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Candidates with deep roots in 99th District try to tap changing demographic

Date published: 2/17/2008

BY FRANK DELANO

The campaign for this week's special election for the 99th District seat in the House of Delegates sometimes seems more about food and family than about issues and money.

For the past month, the two candidates--Democrat Albert Pollard and Republican Lee Anne Washington--have munched at breakfasts, lunches, dinners and coffee-and-desserts from Reedville to Bowling Green.

Last week, Washington got up at 5 a.m. to drive 80 miles from her hometown of White Stone to breakfast with defense contractors in Dahlgren. On days before and after, it was coffee, doughnuts and desserts at Northern Neck GOP functions and a pancake supper at a church.

"This campaign is not about health food," she said.

This week, her opponent, Pollard, hosted a party for 300 supporters at the only factory in Lively, another little Lancaster County community. The crowd gobbled cakes, cookies, brownies, shrimp, salmon, ham biscuits, sliced pork, Moroccan bean dip and hummus.

"I'm so glad to be here. I'm so glad to be anywhere," said Tommie Moeser of Colonial Beach. She and her friend Edna Edmondson cuddled up to former Gov. Mark Warner for a photograph.

"I'm a part-time resident of the Northern Neck," Warner, now a U.S. Senate candidate, bragged to the crowd in his praise of Pollard.

In a way, Warner epitomizes the changes that have occurred in the district that consists of the counties of King George, Lancaster, Northumberland, Richmond, Westmoreland and the Bowling Green and Port Royal precincts in Caroline County.

A rich resident of Alexandria, Warner turned his King George County weekend place surrounded by gravel pits and pumpkin patches into a 15-acre vineyard beside the Rappahannock.

SIMILARITIES, DIFFERENCES

Pollard, 40, and Washington, 44, are both graduates of Lancaster High School. He's a great-grandson of a Virginia governor. She's a lawyer, White Stone Town Council member and latter-day descendant of the Ball and Washington families that produced the first U.S. president centuries ago.

Pollard also has a family tie to W. Tayloe Murphy Jr., whom Pollard followed in 2000-06 as the region's delegate. Pollard's wife is Murphy's wife's niece.

ALBERT POLLARD JR. Age: 40 Party: Democrat Background: Farmer, property manager, delegate 2000-06; lost bid for state Senate seat to Richard Stuart in November Family: Married, three children More info: albertpollard.com LEE ANNE WASHINGTON Age: 44 Party: Republican Background: Lawyer, member of White Stone Town Council Family: Single, 8-year-old daughter More info: washingtonfordelegate.org

Date published: 2/17/2008