Candidates for governor take stage in Dedham (video)

Calling himself “a son of Massachusetts,” Christy Mihos said he is in to win the governor’s race. But first he must overcome GOP frontrunner Charles Baker – so Mihos appealed to Norfolk County Republicans last night to make their primary a vibrant one.

The Cape Cod convenience store magnate noted that the Republican Party has not had a top-of-the-ticket primary since 1998, losing State House seats in that time.

“We can elect Baker or myself governor ’til the cows come home,” but if Republicans don’t have more state and congressional representatives, “we’ll never be able to change things on Beacon Hill,” Mihos said. “So I’m saying to you, a primary is good. What do you have to lose? What do you have to lose about showcasing Republican credentials each and every day? Fiscal conservative and social conservative issues each and every day.”

“To have a primary every single day for the next 6 months, the two of us going at it on these issues, and all of our candidates for Senate and House…it will raise the profile of all of them, it will get them battle-tested and battle-ready,” Mihos promised. “That’s how you rebuild a party. So I’m in it to win it.”

But former Harvard Pilgrim Health Care CEO Baker – pledging to fix the fiscal crisis on Beacon Hill, and declaring he would take advantage of the opportunity to shrink and simplify state government – won over voters in an admittedly small straw poll last night.

He received 100 votes, while Mihos got just 14. The Norfolk County Republican Club said its straw poll would be the only such event leading up to the Republican state convention April 17. The state GOP announced yesterday that the party’s hottest star, Sen. Scott Brown, will be the keynote speaker at the convention in Worcester.

Baker said he entered the campaign “for one reason and one reason only: I was fed up with what I saw going on on Beacon Hill. You do not solve a fiscal crisis at the state level in the commonwealth of Mass. by raising taxes in the middle of a recession and cutting local aid.”

Referring to a newly announced state budget hole of up to $295 million for this year, Baker said, “These people do not know how to get the state out of the fiscal jam that we find ourselves in today. This should be job number one for the next governor – fix the fiscal situation on Beacon Hill, get state spending under control, send a message to families and businesses in Massachusetts that there will not be this continuing uncertainty month over month, quarter over quarter about which tax, which fee, which fine is going to go up or change because the state can’t figure out how to balance its budget, and send a message of predictability and dependability to the people of Massachusetts.”

Mihos said he wants to immediately cut 10 percent of state employees, and pushed to roll back the state sales tax to 3 percent.

“Gov. Patrick has been the best governor in the history of the state of New Hampshire – you’ve got to give him that,” he quipped of last year’s sales tax increase, to 6.25 percent.

“Pass Question 1, and we start to turn it around – $688 to the average person’s pocket annually,” Mihos said. “That’s real money where I come from.”

He said before the results were tabulated that they wouldn’t mean much.

“The folks that I talk to out there on the street, they’re with the populist movement, they don’t buy the issue of big health care executives, $2 million a year, and double-digit (premium) increases every single year. That puts small business out of business. So I feel very comfortable that we get to a primary, we’ll do very well,” said Mihos, whose campaign has had much-publicized financial troubles recently.

He said he has not seen the lawsuit filed Wednesday by former campaign manager Joseph Manzoli, who says he is owed $44,500 for unpaid work.

“I’m stunned that he would do something like that,” Mihos said. “We’ve paid him over $61,000 thus far, but anybody can file a lawsuit.”

About 200 people turned out for last night’s event, held at Dedham’s American Legion hall. It included numerous “candidate runway” speeches by an array of contenders for Congress and State House seats, an appearance by Baker’s running mate, state Sen. Richard Tisei, and a second straw poll for state auditor.

In that mini-contest, former Turnpike Authority board member Mary Connaughton trounced two opponents, receiving 89 votes, compared to 19 for Kamal Jain and two for Earle Stroll.

For more on this story check out next week’s edition of the Dedham Transcript.

Dedham Transcript staff writer Edward B. Colby can be reached at 781-433-8336 or ecolby@cnc.com.