For his actual announcement speech, Romer returned to the room where he had attended Sunday school at the Holly United Methodist Church. "Holly made me what I am," Romer told the small crowd of townspeople and reporters and photographers who were following him around. Earlier that morning, the incumbent governor paid a quiet visit to the cemetery outside of town where his father was buried. With both of his parents deceased, Romer said, his friends in Holly had become his hometown extended family.

There was a walk down, of course, Main Street in Holly, with a side trip to the house on a tree-lined street where Romer spent his childhood and early youth. There also was a potluck supper at the local high school, where Roy Romer graduated in the class of 1946. Most of all there were Romer's reminiscences about growing up in a small agricultural town like Holly - meeting girls at box lunch socials when he was sixteen, hanging out with the other kids at the farm on Dead Man's curve just outside of town, watching his father scratch a living out of a dry eastern Colorado farm during the Depression and Dust Bowl years.

BACK TO "CORE VALUES"

But the purpose of this trip was politics, not nostalgia, and Roy Romer hit the politics hard. His main goal seemed to be to clearly establish his credentials as a "conservative" Democrat and separate himself as much as possible from "liberal" ideas. He asked the question: "How do we pass on a core set of values to the younger generation?" When talking about crime, he said: "The core of it is behavior." In a letter he said he wrote to his grandchildren, Romer spelled out a philosophy of life based on individual effort and responsibility. He wrote:

Romer also sniped at Bruce Benson's money by suggesting that each candidate limit total campaign expenditures to only $2 million. This was a direct challenge to Republican Benson's statement that he intended to spend $5 million to win the governorship from the Democrats. Romer noted that he spent only $1.3 million in his 1990 reelection campaign.

The nostalgic, values-oriented visit to Holly was just the beginning of Romer's "official" announcement for reelection as governor. He visited 22 communities in Colorado over a five-day period, eating oatmeal at every breakfast and spreading the "core values" gospel wherever he went. In each place he visited, Roy Romer made it a point to meet with the local Democratic political organization and get it fired up for the tough election campaign ahead. Whenever possible Romer, a licensed pilot, flamboyantly flew himself from place-to-place in his own airplane, leaving his staff and the news media to trail along behind by automobile.

CAMPAIGN ORGANIZATION

By early May of 1994 Roy Romer had his campaign staff organized and ready to go. Alan Salazar, a longtime professional Democratic staff member in Colorado, was named campaign manager. Salazar, 36, was a native of Leadville, a former silver mining camp located high in the Colorado Rockies that more recently survived on the jobs created by a nearby molybdenum mine. Salazar held a staff position with Colorado's Democratic U.S. Senator Tim Wirth from 1987 to 1992. From 1992 to 1994 he was on the state payroll, serving as director of Governor Romer's policy office.

The other key person on Roy Romer's campaign team was Mike Stratton, who served as Romer's principal media spokesperson but held the title of campaign general consultant. Back in 1990, when Roy Romer won reelection to the governor's chair by defeating Republican gubernatorial candidate John Andrews by a huge majority, Stratton served as Romer's campaign manager.

Television advertising for the Roy Romer reelection campaign was handled by Mandy Grunwald of Grunwald, Eskew, and Donilon, a national political consulting firm. Mandy Grunwald had worked hard in Democrat Bill Clinton's successful campaign for the presidency in 1992. Following that victory, she and some consultant colleagues formed a new firm and advised a number of Democratic candidates for governor and U.S. Senator in the 1994 elections. According to Scott Chase, Roy Romer's deputy campaign manager, the Romer campaign consulted with Mandy Grunwald on a daily basis in its efforts to defeat Republican Bruce Benson.

In addition to a national political consultant, the Romer campaign used a national polling firm. Geoff Garin, of Garin Hart Strategies and Research Group in Washington, D.C., was the person in charge of keeping the Romer forces informed on what the Colorado electorate was thinking and how it would be voting.

If Mandy Grunwald and Geoff Garin represented a "national" influence in the Roy Romer campaign for governor, there was one "Colorado" consulting influence. Eric Sondermann, a Denver-based political consultant and a native of Colorado Springs, wrote and produced all of Roy Romer's radio advertising.

