Poll shows hypothetical mayoral candidate Strimling in dead heat with incumbent Brennan

Ethan Strimling (BDN photo by Troy R. Bennett)

Ethan Strimling (BDN photo by Troy R. Bennett)

There are five people who have taken out papers to run for mayor of Maine’s largest city, but it’s hard to have a conversation about the race without mentioning one person who hasn’t: Ethan Strimling.

Strimling finished as the runner-up to current Mayor Michael Brennan in 2011, and has remained in the public eye as a political commentator for a variety of news organizations, including the BDN at one point and more recently the Portland Press Herald and WCSH 6.

The latest fuel on the “Will-he-or-won’t-he” fire came today in the form of Public Policy Polling results, finding Strimling with a slim advantage in a hypothetical rematch against Brennan.

As recently as this evening, Strimling, who’s been traveling out of state recently, told the Bangor Daily News he still hasn’t decided whether he’ll throw his hat in the race, but acknowledged he’ll “take a close look at this recent poll when I return.”

Portland Mayor Michael Brennan (BDN file photo by Robert Bukaty)

Portland Mayor Michael Brennan (BDN file photo by Robert Bukaty)

Those results show the educational nonprofit director and former state lawmaker carrying a two-percent edge over Brennan in a head-to-head matchup, and a one-percent edge when a third candidate, City Councilor Ed Suslovic, is thrown into the mix. As both numbers are within the 4.1 percent margin of error, it’s perhaps most accurate to say Strimling and Brennan are in a dead heat.

In a separate question, 52 percent of survey respondents told PPP they’re “concerned about Portland’s future,” while 46 percent claimed the city is “headed in the right direction.”

“The overarching theme we found is that people are concerned about the city’s future under Mayor Brennan, and Ethan Strimling has emerged as a really strong candidate to replace him in the fall,” Justin Mayhew, an associate with the polling firm, told the Bangor Daily News. “What really reinforces Ethan Strimling’s position as a frontrunner is the fact that, when we move to a three-person race in which the field is more diluted, he still comes out on top.”

While that sounds like a glowing endorsement of Strimling to be the next mayor of Portland, be wary of a few factors. Baldacci Communications, the local firm ostensibly behind the poll, was aligned with Strimling during his 2011 campaign, and while no direct tie between the hypothetical candidate and this particular poll has come out, results of private polling aren’t typically released to the public unless they play in the favor of the ones who paid for them.

Mayhew described the benefactors helping Baldacci commission the poll as a “group of citizens.”

So in short, whoever makes up the “group of citizens” believes these numbers cast their cause in a positive light, otherwise we’d never have seen them.

But do these poll results benefit Strimling? Maybe, as they generate publicity for his candidacy without him having to actually declare that he’s running.

While I believe him when he says it’s a tough decision whether or not he’ll run again, the side benefit of dragging his feet is that he gets to keep his high-profile media gigs while he waits. Once he officially enters the race, he could be forced to give up the free and largely positive TV and newspaper exposure, at least through the campaign.

But as I said when results from an April PPP poll leaked, being locked in a coin-toss race with the incumbent isn’t necessarily great news for Strimling, either.

While Strimling has had the luxury of staying in the public eye while above the fray of city government, Brennan has been doing the dirty work of grappling with Gov. Paul LePage over General Assistance benefits for asylum seekers and battling to establish a new citywide minimum wage — political fights in which nobody’s ever going to be completely satisfied with the outcomes.

If Brennan can stay in a virtual tie with Strimling while doing the bruising work of presiding over the city, and while his top (hypothetical) rival has yet to have to get his hands politically dirty, that’s promising for the incumbent.

Does this actually mean Brennan’s closing the gap?

Another thing: In that April PPP poll I mentioned, also backed by Baldacci Communications and featuring a similar sample size, Strimling carried an 8 percent advantage in a potential head-to-head matchup with Brennan.

So viewed simply, in the last three months, Mayor Brennan has actually closed the gap by 6 percentage points. While anything can happen once the campaigning starts, by the current trajectory, Brennan would be up by 4-6 percent by the time polls open in November.

The April polling took place over three days and included 507 respondents, while the July polling took place over five days — July 17-21 — and included 566 respondents.

Public Policy Polling stands by its results

Despite all the previous warnings about how publicized poll results only benefit those who paid for them, Public Policy Polling, based in North Carolina, is a reputable national polling firm.

Just because we wouldn’t be seeing the results if they were bad for the poll sponsors doesn’t mean the results aren’t accurate.

As Mayhew said, the poll was automated and conducted through landlines. The results were weighted to reflect Portland’s demographics and income levels, so answers given by people representative of larger percentages of their fellow citizens were given a heavier weight than those representative of smaller percentages of their fellow citizens. (Follow all that?)

PPP’s formula for weighting results to ensure accuracy has a solid track record.

“We’ve done very well in elections with attention nationally, so our weighing calculations have been tested and have been shown to be pretty successful,” Mayhew said, “so we rest on our reputation from previous successes.”

