ELECTION TUESDAY: Key primary races in Missouri

Missouri Primary Elections are coming up Tuesday, August 5th, 2014.  Of primary concern to many of us is Amendment 7, the constitutional amendment that will (finally!) allow biking, walking, and transit to be funded as part of the Missouri transportation system.

But primary elections for many offices are happening Tuesday as well. 

Vote Tuesday, August 5th

And in Missouri, the primary election is often more important than the final election--nearly 50% of candidates don't have an opponent in November.  Another large batch of candidates are incumbents without a serious challenger.

Bike/ped friendly candidates?

We don't endorse candidates at MoBikeFed, but we can certainly inform you about candidates' track record if we know it.

Of the key 2014 candidates mentioned below, here are the ones that have appeared in MoBikeFed News:

• Jill Schupp (senate candidate): Helping stop anti-bicycle amendment, MoBikeFed Award, Helping solve bike rack issue
   
• Joe Keaveny (Senate candidate): Voting on transportation funding, voting against anti-sustainability law, comment on transportation funding plan
   
• Dan Brown (Senate candidate): Supporting the filibuster on the transportation funding initiative, more detail on the filibuster 

Candidates appreciate donations - after voting, the second most important thing you can do to support biking & walking in Missouri is donate to the candidate of your choice

Even candidates who are not seriously opposed now are fundraising--because they will face a challenge in November or perhaps a year or two from November.

If you give a donation to a candidate of your choice, be sure to let them know that you support biking and walking (and whatever other issues you care most about), and you hope they will be a supporter, too.

How to find your candidates?  Ballotpedia has listings of House candidates and Senate candidates in Missouri.

You'll need to know your Missouri House & Senate District numbers, which you can look up here.

Competitive Races

So how do you tell which districts are actually having a competetive race August 5th?  Ballotpedia has an excellent analysis.

Missouri Senate

MOST HOTLY CONTESTED SEAT

Probably the most interesting race in the state is for the Senate District in St Louis County vacated by Senator John Lamping, Senate District 24.  This is one of the few seats that might flip parties. If you support one of these candidates, now would be a great time to make a contribution to their campaign--follow the links below.

DISTRICT 24 Candidates

 August 5 Democratic primary:

• Jill Schupp

 August 5 Republican primary:

• Robb Hicks
• Jack Spooner
• John R. "Jay" Ashcroft

 August 5 Libertarian primary:

• Jim Higgins

SENATE PRIMARY RACES

In these races, the primary winner is nearly certain to become the overall winner of the campaign--again, donations to the candidate of your choice would mean the most now:

• District 4: Incumbent Joe Keaveny is challenged by Bonnie Lynn Green in the Democratic primary. The winner will be unopposed in the general election unless a Republican candidate is nominated to replace Courtney Blunt, who was disqualified before the primary.
• District 16: Incumbent Dan Brown is challenged by Bernie Mowinski in the Republican primary. The winner will be unopposed in the general election.

Missouri House

Here are the most interesting and contested primary contests for the Missouri House

• District 126: Incumbent Randy Pike is challenged by Bill Yarberry in the Republican primary. Sam Foursha is unopposed in the Democratic primary. William Gilmore is unopposed in the Constitution Party primary. Pike and Yarberry ran in a three-way Republican primary in 2012.
• District 155: Incumbent Lyle Rowland is challenged by Mike Lind and Jason Frodge in the Republican primary. No Democrats filed to run.

Again, see the full list of House races & Senate races at Ballotpedia.