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Voters pick lawyers over cops: Democrats oust Wilmington mayor, county boss

Meyer wins New Castle County nod, Purzycki is city nominee

Democrats, the dominant political party in New Castle County, where most Delaware residents live, voted out the state's two most powerful municipal leaders in Tuesday's primary, rejecting incumbents and electing challengers to cope with fiscal, employment and crime problems. Read results here.

New Castle County executive Tom Gordon, a former county police chief who has been elected to three four-year terms, was ousted by Matthew Meyer, a teacher-turned-lawyer who won 52 percent of the vote.

Similarly, Wilmington city voters ousted Mayor Dennis Williams, a former city police chief, and picked former councilman Michael Purzycki, who headed Riverfront Wilmington, promoting redevelpoment of the city's Christina River waterfront, from a crowd of would-be replacements.

Meyer ran against what he and other critics called Gordon's increasingly high-handed management of public assets. He challenged Gordon's decision last year, over county council objections, to lend $3 million from county park funds, using only software as collateral, to backers of the proposed "Delaware Board of Trade" stock exchange.

Gordon boasted the deal, at a time when most professional investors work from remote locations and public trading floors have scaled back or shut down, would create hundreds of well-paid jobs in downtown Wilmington, which is reeling from the loss of the DuPont Co. and other corporate headquarters.

But private backing for the exchange has been slow in coming, and DBOT has failed to open this summer as scheduled. Though Gordon backers had remained hopeful through the eve of the vote. (DBOT officials didn't return calls this morning.) 

Meyer also questioned one of Gordon's proudest claims, his refusal to raise property taxes (which in Delaware are a fraction of what suburban Pennsylvania and New Jersey residents pay). The challenger warned that by burning through years of cash reserves Gordon was making tax hikes or layoffs inevitable. Gordon defended his record.

In Wilmington, Purzycki, backed by business interests, ran an energetic campaign, emerging from a crowded field. The reculsive Williams finished only fourth. Veteran businesswoman and city council member Hanifa Shabazz was elected city council president.

The next mayor will have plenty to do. Although it remains a national center for corporate litigation and its port district is busy, moves and mergers have left downtown offices underused, as unsolved gun murders and gunfire scar the city's poor neighborhoods.