Satan for Mayor?!

continued

"That's assuming I've been unsuccessful in past times," she replies cheerfully. "I'm a really hard worker, and if you work hard, if you go door to door, if you talk to people, if you have a message that they can relate to, you have a very good chance. The second [reason] is that I think the anti-incumbent feeling in the United States is strong."

The incumbent, John Hieftje, was born in Battle Creek in 1951, nine months before his family moved to Ann Arbor. Elected to council from the First Ward in 1999 and as mayor in 2000, Hieftje is the city's longest-serving leader in more than fifty years. Once a real estate agent, he now works full time as mayor, earning $45,000 a year. (Under previous mayors, it was a part-time job paying less than $20,000.) Hieftje also teaches one class a year at the U-M's Ford School of Public Policy--for which, he volunteers, he earns $16,300 a year. He graduated from EMU in 1997 and lives in Burns Park with his wife, Kathryn Goodson, a pianist.

Every two years since 2000, Hieftje has faced a challenger, and every time he's won handily. He's adept at taking credit for popular initiatives--including one he championed but didn't really initiate, the Greenbelt--while distancing himself from unpopular ones. But over time he's accumulated enemies, and lately the number of controversies has multiplied.