Manatee County Commissioner George Kruse injected a jolt of urgency into an Islander Coffee with the Candidates session July 24 in Holmes Beach.
“This is the people versus the special interests,” Kruse said of his race for reelection in District 7.
Before he can face Democrat Sari Lindroos-Valimaki in the Nov. 5 general election, Kruse must face Kevin Van Ostenbridge in the Tuesday, Aug. 20, Republican primary for the at-large seat.
Van Ostenbridge was seeking reelection in District 3, the west Manatee County area that includes Anna Maria Island, but in late May he scrambled the commission contests and filed to run against Kruse, the lone no vote in some of the most controversial 6-1 board decisions in recent years.
Kruse July 24 joined Islander publisher Bonner Joy, reporter Ryan Paice, this editor and Holmes Beach Commissioner Greg Kerchner for a Coffee with the Candidates program at the Anna Maria Island Beach Cafe in Holmes Beach. Van Ostenbridge did not attend and did not respond to Joy’s phone invite.
The conversation lasted about 90 minutes, with talk about Kruse’s goals for four more years and his record after nearly four years, which includes leading the way for a fare-free transit system, bringing the Tunnel to Towers veterans village project to Manatee, advancing a multimodal trail system, fighting a drive to rollback wetlands protections, advocating for full impact fees and challenging Van Ostenbridge’s rush to ignore Holmes Beach regulations and build a parking garage at the public beach.
“This is not partisan anymore,” Kruse said of the election. “I mean, let’s be honest. This is a very red county. … It’s most likely going to be who wins the primary.”
The GOP primaries include Kruse versus Van Ostenbridge, Tal Siddique vs. April Culbreath for county commission in District 3 and Scott Farrington vs. James Satcher for supervisor of elections.
Kruse, aligned with Siddique and Farrington, said of the primaries: “This is just effectively good versus evil at this point. This is the people versus the special interests.”
Because of the stakes in a red county, he and others have encouraged “Hell No! KVO” Democrats and independents to register as Republicans so they could vote in closed primaries.
“Switch, and then vote against me in November,” Kruse said.
The window to switch affiliations closed in late July and, according to the supervisor of elections office, 1,234 Democrats switched to Republican between April 1 and July 25 and 1,200 voters formerly not affiliated with a party also registered as Republicans.
Kruse is aided in his campaign by a small group of volunteers, including his wife, who is working on marketing. The incumbent said he’s speaking daily — to groups of five and groups of 100 people.
“I tell everyone, ‘Get to church 10 minutes early and find people in the lobby,” he said. “Go talk to people at work. Go knock on your neighbor’s door. Call your friends and family. If you can all touch 10 people, I can get to 20,000 people.
“But it takes everybody realizing there’s a fundamental break in the government of this county and this is not a partisan thing, this is just about good governance.”
If he wins and ousts Van Ostenbridge, Kruse said maybe others on the commission, specifically Republicans Mike Rahn and Amanda Ballard, will find their independence and a way to work together.
“There’s a big difference between a 6-1 board with Kevin part of that six and a 6-1 board without Kevin part of that six,” Kruse said. “Kevin’s not one commissioner on that board. Kevin is six commissioners on that board. Kevin is the one with all the money.”