Maybe we need to change our name?
If you don’t live in Madison’s District 19, you may have missed the Alder election drama.
This guy named Nino ran in the District 19 election to become the district alder. When he filed to run in the election, he lived in District 9. Dude didn’t even live in the district he wanted to lead. State law requires that you live in the district for at least 28 days before the election if you want to be eligible, but for some reason he was added to the ballot.
Anyway, he lost by nine votes. He used your taxpayer money to demand a recount, and got it for some reason. Again, all this despite being ineligible as a candidate.
The recount results came in, and he still lost.
What’s all this got to do with bikes, you ask? Well after losing and then recounting and then losing again, my man here posted this on Nextdoor:
I’m not sure where to start tearing into this, but the part that makes me most sad is that he went after our friends at Madison Bikes, and not us.
Madison Bikes does great work, attending city meetings, planning bicycle advocacy events, and generally being nice, helpful people. If you don’t get their weekly newsletter, you totally should! They’re super legit and crime-free, so calling them a mafia doesn’t seem quite right.
On the other hand, we here at Madison Bike To Work Club are literally yelling at cars and alienating drivers and being general nuisances, and we don’t get accused once? Not even a mention!? Unfair!? I wanna be Bike Mafia!
I’m officially calling a vote to change our name to Nino’s Bicycle Mafia. No more Madison Bike To Work Club. Maybe we can get the domain name mafia.bike or something. If I lose I’m gonna demand a recount, because apparently you can just do that.
Alas, I dream of a future where Nino’s Bicycle Mafia gets called out as a lobbyist mafia. Especially if it’s by some rando who didn’t win his local election, ranting away on a mid-tier social media platform. Until then, I guess we’ll just have to be a little more loud and annoying.