Student, 21, is likely youngest state winner

The News & Observer, Page B1, Nov. 7, 1991

By RACHEL BUCHANAN, Staff writer

CHAPEL HILL -- If Mark Chilton had been born two months later, his political savvy would be for naught.

Mr. Chilton, the surprise winner of one of four open seats in Tuesday's Chapel Hill Town Council election, barely made the legal age limit to enter the race. He turned 21 five weeks before election day.

That makes him the youngest elected official in town history. Although the state Board of Elections does not keep statistics on the ages of elected officials, he is probably the youngest candidate ever elected in the state.

And, more significantly for local politics, he is the first undergraduate at the University of North Carolina to be elected to a four-year term on the council.

Gerry Cohen won a seat on the town council in 1973 while he was a graduate student at UNC-CH. But Mr. Chilton is a senior, 21 credits short of graduation. And he was successful against eight opponents, including longtime town business owners, experienced politicians and dedicated community activists.

"Why did he win?" asked council member Arthur S. Werner, who was not up for re-election Tuesday. "He beat the other candidates. He came across as a very nice young fellow who was not a single-issue candidate."

Despite Mr. Chilton's age and student status, his election was no fluke. He began organizing a detailed campaign to win in January -- months before many of his opponents even considered bids.

"This morning I heard two businessmen talking about Mark," said Joseph A. Herzenberg, a town council member who won re-election Wednesday.

"One of them said, 'How did Mark fool so many people into voting for him?' And the other answered, 'Well, he fooled me by coming up to me and asking me for my vote.'"

Mr. Chilton looks younger than his age. His red paisley tie hangs conspicuously on a rumpled white oxford shirt. Blond-haired and round-faced, he could be mistaken for a freshman.

"Obviously that was the face he presented to the voters," said departing Mayor Jonathan B. Howes, a government professor at UNC-CH who has taught Mr. Chilton.

"Maybe that was something voters took comfort in. If they wanted to elect a student, he really looked like a student."

Mr. Chilton was born in Seattle and has lived in St. Louis, Raleigh and Warrenton, Va. He attended Episcopal High School, a boarding school in Alexandria, Va., and now lives off-campus in the Northside neighborhood. His parents, Scott and Mary Dell Chilton, live in Raleigh, which Mr. Chilton describes as "mass suburban sprawl."

The elder Chilton, a botany professor at N.C. State University, was surprised by his son's decision to run for office.

"We're very proud of him," Dr. Chilton said. "He's come a long way.

"As a child he had problems with disorganization. He'd do his homework and then forget to take it to school. I can remember one day I went to pick him up from school and he was a block away looking in the sewer. He said he thought he had dropped his homework in there."

An idealistic, environmental activist, the council member-elect became politically active during his sophomore year after a trip to Costa Rica with the Student Environmental Action Coalition.

"It made me realize that it's not that there aren't enough resources for everyone to get by in the world," Mr. Chilton said. "It's that they aren't fairly distributed."

He said he won the town council race because he surprised voters with his knowledge of the issues, especially his well-researched stand on transportation and solid-waste issues. And he credits his friends with hard work.

The 20 student members of the Mark Chilton For Council staff used homemade tactics to create a successful political machine.

They tacked up homemade poster-board and paint signs all over town, placed balloons around campus on election day and organized dorm captains to remind student voters to head to the polls.

But the campaign wasn't without its sophisticated elements. Mr. Chilton's staff contacted every registered voter on campus, conducted precinct analyses of voters to determine likely areas of support across town, and solicited the endorsement of the NAACP, the Orange County Greens, the Sierra Club and local newspapers.

The result was a heavy student turnout and an interesting election night for the town's political observers.

But when asked if the race will encourage him to seek a life in politics, Mr. Chilton leaned back and sighed.

"Gosh," he said. "I hope not."