On the campaign trail

In 21 days, months of hard work will come to fruition for Democratic mayoral candidate Mark Kruzan and his campaign staff. With the final ballot count tallied, Kruzan will see just how well he connected with the Bloomington community. Already the winner of eight political elections since 1986, Kruzan is working to make this Bloomington election number nine.\nSince announcing his entrance into the race, Kruzan has been working hard to assemble a team of people to help in his campaign for mayor. \nSenior Casey Holsapple has been a member of that team since May. Kruzan said Holsapple's involvement, along with the rest of the interns working on the campaign, has been very important.\n"They're not simply stuffing envelopes, although we all do that too," Kruzan said. "It's been web development, yard sign strategy, precinct analysis, issue development -- all of it. These are all important parts of the campaign, and they couldn't be done well without the support of these interns."\nWhile Holsapple has been involved in many different aspects of the campaign, he said he tends to focus mainly on "writing literature in support of Mark, Web site development, and special event planning."\nLike every other summer intern on the campaign, Holsapple has continued working for Kruzan's election through the fall, despite the added weight of classes and exams.\n"The single most satisfying aspect of the campaign, personally, has been that every single summer intern has stayed on even though classes have started," Kruzan said. "In my mind, it is a victory that IU students care enough about local government to stay involved. If elected, my goal is to continue this working relationship with the students."\nHolsapple said the continued involvement is possible because of Kruzan's understanding of the position the student interns are in.\n"Mark was a student and professor," Holsapple said. "He understands the time commitment involved with classes."\nBut time commitments haven't stopped Holsapple and the rest of the campaign team from working hard for Kruzan.\nMaria Heslin, Kruzan's campaign manager, has devoted hours of time to publicizing the major issues of Kruzan's campaign to Bloomington residents.\n"We are trying to communicate issues in a variety of ways to reach the voters," Heslin said. "We have a very grassroots effort, and we're campaigning using our website, news releases, email, direct mail, yard signs, car decals, public events, door-to-door, and information booths with the help of a great team of IU student campaign interns. Campaigns are about issues."\nFor Kruzan, these issues include the relationship between the economic development of Bloomington, the physical growth of the population, and the widening income gap. To get his message to the community, Kruzan has been hitting Bloomington's streets. This past Friday, he attended the IU Homecoming parade, and last week, he went campaigning door-to-door with U.S. Congressman Baron Hill. He will also take part in the League of Women Voters' debate today. As November 4 nears, Kruzan and his campaign team have taken their campaign efforts to a higher level.\nHeslin, along with others working the campaign said they have set specific goals for themselves in order to get Kruzan elected. \n"The biggest goal is to make the campaign as inclusive as possible both in terms of volunteer participation and in issues," Heslin said. "I really hope people will visit the campaign website to see that we've reached that goal and have a fantastic diversity of volunteers and issues in our campaign effort."\nMaking sure they reach a diverse voter base by using varying campaign methods has been successful to date, Heslin said. \nKruzan said the campaign has been successful largely because of students. \n"A lot of people say students don't care about government, but Mark will tell anyone who makes that claim that they're dead wrong," Heslin said. "IU students as well as staff and faculty have played a very important role in the Kruzan campaign. Volunteer involvement has been the most important part of this campaign so far."\nThis volunteerism has given Heslin a very optimistic outlook for the remainder of their campaigning. \n"More important than the poll results as an indicator of how well things are going has been the huge turnout of volunteers," Heslin said. "We know that the only poll that counts is the election itself."\nKruzan said regardless of the election's outcome, he's proud of his campaign.\n"So far, this is exactly the campaign I wanted to run," Kruzan said.\nFor more information, visit www.kruzan.us.\n-- Contact staff writer Sarah Schwimmer at sschwimm@indiana.edu