Alvin Brown navigates a triangulation strategy

Last night, at the Ballots and Brews event hosted by the Jacksonville Young Voters Coalition at Intuition Ale Works in Riverside, I ran across Mayor Alvin Brown … very briefly.

Most of the politicians and staff people there had time for extended chats, which was because they were there to message and network, even if off the record. Mayor Brown? Not so much.

I got a quick handshake and a walk by. I had hoped for more. But I didn’t expect it. He was there so that it could be said he was there. Or so it seemed.

Mayor Brown is a busy man, of course. He’s juggling a lot of issues — passing pension reform while dealing with a Republican Council, a fundraiser with former President Bill Clinton, Shad Khan‘s ambitious Shipyards proposal, and, of course, the other aspects of a campaign.

What kind of campaign is it going to be, though? It depends on where you sit and who you ask.

There are those who believe that a second Alvin Brown term would be a Cowford Camelot, one in which the Human Rights Ordinance would be revised to include protections for the LGBT community, and the progressiveness that so many of his supporters expected last year in the wake of his victory would come to pass.

On that, it depends on who you ask. At least some of his canvassers are going door to door, according to informed sources, and telling voters that Mayor Brown supports the HRO.

On the other hand, it has been alleged he told black pastors and activists that he would never support the HRO.

Which is true?

As mayor, he has a platform like no one else. At any given time, he could remove all doubt on that issue. Just as he could have done on the courthouse wedding controversy in January at the MLK breakfast — an occasion where he punted when he had a chance to unambiguously voice support for civil rights for a group of citizens who have been marginalized locally for far too long.

That said, the post-event press conference deviated from the script and moved toward a discussion of a civil rights issue that is very salient to Alvin Brown’s cadre of LGBT and Straight Ally supporters: Clerk of Court Ronnie Fussell’s unilateral decision earlier this month to stop the longstanding practice of courthouse weddings, which famously made his staff feel “uncomfortable” when they involved same-sex couples.

Stephen Dare of MetroJacksonville.com got the ball rolling, asking Mayor Brown his position on courthouse wedding ceremonies, at which point the mayor reiterated the non-answer he’d been giving local media since the Fussell decision, saying that it’s “very clear that the court has made a decision, and [we] have to respect and follow the law” — an utterly ambiguous bowl of word salad with passive-voice dressing that said precisely nothing.

As the press conference was being concluded, this reporter posed a follow-up question to Dare’s, asking the mayor whether he supported or opposed the Fussell decision, in hope of getting, finally, a clear position stated.

Mayor Brown mentioned that “judges are now having weddings” in chambers and that the American Bar Association has stepped up and filled the void that Duval County left when it decided to deny the longstanding public accommodation of courthouse weddings. Interesting that, on a day devoted to commemorating Dr. King’s long, often lonely fight for civil rights, a war that left him slain by an assassin’s bullet in 1968, Jacksonville’s mayor dodged the question of whether LGBT members — who pay taxes and helped to finance our city’s $500M courthouse — are entitled to the simple courtesy of a courthouse wedding.

To be clear, other politicians oppose the Human Rights Ordinance and the extension of the public accommodation of courthouse weddings performed by courthouse staff. But unlike the mayor, they are willing to stand up and be counted in their position.

Where does Mayor Brown stand on these issues? He didn’t stick around the Young Voters Coalition event long enough for anyone to find out. But he’s been messaging in other ways.

An ad dropped on urban radio in the past couple of days.

This advertisement, voiced by the Rev. H.T. Rhim of the St. Joseph Missionary Baptist Church. Rhim has known Mayor Brown “since he was a teenager,” as he says in the advert, and so is uniquely positioned to speak with authority about Mayor Brown’s priorities as he vies for a second term.

Well, the ad doesn’t say much as far as that goes. It functions more as an attempt to reiterate extant personal branding efforts, citing the mayor’s “faith and his willingness to work hard,” and that “he was the first in his family to go to college.”

“As our mayor, he made us proud. He worked with community leaders to save middle school football and NJROTC, and Mayor Brown started ‘Earn to Learn,’ which helps young people whose parents didn’t go to college …”

Rhim’s commentary abruptly cuts off there, and an unidentified female voiceover concludes the message.

Wednesday, aside from the Ballots and Brews event, Mayor Brown had what was called a “Leaderboard Lunch” with local Republican tea party activists — including Billie Tucker, the co-founder of the First Coast Tea Party. Apparently this lunch went well, as Tina Meskel, another tea party insider, posted photos to her Facebook page with the caption “Lots to think about regarding the upcoming election.”

Presumably, she’s not referring to middle school football.

Some very well-informed people in this city’s political scene believe that Alvin Brown is making a play for tea party support, and that indeed gives progressives “lots to think about.” There are informed sources who say that the hard right in the local GOP — what some colloquially call the “Hogan camp” — is pressuring Lenny Curry to take a harder line on the HRO than he has thus far.

It’s ironic that Mayor Brown had Bill Clinton in town today — the president who was the master of triangulation. Mayor Brown is forging a very nuanced path, trying to message to disparate communities: young hipsters, the tea party theocon set, and the African American faith-based community that turned out so strongly for him in the runoff election four years ago. Will Alvin Brown clarify, finally, his position on LGBT rights? Unless he did it in the Leaderboard Lunch, I missed it.