In fact, the Romer campaign staff made much of the fact that the five key campaign decision makers were all native Coloradans. Those decision makers were Roy Romer (the governor himself), Alan Salazar (campaign manager), Mike Stratton (campaign general consultant), Scott Chase (deputy campaign manager), and Jim Carpenter (press secretary). "You have to have local people in final control of your campaign," said Scott Chase. "Out-of-state consultants, not knowing the particulars of any one state, need the 'locals' to take that final look at all campaign ideas and make sure they meet 'state specifics.'"

ROMER'S FUND-RAISING

Similar to most incumbents in major political offices, Roy Romer was raising - and spending - money for his reelection campaign all the time. He had a broad base of contributors throughout Colorado, most of them Democrats, but many of his best-known financial supporters were Republicans. A case in point was Jerry McMorris, owner of a trucking line, NW Transport Services Inc., but better known as president of the new Colorado Rockies major league professional baseball team. McMorris co-hosted a fund-raising dinner for the Colorado Republican Party - "Salute to our 1994 Candidates" - but adamantly remained publicly committed to Democrat Roy Romer for governor. McMorris backed up his public statements in behalf of Romer with a $20,000 contribution early in the incumbent governor's reelection campaign.

Roy Romer received strong financial support from wealthy Democrats as well as wealthy Republicans. One of his staunchest contributors was Swanee Hunt of Denver, an heiress to the substantial fortune of Texas millionaire H. L. Hunt. In addition to Romer, Swanee Hunt supported Democratic presidential candidate Bill Clinton in 1992 and, after Clinton was elected, was appointed U.S. ambassador to Austria.

First came Clinton's secretary of commerce, Ron Brown, who appeared at a Romer fund-raiser in Denver on March 4, 1994. Close on his heels was Hillary Rodham Clinton, the president's wife, who raised money for Romer and the state Democratic Party in Denver on March 14, 1994. Next on the list was Hazel O'Leary, Clinton's energy secretary, who spoke at a fund-raising breakfast for Romer in Denver on March 24, 1994. Henry Cisneros, secretary of housing and urban development, was the featured guest at a Denver fund-raiser for Romer on June 25, 1994. Vice President Al Gore stopped by Denver to help fill Roy Romer's coffers with money in mid-July of 1994.

When a leading light in the Clinton administration could not make it out to Colorado to raise money for Roy Romer, the leading light was used to raise money in Washington, D.C. Thomas "Mack" McLarty, President Clinton's boyhood pal and the White House chief of staff at that time, was the star attraction at a party hosted by the Romer campaign in the nation's capital on June 19, 1994. National business and civic organizations with interests in Colorado sent their lobbyists to the "party with McLarty" to increase their visibility and influence with the Colorado governor's office - and to help provide the financial wherewithal to get Roy Romer reelected.

Clearly Roy Romer had the campaign staff and the campaign fund-raising ability to match any Republican candidate for governor, even Bruce Benson with his willingness to invest a substantial portion of his large personal fortune in the campaign. Actually, that could have been putting it backwards. Bruce Benson claimed he was running for governor of Colorado in 1994 precisely because of Roy Romer's great organizational talents and proven fund-raising ability.

THE 1994 DEMOCRATIC STATE ASSEMBLY

Similar to the Republican candidates for governor of Colorado in 1994, Roy Romer had to put his name in contention at the Democratic precinct caucuses, county assemblies, and state assembly. There was one big difference, of course. Roy Romer did not have any opposition for the Democratic nomination for governor.

The 1994 Democratic county assemblies provided Romer with the opportunity to meet with and appear before high school auditoriums filled with activist Democrats, but there was little publicity to be obtained by attending these events. During this period in late April and early May of 1994 the Colorado news media had their attention fixed firmly on the Republicans, who were generating plenty of news in their three-way race for the GOP nomination.

