CROWDED FIELD IN COUNCIL RACE

There’s no shortage of candidates for the open Super District 9, Position 2 seat.

Looking to vote for someone in a Memphis City Council race who supports the deannexation of Cordova? Super District 9, Position 2 has your choice: It’s Lynn Moss.

Searching for someone who has the backing of the blue-blood business community, yet who has middle-class roots? There’s Philip Spinosa Jr.

Want someone with a solid labor background? Meet Paul Shaffer.

Is education your thing? OK, Stephanie Gatewood used to serve on the school board.

Is education really your thing? Try pastor Kenneth T. Whalum Jr., whose personal cause this summer has been the “education slate,” a grouping of candidates who support a more aggressive role in education by city government.

In Super District 9, Position 2, there’s no shortage of unique — and, for the most part, viable — candidates. It’s the only open seat among the three in Super District 9, which occupies half the city, including much of Midtown, East Memphis, Raleigh, Cordova and some of Southeast Memphis.

The seat came open in the spring when Shea Flinn, elected in 2007 and 2011, resigned to become a senior vice president with the Greater Memphis Chamber. Alan Crone received the interim ap-

pointment but vowed not to seek election in the fall.

Spinosa’s entry dominated the money in the race. He raised $164,940 in the second quarter alone, including donations from some of the city’s deepest pockets. That’s the largest quarterly fundraising total of the election cycle thus far.

Spinosa, who grew up in Raleigh, is Flinn’s choice as his successor. The county Republican party also has endorsed Spinosa.

(Former City Council member Scott McCormick toyed with entering the race but decided it against it in June.)

In a written response to The Commercial Appeal’s Voter Guide questionnaire, Spinosa, 37, said his top issues were crime, economic opportunity and the city’s budget.

“All three of these issues are directly related to one another,” Spinosa wrote. “If we cannot balance the budget and get our city’s crime rate under control, businesses and families won’t invest in our community.”

Moss, 54, said her top issues were the city’s budget, public safety and saving the Mid-South Coliseum. Her support of giving annexed residents a choice to leave the city is in support of bringing “the area of Memphis back down to a manageable size,” she wrote.

Shaffer, 62, is the business manager of IBEW Local 474, which represents electrical workers. Poverty, blight and crime are his top issues.

“These and most of the problems faced by our city would be much easier to address if the city had a legitimate and realistic long-term plan in respect to where we should be headed,” Shaffer wrote. “We are in desperate need of a plan that is of value to all of the citizens and communities.”

Shaffer sought to unseat Kemp Conrad in Super District 9, Position 1 in 2011, but lost by nearly a 2-to-1 margin.

Gatewood, 44, is a family and community engagement specialist at Shelby County Schools and a former member of the school board. Her top issues are safe and healthy neighborhoods, productive and comfortable neighborhoods and governmental accountability.

“Memphis must maintain a full complement of police who are effective in their roles and are receiving adequate compensation and benefits,” she wrote.

Gatewood ran for the District 1 seat on the City Council in 2007, losing to Bill Morrison in a runoff despite having the highest vote total on election day. There is no runoff in a super district, however.

And then there’s Whalum, 58, who has been steadfast in saying the city’s surrendering of the school charter was a mistake. Whalum toyed with running for mayor but decided on a council race because, he said, a council with the right priorities could dictate the city’s policies more than the mayor.

Whalum’s top priorities? “A failing educational structure, a failing educational structure, and a failing educational structure.

“As councilman, I will lead a coalition of newly elected councilpersons whose top priority is the reclamation of our children’s educational future by any means necessary. We will, through legislation, budgetary appropriations and moral fiat, make decisions that protect and provide for our children,” he wrote.

Whalum, a former Memphis City Schools board member, sought the city mayor’s job in 2009, garnering just 2 percent of the vote. He ran for the Democratic nomination for Shelby County mayor in 2014, losing to Deidre Malone by 1,185 votes.