Lynne Dixon announces candidacy for Erie County Executive

Erie County Legislator Lynne Dixon has announced her candidacy for Erie County Executive.Dixon launched her campaign in a video Wednesday morning.

"I'm running for County Executive because taxes are too high, government spends too much," Dixon said. "You know what, Mark Poloncarz thinks he knows how to spend your money better than you do. I'm Lynne Dixon and I'm different from Mark Poloncarz."

Dixon goes on separate herself from the current county executive,

"I'm a single working mom with four kids. I'm not a Republican. I'm not a Democrat. I'm an Independent and I don't care about party labels or partisan politics. I only care about doing the right things, the right ideas."

The former broadcast reporter was first elected to the legislature in 2009, representing the 9th District, which includes South Buffalo southward to Hamburg. She follows in the political footsteps of her former WGRZ-TV colleague Stefan Mychajliw, now Erie County Comptroller.

Although an Independent, Dixon has usually voted with Republicans in the legislature and includes prominent Republicans in her launch video.

In the video, Dixon spoke of the lack of bi-partisan political cooperation and pointed to the attacks of 9/11 to make her point. 

"..What was beautiful about it, everybody came together, Democrats and Republicans alike. We don't see that anymore. We don't have leaders like that anymore," she continued. "So if you want a County Executive who tweets all day and mocks you if you don't agree with him 100 percent of the time, then I'm not your candidate. But if you want someone who understands what you're going through, you will take politics out of government, you wants to listen, then let's talk some more."

Dixon emerged as the frontrunner for the Republican nod after state senator Chris Jacobs announced he would not run.

Poloncarz responded to the Dixon candidacy with a tweet Wednesday morning: