Absent Alder Not Quitting After All

(Updated) Fair Haven’s Ward 14 was poised to have its fourth alder in three years as the newly elected neighborhood legislator said she was preparing to step down from her post.

But then she changed her mind — and will go ahead with being sworn into the office after missing inauguration.

Meanwhile, two new candidates are vying to replace the current Democratic Ward Committee co-chairs.

Ward 14 Alder Paola Acosta told the Independent by text message Tuesday night that she plans to resign from her position on the city’s Board of Alders later this week.

Acosta ran unopposed in November’s general election, and assumed office earlier this month. She has not attended either of this year’s first two full Board of Alders meetings, which are held twice a month in the Aldermanic Chambers on the second floor of City Hall.

“I will be resigning tomorrow due to personal issues outside my control,” she told the Independent by text after Tuesday night’s full board meeting.

She said she works a retail job that keeps her on the clock until 11 most weeknights. She needs to prioritize that job over her newly elected position at this time, she said. ​“This job isn’t something I had when I made my decision to run but unfortunately my situation changed.”

Acosta did not respond to multiple text messages and phone calls Wednesday. City Clerk Michael Smart told the Independent Wednesday afternoon that Acosta had not yet as of that time submitted her resignation letter.

Update: After this article was originally published, board staff informed the Independent that Acosta had changed her mind. She plans to proceed with a planned swearing-in ceremony Friday afternoon. (She had missed the swearing-in on Inauguration Day.) Acosta did not respond to requests for an updated comment on her status.

If Acosta had followed through on resigning, that would have triggered a Secretary of the State-mandated special election calendar. The Democratic Ward Committee for Ward 14 would nominate a replacement candidate. If one or more candidates gathered enough signatures to challenged that ward committee-endorsed candidate, then there would be a special election.

The special election calendar process occurs when an alder resigns within the first 18 months of her term. If she resigns within the last six months of her term, then the mayor appoints a replacement to fill the seat until the next regularly scheduled election.

“I Do Not Know Who The New Alder Will Be”

Ward 14 covers the eastern swath of Fair Haven, running from Ferry Street on the west to Quinnipiac Avenue just over the Quinnipiac River on the east, and from Grafton Street on the north to Fulton Street in the Annex on the south.

The ward has experienced quite a bit of political turnover in the past three years.

In January 2017, then-Ward 14 Alder Santiago Berrios-Bones resigned from his post.

After a fractious Ward 14 Democratic Ward Committee special election debate, New Haven Rising organizer Kenneth Reveiz won the committee’s endorsement and was sworn into office in March 2017.

Reveiz decided not to run for a second term last year.

At the July 2019 Democratic Town Convention, the Ward 14 committee formally endorsed Wilda Garayua as the Democratic nominee for the open seat.

But by the time the September Democratic primary rolled around, Garayua had dropped out, and Acosta had petitioned her way onto the ballot.

Acosta won the primary and general election races unopposed.

Now, three weeks into her first term, she said she plans on stepping down.

“I do not know who the new alder will be,” Ward 14 Democratic Ward Committee Co-Chair Juana Sanchez said in a brief phone conversation with the Independent Wednesday morning. Her fellow ward committee co-chair, Zoraida Hernandez, could not be reached for comment by the publication time of this article.

“Bring Some Stability”

Sanchez and Hernandez may not be the leaders of the neighborhood’s Democratic Party for much longer, either.

According to city Registrar of Voters records, neither has filed as of Wednesday to run for another two-year term as ward committee co-chair.

Instead, public school parent activist and mayoral transition team co-chair Sarah Miller and city parks staffer Martin Torresquintero have filed to run for the Ward 14 seats.

Interested candidates have until Jan. 29 at 4 p.m. to drop off signatures totaling 5 percent of their ward’s registered Democratic voters. The contested ward committee elections will take place on March 3.

“We just want to bring some stability to the neighborhood,” Miller said about why she and Torresquintero are running for the apparently open Ward 14 co-chair seats.

She said they want to help establish in their neighborhood a ​“reliable, predictable process that people can participate in and have trust in.”

The ward committee process came under close scrutiny in the run-up to the town convention last summer, with even the town Democratic Party chair lamenting that some committees had barred the public from public meetings and disregarded the votes of the majority of their members.

Miller said that she has seen first-hand her neighborhood’s struggles to find someone to fill the Ward 14 alder seat.

“It’s a thankless job,” she said. ​“It’s pretty impossible to do if you have a busy job or young children.”

Alders are paid just over $2,000 a year for their service to the city. Some alders have said they spend upwards of 20 hours a week on constituent services, sometimes more, on constituent services and City Hall meetings.

“We’re going to try to ensure that we have as good a process as we can,” Miller reiterated about her bid for the Ward 14 co-chair seat. ​“With integrity and following the by-laws.”

The other candidates running for Fair Haven ward co-chair seats as of Wednesday are Robert Roberts and Kevin Diaz in Ward 15, Mishele Elizabeth Rodriguez and Jayuan Carter in Ward 16, Sarah Locke and Claudia Herrera-Martinez in Ward 9, and Brenda Harris and Ana Winn in Ward 8.