One-party dominance detrimental to the city

The race is over.

Jim Kenney will be sworn in as Philadelphia's 99th mayor in eight weeks, the 10th Democrat in a row elected to that office since 1951.

Melissa Murray Bailey, the Republican nominee for mayor, lost with a record-breaking low of 13.2 percent of the vote.

What comes next for her? What about the GOP and the job as the city's chief executive officer?

If Kenney wins a second four-year term in 2019 - already likely, given the city's history of giving just about any mayor an eight-year ride in office if the person wants it - the GOP will have to wait until 2023 for another crack at a mayoral election without an incumbent.

Let's pause for a brief statement of principles.

One-party dominance is bad for Philadelphia. Everyone, including public servants, improves with competition. Meritocracies have merit.

We don't have that in Philadelphia right now.

The Republican City Committee, long engaged in a self-defeating civil war, has been improving since state Rep. John Taylor was selected in 2013 as a chairman the warring factions could support.

Still, it has been a dozen years since a Republican, Sam Katz, was competitive in a race for mayor.

Let's take a look at what has happened since then:

2007: Al Taubenberger, the longtime head of the Northeast Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce, ran a genial general election campaign against Democrat Michael Nutter. He won just 17 percent of the vote.

The thinking: Taubenberger was in the race to raise his name recognition for a future bid for a City Council seat. The effort appears to have paid off; last Tuesday, he won as an at-large candidate.

2011: John Featherman, one of the insurgent Republicans challenging the old guard (and now a Philly.com columnist), declared his candidacy.

The old guard responded by recruiting Karen Brown, a Democratic committeewoman with a history of financial problems.

Brown defeated Featherman by 64 votes. Mayor Nutter won a second term, defeating Brown with 75 percent of the general-election vote.

Brown last year failed in a bid to return to Democratic ward politics, and now says she is taking a break from all that.

She is uniquely suited to size up Bailey's run as a Republican convert for mayor.

"I was amazed that they went that route again," Brown said of the Republican City Committee. Of Bailey: "She was good. But she didn't have a chance."

2015: Bailey, fed up with the impact of a Democratic stranglehold on the city she moved to three years ago, left that party for the Republicans in January; she pitched herself as a candidate for mayor one month later. Bailey hoped to raise $3 million to be competitive. Her campaign brought in less than $30,000.

Bailey, an executive who has worked in corporate branding internationally, is sharp and studied up on city issues, but did little to challenge Kenney effectively in the campaign.

She is still smarting from media coverage - much of it was mine - that repeatedly noted that Democrats hold a 7-1 voter registration advantage over Republicans in the city.

"You have to go out of your way to vote," she said after the election. "And when you're told your vote won't have an impact, why would you do that?"

Bailey said frustration with the media prompted her to limit coverage of her election night party to "by invitation only."

Taylor says Bailey has a future with his party.

I asked Bailey if she sees - or wants - that.

"I don't know," she said, with a pause, the day after the election. "It's the wrong time to ask."

Seeking another elective office would be tough. An example: Her Society Hill home sits in the congressional district of U.S. Rep. Robert Brady, the city's Democratic Party chairman.

Taubenberger worries about the "caliber" of candidates in his party's future. The Republicans, he said, need people with strong name recognition and records.

"They're not there or they won't do it," he said. "So you get a Karen Brown or a Melissa Bailey. And both worked hard, but they had no base in Philadelphia."

brennac@phillynews.com

215-854-5973

@ByChrisBrennan