Sam Gurwitt Photos
Hamden’s July DTC convention.
After a heated set of caucuses for Hamden’s Democratic Town Committee (DTC) earlier in the month, primaries for the committee in seven Legislative Council districts are now set, exceeding the town’s record.
On Jan. 8, Democrats in all nine council districts gathered to choose the seven people they would like to represent them on the town’s Democratic leading body. Read a previous article about the caucuses here. The DTC is responsible for endorsing candidates come election time, automatically giving those candidates a spot on a primary ballot, or the general election ballot if no one decides to challenge them in a primary. (Read about July’s DTC convention here and here.) Each district has seven members who represent it on the committee. At the caucuses, residents choose seven people to endorse. If no one decides to challenge them to a primary, they automatically get spots on the DTC.
This year, slates in seven districts — 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 — submitted paperwork to challenge endorsed slates.
In order to trigger a primary, each slate needed to collect the signatures of 5 percent of registered Democrats in the district.
On Thursday, the registrar counted the signatures and determined that slates in all seven districts had collected enough signatures for a primary, which will take place March 3. A three-person slate in the Third District was the only one that did not qualify, though another challenging slate, of seven people, did.
According to DTC Recording Secretary Joseph McDonagh, the most primaries the Hamden DTC has ever seen in the past was five, in 1966. He said that District 4 has never had a DTC primary, meaning this year will be its first.
In some districts, the contests exhibit similar dynamics to the elections this fall, and to council politics in the previous terms. For the last two years, a group of newer politicians has challenged the way Mayor Curt Leng has handled town finances and other town business, and has clashed with many longer-serving politicians who support Leng. Lauren Garrett, who lost to Leng in a mayoral primary in September, was one of the most outspoken of the crop of newer, more progressive Democrats in town.
Curt Leng.
That dynamic is most pronounced in the Sixth and Ninth Districts. In the Sixth, Leng is running a challenge slate with a few other town officials after they lost the district’s endorsement at the caucus. That slate includes Board of Education (BOE) Chair Arturo Perez-Cabello, District‑6 Councilwoman Kathleen Schomaker, Interim Finance Director Myron Hul, and BOE Member Melissa Kaplan.
They are challenging a slate that includes Cory O’Brien (pictured above), who served on the council until Schomaker unseated him in September’s Primary. When he was on the council, O’Brien was one of Leng’s fiercest critics when it came to town finances, opposing transfers from pension-allocated funds and speaking out about what he saw as inflated revenue projections in Leng’s budgets.
Brad Macdowall.
In the Ninth District, a slate of newer progressives is challenging a slate of longer-serving Democrats who backed Leng in the last election. The challenging slate includes Councilman Brad Macdowall, who has been another fierce Leng critic, as well as BOE Member Roxana Walker-Canton. Walker-Canton won the DTC’s endorsement for her new post at the party’s July convention. The slate also includes Garrett’s husband Dan Garrett. Lauren Garrett opted not run herself after losing in the caucus, and Walker-Canton took her place on the challenge slate.
That slate will face another slate stacked with politicians, including Council Majority Leader Berita Rowe-Lewis, BOE Member Melinda Saller, and BOE Member and Director of Town/Legislative Affairs Walter Morton (pictured above). All three have been outspoken supporters of Leng.
Contests in the Seventh and Eighth Districts feature similar contests, though with fewer elected officials. In both cases, residents aligned with Hamden’s progressive newer politicians are challenging slates of longer-serving DTC members and politicians who won the district endorsement at the caucus. In the Seventh District, Garrett’s former Campaign Manager Sean Grace is leading the challenge slate. He is a leader of the Hamden Progressive Action Network (HamPAN). Many HamPAN members through their support behind Garrett in the fall, and the slate includes a few other active HamPAN members, including Alexa Panayotakis. That slate will challenge a slate which includes the district’s council representative, Michael Coloaiacovo, Jr.
The endorsed slate in the Eighth District includes two big names in Hamden politics: Jim Pascarella and John DeRosa. Both served many terms on the council until this fall, when they decided not to run for reelection. Both have been leaders on the council and in the party. Pascarella served in every elected office in Hamden: BOE, council, and mayor.
Rhonda Caldwell at a council meeting in May.
