VENICE, Fla. (SNN TV) — After a trashing at the polls last year, Florida Democrats were at their lowest point in the state. But they’ve had local successes in the state in 2023 as they’ve tried to rebuild.
That included on the Suncoast, where the candidates Sarasota Democrats favored won both races on the Venice City Council and are now in office.
The 2023 Venice City Council races were nonpartisan — no party is listed on the ballot. But Sarasota Republicans canvassed for candidates Dusty Feller and Mitzie Fiedler, while Democrats helped Joan Farrell and Ron Smith. Both Farrell and Smith won.
The biggest issue? Development.
“By far,” said Venice Area Democratic Club President Gillian Beck.
“I think people are starting to realize development is encroaching on where they want to be,” she said. “It’s encroaching the environment around them, especially around snowbird season; it’s affecting the time to get to places more so than it has before.”
“I think you’ve also sent a message that you’re tired of clear-cutting, that you’re tired of paving over our paradise,” new City Council Member Ron Smith said in the chamber late November.
Beck says county Democrats gave guidance to the Venice Democratic Club and said the candidates’ position on development –– slowing it down and having managed growth — was attracting voters with no party affiliation and Republican residents.
We reached out to the Sarasota County Republican Party for this story. They provided SNN with this statement:
“While we are disappointed with the outcome of Tuesday’s Venice City Council election, we are heartened to see that we had record Republican turnout for an odd-year Venice election. That is in part due to all the volunteers who worked to canvas every non-gated neighborhood in the city, made thousands of phone calls and distributed thousands of voter guides.”
As for the Democratic candidates, Beck says she thinks they’ll be important voices within the council.
“Whether they get everything they want, whether the people will feel they’ve done everything they can, that remains to be seen,” Beck said. “But I know them both well, and I know they will do everything they can to keep the city [as] the city [that] it is but growing with managed development.”
