by Paul Goldman

But for former Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney running for Lieutenant Governor, the RVA water fiasco would likely have been a far different political story. High profile for sure. But Mayor Danny Avula is new, and folks likely would have been willing to let him fix the issue, fire the public works director, and move on as the promising new sheriff in town.

However, Stoney and his chief aide Lincoln Saunders actually think they have a record to be proud of. They first thought Stoney was governor material. He had to drop out when getting only 8% in the polls. Then he decided to run for LG. Stoney‘s only private sector job was with the now bankrupt and scandalous-to-some GreenTech auto company. As for Mr. Saunders, his only private-sector job appears to be as a top executive for a now bankrupt Green B.E.A.N. Veggie delivery company. The Green Boys each also had jobs with the Democratic Party or Democratic politics operating under the Peter principle. Having the audacity to raise salaries to the highest levels ever, they and their cronies got rich off city government. (To be fair, RVA City Council had to agree with all of this.)

Stoney’s bid for LG Is what has made this story politically juicy.

Richmond’s water fiasco has given the GOP a political battering ram to use in 2025. Democrats have already made the classic mistake of saying this is a problem caused in part by the lack of state money and demanding the state provide money to Richmond. 

Wrong.

We in Richmond did not need state money to fix the water treatment plant! I can find the money in five seconds if you just give me the city budget. Well, maybe a minute. RVA is currently spending $130 million on a new baseball stadium pushed and passed by Stoney/Lincoln and backed by Council. RVA always had the money for the reliable plant equipment needed to run their water system. 

Reality check: Democrats need a plan not just to better govern Richmond but also to stop the Republicans from using Stoney’s and Lincoln’s incompetence to hurt the Democratic brand going into 2025. I tried to stop their fiscal mismanagement — even went to court to try to stop them from issuing city baseball stadium bonds when we have all these other needs. But I got no help.

Stoney is not going to drop out. Right now, he is likely to win the nomination. Therefore, Democrats need to put in place a plan that will insulate the statewide Democratic candidates for governor and attorney general.

Let’s get real people: This water treatment plant fiasco is just a tip of the incompetence iceberg. I’m not saying the Stoney administration over the last eight years was all bad, but I would urge people to see the water fiasco as the tip of the iceberg, so to speak.

Here’s what I think the Democrats need to do. Urge Mayor Avula to trump whatever Youngkin is planning on doing. As a political matter, that means ordering the independent investigation to conduct a query on a far wider scale. RVA infrastructure issues are far bigger than the water fiasco. A broad scope would reduce the importance of the Youngkin investigation.

If Avula declines, then the General Assembly should conduct its own investigation. The key is to prevent the Youngkin investigation results from becoming the narrative to be used in the 2025 campaign. Any honest investigation is going to roast Stoney and Lincoln. Youngkin doesn’t even have to make it partisan. 

I’m assuming the Youngkin investigation will interview both Stoney and Saunders. How do you think that’s gonna go?

Any good lawyer will tell you there’s a basic rule: Make sure your side is the first to put out the bad stuff. You don’t want the other side to be the ones to say, “Well, Mr. Stoney, isn’t it true that you failed to mention earlier your…”

I’m not suggesting anything criminal or corrupt. But if Democrats think Republicans can review Stoney’s hiring and contracting policies and not find favoritism to many Democratic types, they need to get their heads examined. There’s no way this will not look like some form of political corruption to independent voters. 

Let’s get real: Stoney wants to be a heartbeat away from the governorship. Anything could happen. Governor Ralph Northam nearly resigned not that long ago. So, we’re not talking about something out of a political novel. If Stoney became governor, he would hire Lincoln as his chief of staff. These guys were involved in bankrupt car and bankrupt veggie delivery companies. Now they’re supposed to run a $60 billion business?

Like I say, it’s not that these guys were all bad running the city of Richmond. But they have been involved in previous campaigns. They realize the narrative of this campaign has been set. Stoney will be on the defensive for as long as he stays running for office this year. His own party is not going to want to defend him. I ran Doug Wilder’s campaign for Lieutenant Governor. The Democratic Party didn’t want to defend us either. Back then, their only beef with Doug was that he was born Black.

Admittedly, the party has become more culturally aware since then. But incompetence, once it becomes part of the narrative, is not something anybody running in the Democratic Party in 2025 is going to defend. I seriously doubt the Democratic nominees for Governor and Attorney General will want to be in the same picture frame as Stoney.

I’m not saying that’s fair. But I don’t see how Mr. Stoney or anybody else can blame those nominees for keeping their distance from a radioactive LG candidate. If Stoney’s mentor, Terry McAuliffe were still Governor, he could protect him perhaps. But he’s not, so he can’t.

Bottom line: as long as Stoney remains a candidate for LG, the Democrats will have a real problem in containing the issue of the incompetence of former Democratic mayors running Richmond over the last 16 years. Stoney seems as competent as anyone else running for LG nomination, but he made the mistake of spending his last year campaigning first for governor, then for LG, instead of concentrating on his job as mayor. This was the height of vanity. Had he concentrated on his mayoral duties, the water treatment plan fiasco, the meals tax fiasco, the baseball stadium bond priority fiasco…I could go on… would not have happened. At least in the minds of the voters.

If Stoney were not running for LG, the water fiasco would have a different narrative. But here at the beginning of 2025, the gods of politics have decided to punish him. He has a right to feel it’s not fair. But it is what it is.

Paul Goldman is former Chair of the VA Democratic Party, a former candidate for mayor of the City of Richmond, and author of “Remaking Virginia Politics.”