Fineprint

Less words, more story.

by April Brown

A (Web) Tale of Two Katzes

In his quest for the Democratic presidential nomination, Howard Dean has exposed the power of the Internet when it comes to political campaigning. Though it's probably not as pressing -- or helpful, for that matter -- in city politics, both John Street and Sam Katz have websites.

But if you're trying to pin down just where cyber-Katz can be found, don't depend on your Web browser's bookmarks.

In his past two runs for City Hall -- the current one and his 1999 showdown with Street -- Katz has used a different website to get his word out to tech-savvy voters and Web surfers alike.

When he ran against Frank Rizzo in the 1991 Republican primary, the Web was still in its infancy, so there was little need for a site. By the time the 1999 race rolled around, www.samkatz.org was put into commission, but when he lost by a scant 9,447 votes, he let the domain name lapse.

Presumably, he could've revamped the site come this campaign, but a fellow by the name of -- you got it -- Sam Katz snatched it up to use in his campaign for district court judge in Bexar County, Texas.

After he lost that campaign, the hee-haw Katz told Chestnut Hill-based Web designer Mike McAllister, I am done with public office. That conversation occurred after the local Katz announced he'd be running for mayor again earlier this year. So, McAllister, president and founder of Logikbox and a (local Sam) Katz supporter, then purchased the Web domain in an effort to win the contract to redesign the site for the Philadelphia campaign.

He thought, after all, that he held a trump card since most organizations reuse their old sites due to familiarity, McAllister says. So, he called Katz campaign headquarters only to find out they'd already got www.sam2003.com, Katz's current website, up and running.

(Today, www.samkatz.org contains a message stating that it's not related to the campaign. But, if somebody's interested in buying it, or www.electsamkatz.org, they're available. On the former site, there's a link to a letter supporting Katz from a Democrat named Mr. V, an elementary-school teacher who thinks Street has let education fall by the wayside.)

So the question that remains is, why did Katz switch technological gears? A little superstition? Offering a succinct answer is deputy press secretary Nathan Raab.

Mr. Katz, he says, likes being called Sam. And he is running in 2003.