Roanoke College poll: Cobb leads Roanoke mayor’s race but Democrats may not sweep council

Want to find out more about the candidates? See our Voter Guide.

Roanoke is poised to elect its first openly gay mayor, but Democrats may not sweep the city council elections, according to a new poll by Roanoke College that was co-sponsored by The Roanoke Rambler.

The poll shows Democrat Joe Cobb leading by a double digits in the three-way race for mayor, with Democrats Terry McGurie and Phazhon Nash leading for two of the three council seats available. However, the contest for the third and final council seat is a statistical tie between Republican Nick Hagen, independent Evelyn Powers and Democrat Benjamin Woods. If Hagen were to win, he’d be the first Republican elected to council since Ralph Smith and Bill Carder in 2000.

Let’s get the horse-race numbers out of the way, then we’ll delve into the deeper parts of the poll that show how Roanoke voters are thinking.

Two-term Mayor Sherman Lea is retiring and the poll finds these results:

Joe Cobb (Democrat): 50%
David Bowers (Republican): 26%
Stephanie Moon (independent): 18%

Three council seats are available and not a single incumbent is running, so Roanoke is guaranteed to get at least three new members on council (it would get four if Bowers won the mayoral race; Cobb and Moon are already on council):

Terry McGuire (Democrat): 54%
Phazhon Nash (Democrat): 51%
Evelyn Powers (independent): 35%
Benjamin Woods (Democrat): 34%
Nick Hagen (Republican): 33%
Jim Garrett (Republican): 28%
Cathy Reynolds (independent): 10%
Undecided /write-in / refused: 9%

Some final housekeeping before we move on: The poll has a margin of error of 4.8%. The Roanoke College poll also has a high ranking with the Five Thirty Eight data website, which ranks 250 pollsters by their accuracy and transparency. Roanoke College is ranked No. 32, with a score of 2.6 out of a possible 3.0.

Cobb’s lead shouldn’t be surprising but . . .

Roanoke is a blue city. In three of the past four presidential elections, the Democratic nominee has taken a pretty consistent 61% to 62% of the vote; Hillary Clinton, at 56.5%, was the only exception. I also notice that when the pollsters asked respondents for their party affiliation, 61% said Democratic, so that tells me this poll is a pretty good reflection of the Roanoke electorate as we’ve seen it in the past.

With that background, the big leads for Cobb in the mayor’s race and McGuire and Nash in the council races shouldn’t be surprising. What’s notable to me is how low Bowers polls. Of the three candidates, Bowers is likely the best known: He spent 16 years as mayor as a Democrat, before he retired in 2012. Four years ago, when Bowers ran as an independent against Lea, he took 46.7% of the vote. Furthermore, Moon initially sought the Democratic nomination for council four years ago before deciding to run as an independent. That raised this prospect — that Moon would take Democratic votes away from Cobb, and that Bowers, with Republican backing, might be able to capitalize on his name and legacy to outpoll them both. (I looked at the dynamics of three-way races in this column).

Moon might well be taking votes away from Cobb — his 50% isn’t close to the 61% that Democratic presidential candidates have won — but Bowers, at 26%, is running lower than what a Republican nominee in Roanoke normally would. Donald Trump took 36% four years ago; 37.5% in 2016 while Mitt Romney took 37.5% in 2012 and John McCain took 37.8% in 2008. Put simply: In this poll, Bowers is underperforming both the standard Republican vote as well as what he did as an independent four years ago. This surprises me because, as we’ll see below, some of the issues that voters are concerned about would seem to be beneficial for a Republican candidate. Are Roanoke voters simply tired of Bowers? Or are they so Democratic that they trust or prefer a Democrat to handle what might traditionally be Republican issues?

Here’s one clue: Bowers is the only one of the three mayoral candidates whose unfavorable rating is higher than his favorable rating. Of those responding to the poll, 43% said they had an unfavorable opinion of Bowers; only 22% had a favorable one. By contrast, Cobb appears to be well-liked — 47% favorable to 16% unfavorable. Moon also has higher favorables than unfavorable, but her big challenge is that 40% simply don’t know enough about her to have an opinion.

