P.T. calls it quits after a quarter century of Cedar Rapids City Hall campaigns

As the years have come and gone, it has never been news that P.T. Larson is running for the City Council.

It is news now: The 56-year-old, who has run unsuccessfully in the last 14 City Council elections over a quarter of a century, has called it quits on City Hall campaigns.

"It's kind of like spring training for these athletes where there are final battles between rookies and veteran players for roster spots," Larson said on Wednesday. "It's time to bring it to a close and call it a political career locally."

In the council election in 2011, Larson finished third among three candidates in the council District 2 race. Monica Vernon won easily with 64 percent (2,958 votes) of the vote, but Taylor Nelson, 19 at the time, finished second with 27.7 percent (1,279 votes) to Larson's 7.4 percent (341 votes).

In his 14 races, Larson has run for mayor four times, including in 2009 when he sounded like the seasoned campaign veteran he had become in the mayoral political debate at Coe College with election winner Ron Corbett and second-place finisher Brian Fagan, an at-large council member and mayor pro tem at the time.

Back then, Larson was pushing the "one-two punch" of public safety and public infrastructure.

"The city isn't as safe as it should be, and the streets and sidewalks are in awful shape," he said in 2009.

In 2011, Larson said he figured that some people liked his untiring willingness to seek a spot on the City Council despite 13 previous defeats.

"Because there's still hope, and it gives other people hope," he explained back then. "And that's a positive for the community. There's that drive and desire to finally succeed one of these times. It's just a never-give-up, don't-quit attitude. I've been called the Cubs of local elections."