Firehouse.com

Former city fire chief and political independent Mike Bell is headed back to full-time employment with the city of Toledo, this time as mayor, following a victory Tuesday over endorsed-Democrat Keith Wilkowski.

Despite being outspent, Mr. Bell won his first-ever election bid with 52.3 percent of the unofficial vote to replace incumbent Mayor Carty Finkbeiner.

He will be Toledo's second black mayor, following former mayor Jack Ford, who endorsed him.

"The stuff I promised to do -- and one of those things was to be honest with you -- I will do those things. We will not only turn the city of Toledo around, we will, with our neighbors around us, turn this whole northwest Ohio around," Mr. Bell said to jubilant supporters in the Navy Bistro restaurant at The Docks last night.

"The only reason I got into it was about unity; it was about bringing everybody together,"

Mr. Bell said. He thanked his parents, Norman and Ora Bell, who campaigned with him constantly, and the volunteers, police and fire unions, and political action committees who joined his side.

Mr. Wilkowski, meeting with supporters and other Democratic candidates and campaign supporters at the United Auto Workers Local 12 hall, told his supporters they had "waged a tremendous campaign."

"When it's all said and done what we have are the relationships we make with one another. It has been such a privilege to work with all of you and to talk about how we can improve the lives of the peple of Toledo," he said.

He said he called Mr. Bell and congratulated him on a race well- fought, and promised to lend his support.

The election appeared to reflect the enduring goodwill that Mr. Bell earned during his 17 years as Toledo's fire chief.

Mr. Bell won even with an ambiguous message on taxes. He vowed to "play within the perimter," meaning he would work within the tax revenues from the city's current 2.25 percent income tax, but said the public is "fickle," and might choose a tax hike over painful service cuts.

He vowed to appoint a citizen task force to examine the city's budgets, and to lead a campaign to set the city's priorities for the available revenue. He made clear that his priorities would be public safety and trash collection.

Unlike Mr. Wilkowski, Mr. Bell never got very specific with his economic development vision, touting his intention to appoint a "business advocate" as deputy mayor, and to let the professionals -- led by the University of Toledo -- chart the region's economic development course.

Mr. Bell, 54, attended Spring Elementary School and Woodward High School, and graduated from the University of Toledo. He joined the city fire department in 1980 and was soon laid off during a fiscal crisis. He became the first big-city black fire chief in Ohio when he was appointed in 1990.

Mr. Bell stepped down in 2007 to accept the state fire marshal job to which he was appointed by Gov. Ted Strickland in 2007. He resigned in April to undertake the campaign for mayor.

He will be paid $122,400 as mayor, as well as receiving his state pension which totaled $62,319 in 2008.

The former fire chief who described Toledo's situation as "a three-alarm fire" inherits a city with troubled finances.

Income tax collections, which account for the bulk of the city's revenues, came in at $145 million in 2009, well below the predicted $169 million upon which the budget was based, forcing the layoff of 75 police officers in May. All of those have been brought back, with the help of state and federal grants.

Next year is not expected to be improved much.

The campaign pitted two high school friends against each other. Mr. Bell and Mr. Wilkowski went to Woodward together, both graduating in 1973. Mr. Wilkowski went on to Ohio State University and Mr. Bell to the University of Toledo.

The general election campaign was mostly civil, and involved at least 20 open forums and debates, some drawing a handful of people, with others beamed to audiences of thousands watching television.

Two weeks before the election, Mr. Wilkowski began airing ads attacking Mr. Bell for saying raising taxes is "a common-sense thing" and for saying it was not the mayor's job to have an economic development plan. In the last weekend, he announced he was dropping Mr. Bell's name and picture from his ads and would be 100 percent positive in the final days.

Mr. Bell went in the opposite direction, running ads saying Mr. Wilkowski had never "ever" run anything, and that he had a history of raising taxes, a reference to Mr. Wilkowski's vote as a county commissioner in 1989 to raise the county's sales tax from 1 percent to 1.5 percent. That boost was repealed in a referendum the following year.

He said Mr. Wilkowski's economic development plan was "written by political insiders."

Mr. Bell, a lifelong Democrat, opted to run as an independent rather than seek the Democratic nomination because he said he wanted to govern free of political obligations.

Mr. Bell told his supporters last night that when he announced at the fire marshal's office that he was running for mayor of Toledo as an independent, "there were people on the inside who laughed at me, that to run as an independent was a stupid thing, that there was no way I could ever win. I wonder what they're saying now."

Mr. Wilkowski and Mr. Bell were the leading vote-getters in the Sept. 15 primary out of a field of six. Turnout was so low, at 18.5 percent, and the two front-runners were so close -- separated by about 600 votes -- that few predictions could be made about the outcome.

That Mr. Bell was not a practiced politician was obvious. He hinted that he would be open to an increase in taxes if that's what the public wanted. During one candidate forum, he said he planned to go on vacation the day after the election because campaigning was "a tough road."

Among voters yesterday, Joan Murphy, who voted at Lagrange School, and described herself as "over 50," said she voted for Mr. Bell because she's known him a long time.

"He matches my values -- lower taxes, getting things together, investigating what went wrong," Mrs. Murphy said.

Yvette Harris, 48, a laid-off health care worker, voting at Birmingham School, said she knew Mr. Bell from his charitable activities.

"I think he's fair. I like the way he ran the fire department. If he runs the city like he ran the fire department then we'll be good," Ms. Harris said.

Paula Stachowski, 48, voted at Elmhurst School in West Toledo, Ward 21. She said Mr. Wilkowski has more political experience.

"I liked his stand on the issues -- creating jobs, technology," said Ms. Stachowski, a medical technologies teacher for Stautzenberger College.

Torrance Glander, 49, voted at Elmhurst School for Mr. Bell. Wearing a shirt with a Harley-Davidson logo on it, he said he identified with the motorcycle-riding former fire chief.

"He's a good man -- and he rides a Harley," Mr. Glander said.

Justin Sheldon, a criminal justice student at Owens Community College, celebrated Mr. Bell's victory at Navy Bistro, and said he agreed with Mr. Bell that people will have to set politics aside to rebuild Toledo.

"I firmly believe it's going to take Republicans, Democrats, independents, conservatives, and liberals working together to revive the city," Mr. Sheldon said.

McClatchy-Tribune News Service