Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Richard Carlbom


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.  

The result was delete. Mackensen (talk) 16:05, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Richard Carlbom

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Non-notable local politician -- mayor of a small Minnesota town, campaign worker. Sources include a single MPR story and a blog entry; Googling "Richard Carlbom" yields little else of significance. android 79  17:34, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete. The article doesn't have enough sources and it's subject doesn't appear notable. Bart133 (t) (c) 17:52, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep While WP:BIO states that local elected officials may not be notable, I would believe that this is mostly intended to prevent articles about school board members and city councilpersons, who really aren't that notable and the articles would be nothing but resumes of otherwise private people. Mayors are at the top of the local governmental structure and I would think would be considered to be fairly notable as they would have been written about extensively. Further, Carlbom in particular was the second of two consecutive mayors of St. Joseph who were elected at age 23. This in itself is fairly unusual and makes him stand out among other mayors of St. Joseph for whom the notability argument might be harder to make. I have added a couple of more links to the article to be used as sources. I will come back and inline reference them if I have the time, but anyone else is welcome to. In fact, I encourage it. In my search for sources, I also came across this document which may imply a small scandal, perhaps relating to Carlbom's involvement in Tim Walz's campaign while he was mayor and may have been an impetus for his resignation. I have not added this to the article particularly because it does involve some speculation on my part and borders on OR (that I did in under 10 minutes using Google!) but I mention this because it may point to the existence of some sources providing coverage of this. Speaking of Google, while a search of "Richard Carlbom" (in quotes) returns only 654 results, most of them are in fact about the subject of the article. This is in contrast to many other notable person AFDs in which a search for the subject will return thousands of results, but only a handful are actually about the person in question. I point this out because it's important to keep in mind that the Google test is not the best standard for supporting a case of non-notability. LaMenta3 01:46, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete honestly, would anyone outside the town/county care about this person?  From reading the article, I'd say no.    Delete per narrow scope of notability Corpx 04:28, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per LaMenta3. This person is actively involved in the political process and has accordingly received significant press coverage (in contrast to the variety of small town mayor who's the town's doctor most of the week but presides over votes on fixing potholes one evening every two weeks. Sarcasticidealist 09:49, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per above, believe there is enough coverage in reliable sources to establish notability. Davewild 17:16, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete This is a very small town indeed, under 5,000 population. The minor things he did there do not make for notability, even if the local paper reported them.DGG (talk) 06:30, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
 * KeepNotable person. Elmao 10:18, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete. Narrow, local notability. - Dean Wormer 04:08, 8 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete. Narrow, local notability. Cheers, :) Dlohcierekim  01:29, 9 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Minnesota-related deletions.   -- John Vandenberg 04:36, 9 September 2007 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.