who live in her district: …widening [Route] 28 to six lanes just south of U.S. 29, removing stop lights where appropriate (and the residents find useful) and coming up with multi-modal traffic options so people aren’t stuck having to only choose [to drive] vehicles.
Opposed to toll roads, she says it is too late to fight over the one that has already been approved. Instead, she urges use of funds the toll road conglomerate has promised for the Route 28 improvements rather than for improving the intersection between the toll road and Route 28.. That would mean Route 28 improvements would not cost taxpayers money.
Danica Roem danicafordelegate.com has proposals on jobs, schools, and community policing as well. She is striving to be a candidate addressing the varied needs of her constituents. She can succeed and can be elected because the world has changed, because her district has changed demographically, and because she is persuasive in her efforts. Help her win her election. Help her turn Virginia blue. And help her now, because the election is only a few months away.