A three-way contest for the final council seat

Given Roanoke’s Democratic background, the leads for McGuire and Nash aren’t surprising. The three-way fight for the final slot is. Here’s what the poll shows about why that’s happening. Woods simply isn’t very well-known. The poll shows 61% of votes are familiar with McGuire and 54% are familiar with Nash but only 27% are familiar with Woods. The only candidate who ranked lower than Woods is independent Cathy Reynolds; only 16% of those responding had heard of her. Woods also has been the least-funded of the three Democrats, so he’s had a harder time getting his message out. By contrast, Powers is the best-known candidate in the field — 72% say they are familiar with her, a consequence of winning five elections for city treasurer — as a Democrat. The challenge for her is that a lot of people know who she is but aren’t yet committed to voting for her. Nick Hagen, the top Republican candidate, is also better known than Woods — 37% are familiar with him, no doubt a result of his unsuccessful but close campaign two years ago.

Hagen is also outperforming the other Republican in the race, Jim Garrett, which suggests that he’s able to expand beyond the standard Republican vote. Given the closeness of these races, that third council seat could go in any direction: Powers needs to convert people who know her into votes, while both Hagen and Woods need to become better known and then convert those people into supporters.

To learn more about any of these candidates, see our Voter Guide.

Economic development, crime, homelessness and housing are the top issues

Here’s what poll respondents said the top issues are:

Economic development: 23%
Crime: 19%
Homelessness: 16%
Housing: 14%
Education: 9%
City hall management: 6%
Zoning: 5%
Something else: 4%
Jobs: 2%
Don’t know/ refused: 2%

Jobs really seems another say of saying economic development. Add those together and that’s quarter of the electorate listing that as the top issue. Bowers has pushed crime and public safety as an issue. Crime ranks second, and that’s usually an issue that helps Republicans. Unfortunately for Republicans, it may not be helping them enough. These poll results suggest that maybe some candidates aren’t talking about economic development as much as they should. Garrett has based much of his campaign on zoning; he has campaign signs with a long explanation of why he opposes the zoning plan. These results suggest not that many voters are interested in that.

Preserving Evans Spring outweighs development, but many are neutral

One of the issues that has animated Roanoke has been whether to develop Evans Spring, a privately owned 150-acre site across the interstate from Valley View Mall that is the largest undeveloped tract of land in the city. This pitted those who were in favor of preserving green space against those who said the city needed more housing. In March, city council voted 4-3 to adopt a master plan for development for Evans Spring.

In this poll, 39% said the land should be preserved, 32% said it should be developed — but 23% were neutral and 6% either didn’t know enough to respond or refused.

Roanokers lean against zoning plan

The poll asked: “Roanoke recently eliminated single-family-only zoning to allow for more multi-unit housing across the city. Do you agree or disagree with this policy?”

It found that 47% disagreed, while 35% supported the new zoning. However, notice that above, not many people listed zoning as their top concern.

New council should pick next city manager

The current council hopes to pick a new city manager by year’s end, but the poll finds voters overwhelmingly want the new council to do that — 74% say council should wait, only 9% say the current council should go ahead. By any standard, that’s a landslide.

What we don’t know

To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, we know what we know and then there’s a lot we don’t know. This poll did not ask about the presidential race, so we don’t know how that’s impacting the local races. Is Bowers under-performing the Trump vote in the city? Is Hagen over-performing? We don’t know. We also don’t know the profile of those voters who are still undecided in the council race — those are the ones who will determine that final council seat. I bet the candidates would like to know that, as they frame their closing arguments.

The poll also found that 47% of respondents had already voted. If that’s so, that’s a high percentage. In last year’s General Assembly races, 34% of Roanoke voters cast ballots early. It’s traditional to say the only poll that matters is the one on Election Day. With early voting, that poll is already well underway.