In 2010, Pandell and Caporusso argued nose-to-nose over the county registrar's ballot tallies after a hot congressional election. Then they went to lunch together.
That's Danville, Pandell said: "It's a nice enough place where even if we Democrats occasionally feel we're in the minority, we can still sit down and have a bite with our friends on the other side of the aisle."
Caporusso agreed: "We were always able to have that dialogue, that discourse, and then have the common bond of the community to come back to when we were done."
Both describe Danville as an archetypical American town -- a bit of the Midwest transplanted to the coast. That's not entirely so: U.S. Census data show it's more than twice as rich and college-educated than the nation or the state -- and also much whiter. But it's an image the town cherishes. "Life's good for folks, and there's no need to be hyper-partisan one way or the other," Caporusso said.
When it comes to the town's upkeep, "it's not a liberal pothole, it's not a conservative pothole," said Mayor Newell Arnerich, a Democrat. "We're fiscally responsible, we save our money and we try not to build things just because we want them."
Behind closed curtains at the polls, though, Republicans rule.
Only two Democrats have carried Danville in presidential, gubernatorial or U.S. Senate votes since 1992: President Barack Obama in 2008, and U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein all four times she has run. Feinstein, however, might be kissing Danville goodbye this year. Her Republican challenger in November, Elizabeth Emken, lives here.
But don't start mouthing off about that race, or any other, at Elliott's Bar on Hartz Avenue.
Owner Dale Stockbridge called Danville "a bedroom community where everyone does their own thing" politically -- but not in the bar he has tended since 1976.
If patrons start trading political rhetoric, "we make them shut up," he said. "The first things you're going to get fights over are women and politics, so I put the kibosh on politics right off the bat."
Josh Richman covers politics. Contact him at 510-208-6428. Follow him at Twitter.com/josh_richman. Read the Political Blotter at IBAbuzz.com/politics.
a few red dots IN a sea of blue
Only six Bay Area cities have more registered Republicans than Democrats:
Danville: 43.1%
Atherton,: 42.5%
Hillsborough: 40.7%
Clayton: 39%
Monte Sereno: 38.6%
Los Altos Hills: 35.3%
BAY AREA'S FIVE MOST DEMOCRATIC CITIES
Richmond: 67.8%
Oakland: 66.5%
Berkeley: 65.9%
San Pablo: 65.6%
Albany: 64.7%
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