Business Owners Need Not Apply

If you're a candidate and want the endorsement of Sandy Parker's Rochester Business Alliance, holding one occupation could be fatal to your chances:   owner of a business.

Few events better illustrate RBA's decline from business advocacy group to Democratic front organization than three of this year's endorsements.

• Steve Tucciarello is the incumbent County Legislator for Gates.   He's also owner of Colony Cleaners, a successful drycleaning business on Howard Road.   But Democrats consider Tucciarello's district winnable.   As dreadful as his Democratic opponent may be on business issues, the Parker-dominated interview panel couldn't bring itself to make any endorsement in the race.
  
  Tucciarello is just the kind of businessman whom the RBA was established to serve.   But RBA in its current incarnation won't endorse Republicans in competitive races a Democrat can win.
  
  Parker to Tucciarello:   "No soup for you!"

• Fred Ancello owns Davies Seafood, a popular destination in Greece he's run for 24 years.   He's the GOP challenger to County Legislator Dick Beebe, one of the Democrats' two most endangered incumbents this year.
  
  Almost unique among Democratic members of the County Legislature, Mr. Beebe is employed in the private sector.   Yet as owner of a small business, Mr. Ancello is the one who grapples daily with the issues at the core of RBA's ostensible mission.
  
  No way la Parker and company endorse the Republican in a must-win seat for her sidekick Joe Morelle.   Endorsement to Beebe.

• Dr. Joe Carbone for years has maintained a practice in Irondequoit.   He's run a campaign so formidable it's driven up sales of Depends at the neighborhood grocery for incumbent County Legislator Vincent Esposito.
  
  Esposito's not merely the Dems' other most vulnerable legislator, but a staffer in the State Assembly, where he serves as Morelle's political bum-boy numero uno.   The Master Plan is for Esposito to inherit the Assembly seat once Morelle gets the state sinecure he's been waiting for.
  
  Proprietor of a local professional business versus a staffer in the State Assembly -- source and defender of every corrosive policy hostile to business.   Including specific policy abominations that RBA, on paper, opposes.   For today's new RBA, no contest:     endorsement to Esposito, the Assembly staffer.

In competitive races, the RBA's endorsement is off-limits to Republicans.   No matter what kind of business they own.