The 1994 Democratic State Assembly was a different story. Even though Roy Romer had little or no opposition and was routinely voted in as the 1994 Democratic nominee for governor of Colorado, the press did cover the Democratic confab, held at the Colorado Convention Center in downtown Denver. The event mainly provided an opportunity for Roy Romer to publicize his gubernatorial candidacy before a captive audience.

Roy Romer showed up at the Democratic State Assembly in a dark suit and white running shoes. The running shoes could have been to symbolize that he was running hard for reelection. Romer called the Democratic ticket in Colorado for 1994 "the best running team the state has ever seen." The Democratic State Assembly nominated Gail Schoettler, the incumbent state treasurer, to run for lieutenant governor on the Romer ticket.

Once the 1994 Democratic State Assembly was over, one might have thought that Roy Romer was going to sit back and watch while the Republicans - Bruce Benson, Mike Bird, and Dick Sargent - fought it out in the 1994 Republican primary election campaign. Anyone who thought that did not know Roy Romer very well.

CAMPAIGNING FROM THE "BULLY PULPIT"

Even when engaged in a hard-fought reelection campaign, the governor of Colorado remains the top executive official of the state. His or her more important actions and major pronouncements are, by the very nature of his or her high office, always news. Roy Romer did an outstanding job during the 1994 Colorado gubernatorial election campaign of exploiting his ability, as governor, to make news and draw attention to himself.

President Theodore Roosevelt once described the presidency of the United States as a "bully pulpit" from which to make speeches and attract attention. In Colorado it is the state governorship that serves as the "bully pulpit," and Roy Romer used that "bully pulpit" to the best of his ability during his 1994 reelection campaign.

Case in point: in late June of 1994 Roy Romer had his staff compile figures comparing his record on pardoning criminals and shortening criminal sentences with the record of his three predecessors as governor. The figures revealed that Romer was much tougher than his predecessors where granting clemency to criminals was concerned, even though one of those predecessors was Republican John Love, who sat in the governor's chair in the mid to late 1960s.

But being a sitting governor gave Roy Romer much more to do than just make gubernatorial pronouncements to the press. Expressing concern about the 434 convicted criminals who walked away from "halfway house" rehabilitation centers in Colorado in 1992, Romer used his executive powers to order the formation of a "fugitive-apprehension unit" to hunt down these escapees. The governor said he would start with a two-person fugitive-arrest team working under the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI). In telling the news media about this latest "executive action," Romer was able to create an aura of purposefulness and authority. He said:

STORM KING MOUNTAIN

Sometimes sitting governors do not have to think up new ways to look action-oriented and decisive. Sometimes the natural course of events presents them with honest opportunities to demonstrate leadership and, coincidentally, generate favorable news for themselves. Such an opportunity was presented to Roy Romer in late July of 1994, and he took full advantage of it.

Colorado was having a dry summer in 1994, and a series of wild fires had broken out in a number of places in the mountains. One of those fires was at Storm King Mountain near Glenwood Springs, a resort community famous for its hot springs. Late in the day, when there was a major wind change, the Storm King Mountain fire "blew up." The resulting raging inferno raced up a heavily wooded hillside, killing more than ten men and women fighting the forest fire who could not get out of the way in time.

As he should have, Roy Romer raced to the scene. He expressed the condolences of the people of Colorado to the families of the dead fire fighters, all of whom were from out-of-state. He surveyed the scene of the tragedy, repeating the common sentiment that every possible step must be taken to reduce the possibility of such a terrifying event occurring in the future.

Roy Romer's Republican opponents had no choice but to step back and let the sitting governor play his assigned role as "official spokesperson for the people of Colorado." The Republican gubernatorial primary took the back seat for a week to Roy Romer "doing his duty" at Storm King Mountain.

Charles Roos, a political columnist at the Rocky Mountain News, summarized the delicate situation of a sitting governor responding to a great natural tragedy during an election campaign. He wrote:

MORE POWERS OF INCUMBENCY

There was no question that Roy Romer was a master of the powers of incumbency. He exploited every opportunity to use his position as governor to inflate his own importance and draw attention to himself. The governorship of Colorado is indeed a "bully pulpit," and few had ever used that "pulpit" as skillfully and effectively as Roy Romer.