What about the other legitimate candidates?

One potential reason to be wary of the results, however, is the exclusion of most of the actual candidates.

The aforementioned Suslovic has taken out papers to run for the office, but the other hypothetical candidate PPP asks respondents to consider is former mayor and current City Councilor Nicholas Mavodones.

Mavodones, who finished third in 2011, hasn’t taken out papers to run again this year and hasn’t publicly expressed interest in doing so.

Tom MacMillan (BDN photo by Troy R. Bennett)

Tom MacMillan (BDN photo by Troy R. Bennett)

Meanwhile, prominent Green Independent Party leader Tom MacMillan has taken out papers — and unless this information is among data that hasn’t been publicly released — is ignored by the poll, as is firefighter and surprising 2011 mayoral candidate Chris Vail and longshot Zouhair Bouzrara.

MacMillan would seem particularly difficult to overlook, given the sizable Green Party contingent in the city and overall liberal bent to the population base. How do we know how Brennan and/or Strimling perform when put up against a threat on their political left?

We don’t know, because the poll didn’t ask. (Or if it did, the sponsor of the poll didn’t release that information.)

Among those the poll did ask about, Brennan kept a sizable advantage in head-to-head matchups with both Suslovic and Mavodones. Against longtime friend Suslovic, the incumbent held a 47-percent-to-25-percent lead, and against Mavodones, he was up 41-percent-to-33-percent.

In a three-way race, Brennan maintained his edge over the councilors, with 36 percent of the respondents supporting him. Mavodones garnered 22 percent and Suslovic earned 12 percent in that scenario.

When the three-way-race considered Brennan, Strimling and Suslovic, Strimling gathered 30 percent of the respondents, while 29 percent backed the incumbent and 14 percent picked Suslovic.

Ranked choice voting could play a big role in November, but isn’t considered in these results

None of the questions considered second-choice votes, which will come into play in November, because the city’s the only place in Maine using ranked-choice voting, meaning second-place votes could be reallocated among higher finishers and ultimately determine the outcome.

For instance, in the Brennan-Strimling-Suslovic scenario, if even a tiny majority of Suslovic supporters — let’s say 52 percent — like Brennan better than Strimling, the incumbent could overcome that 1 percentage point deficit and leapfrog Strimling to victory.

And although Suslovic has been a critic of Brennan’s mayoral office in recent months, Suslovic and Brennan have been close enough on the issues that it wouldn’t be crazy to think the mayor might have that advantage in second-choice Suslovic votes.

What did the poll questions actually ask?

Oftentimes, the full spectrum of questions asked of poll respondents isn’t released publicly. But in the news release issued today by PPP, the question relating to the direction of the city read:

“In general, do you feel things in the city of Portland [are] strongly headed in the right direction, somewhat headed in the right direction, or are you somewhat concerned about Portland’s future, or are you strongly concerned about Portland’s future?”

Let’s go back to Mayhew’s characterization of the poll results. He said: “… people are concerned about the city’s future under Mayor Brennan…”

Unless the question asked of respondents was worded differently than what was released to the media Thursday, the poll didn’t actually associate the direction of the city with Brennan’s leadership.

While it’s not absurd to make that leap when analyzing the poll results, it’s also possible for Portlanders to be concerned about the city’s future because of perceived trouble LePage is causing for Portland from Augusta, or because of a range of problems they don’t necessarily blame on Brennan.

It’ll be up to Brennan’s opponents to convince voters they’re insecure about Portland’s future because of the incumbent, and it’ll be up to Brennan to talk up all the ways he’s been working to solve whatever problems they’re concerned about.

Portland City Councilor Ed Suslovic. (BDN file photo by Seth Koenig)

Ed Suslovic (BDN file photo by Seth Koenig)

Stephanie Clifford of Baldacci Communications suggested to Randy Billings of the Press Herald the pollsters asked other questions as well, but didn’t say specifically what they were or what the results were, only hinting the unreleased questions dealt with Brennan’s vulnerability.

This is worth mentioning as well. If respondents answered a list of questions about Brennan’s vulnerability, even if they weren’t worded overtly, it could have helped tilt the tenor of the entire call in that direction.

It’s tough to know without seeing the entire questionnaire and results, but if Brennan played to a statistical tie with Strimling in a survey including questions indirectly reminding people how vulnerable he is, that says something as well.

But know this: Strimling will look at these poll results and consider all of these things as well. Campaigns are hard work, and Strimling has a rewarding job in the education field, which he feels strongly about. He won’t give that up lightly. If he throws his hat in the ring, it’ll be because he feels he can win.

If he enters the race, it’ll be in part because he’s confident he can build on this advantage and capitalize on public concerns about the direction of the city. It’ll be hard to make any more serious predictions about the race until we know whether he’s in or out.

The deadline for candidates to submit the necessary 300 signatures to run for mayor — as well as other public offices, such as the City Council and school board — is Aug. 25.

Seth Koenig

About Seth Koenig

Seth has nearly a decade of professional journalism experience and writes about the greater Portland region.