2 Seek To Succeed Ex-Alder Winter

Two lifelong New Haveners are seeking to become the next Ward 21 alder now that the incumbent has stepped down mid-term.

Maceo Troy Streater and Fred Christmas filed papers at the city clerk’s office Monday to seek the position in a special election.

Incumbent Alder Steve Winter resigned Friday to become the city’s new climate-change chief. Ward 21 includes stretches of Dixwell, Newhallville, and Prospect Hill.

Streater, 55, has run before for alder and Democratic ward co-chair. He has a lawn business and works as a counselor at the 180 Center on East Street.

“I’m up for the challenge. I’m up for the task,” Streater said Monday. ​“My goal is to improve what the residents say that they need done.”

Streater spent two decades behind bars for a crime he said he didn’t commit, and received a pardon. He said that experience would inform his efforts if elected alder to help other people returning to society after imprisonment, beginning with helping people obtain needed state IDs.

Christmas, 65, runs a business managing asbestos, mold, and lead jobs on construction sites. He has been an active volunteer with groups like Women of the Village. He also stages community concerts through the group Cool Breeze in the Park with Phil Bynum.

His priorities would include continuing to join community efforts to keep sidewalks and streets clean; and luring more developers to build up Dixwell.

“I’m very passionate about my ward, and I’m very passionate about New Haven,” said Christmas, who grew up in the old Elm Haven low-rises. ​“I’ve always wanted to do this since I was a kid.” He cited the late Alders Stanley Rogers and Mae Ola Riddick as influences.

The Democratic ward committee is in the process of scheduling a meeting to endorse a successor. The other candidate could then petition to be on a special-election ballot.

Winter’s resignation marks the third time this year that an alder has stepped down early. On June 9, Ward 28 Alder Shafiq Abdussabur resigned after citing a conflict between a custodial cleaning contract his company was bidding for with the public school system and his continued services in local elected office. And on Aug. 31, Ward 9 Alder Charles Decker resigned right before moving out of state.