The challenge slate in the Eighth District includes Rhonda Caldwell, who ran with Laurie Sweet for the council this fall on the Working Families Party ticket.
In other districts, races are not quite as straightforward. In the Third District, a group of endorsed candidates pulled their names in order to run as a challenge slate. That slate includes Councilwoman Dominique Baez, her husband Joe Baez, Councilwoman Athena Gary, and Cherlyn Poindexter.
In the Fifth District, Laurie Sweet and Marnie Hebron launched a challenge after only part of their slate was endorsed at the caucuses. Sweet said she and Hebron are trying to unseat current DTC Secretary Kyle Blake and Seth Rosenthal, both of whom won endorsements, alongside members of Councilman Justin Farmer’s slate.
In the Fourth District, Councilwoman Valerie Horsley is leading a challenge slate against an endorsed slate that includes Eric Annes, who held Horsley’s seat on the council until he decided not to run for reelection this fall.
After the caucuses, residents in the fifth, seventh, and eighth districts filed letters with the state Democratic Party contesting the results. The letters aimed to invalidate the results of the caucuses in those three districts because they had not followed rules governing how caucuses are supposed to be run. The complaints had to do with the voting procedures of each of the caucuses. The fifth district, especially, was chaotic, with three slates in the mix, confusion about the rules, people coming and going, a locked door, no heat, and not enough chairs. Last week, complainants traveled to Hartford for a hearing on the caucuses. On Friday, the party issued its decision, which upheld the caucus results on the basis that “there was no evidence that the errors or irregularities, to the extent they occurred, resulted in a different outcome.”
The complaints in all three districts were filed by members of the challenging slates in the March 3 primary.
Below are the slates, and the polling places for the March 3 primary. All registered Democrats are eligible to vote.
District 3 – Endorsed
Lamond Battle
Eric Daniels, Jr.
Greta Johnson
Abdul Osmanu
District 3 – Challenging
Dominique Baez
Joseph Baez
Mark Buono
Cynthia Cardo
Athena Gary
Christopher Holland
Cherlyn Poindexter
District 3 polling place: Keefe Community Center, 11 Pine St
District 4 – Endorsed
Eric Annes
Vanessa Crawford
Brian Murphy
Analis Quintman
Sana Shah
Janina Tauro
Grace Yukich
District 4 – Challenging
Chris Daur
Patricia Gambori
Jaimie Garretson
Valerie Horsley
Karen Kleinerman
Bill Lavelle
Stephen Mongilo
District 4 polling place: Spring Glen School, 1908 Whitney Ave
District 5 – Endorsed
Kyle Blake
Justin Farmer
Alan Graham
Elizabeth Hayes
Shequerra Hobby
Kathleen Kiely
Seth Rosenthal
District 5 – Challenging
Marnie Hebron
Laurie Sweet
District 5 polling place: Board of Education Central Offices, 60 Putnam Ave
District 6 – Endorsed
Elaine Dove
Megan Goslin
Art Hunt
Patrick Johnson
Mike Lockett
Philip Nista
Cory O’Brien
District 6 – Challenging
Rochelle Cummings
Myron Hul
Melissa Kaplan-Charkow
Curt Leng
Arturo Perez-Cabello
Vaughn Scanterbury
Kathleen Schomaker
District 6 polling place: Ridge Hill School, 120 Carew Rd.
District 7 – Endorsed
Thomas Alegi
Michael Colaiacovo, Jr.
Deborah DiLeone
William Doherty, Jr.
Janet Draughn
Scott Howland
Doris Marino
District 7 – Challenging
Scott Beck
Tracy Bowens
Sean Grace
Dave Hannon
Diane Hoffman
Karimah Mickens
Alexa Panayotakis
District 7 polling place: Dunbar Hill School, 315 Lane St.
District 8 – Endorsed
John DeRosa
Michael Dolan
Larry Esposito
Angela O’Brien
James O’Brien
James Pascarella
District 8 – Challening
Christopher Atchley
Phaedrel Bowman
Rhonda Caldwell
Michelle Gibbs
Kenneth Kirchoff
George Levinson
Jennifer Schenk Sacco
District 8 polling place: Bear Path School, 10 Kirk Rd.
District 9 – Endorsed
Betsy Gorman
Joseph McDonagh
Walter Morton IV
Nicholas Rogers
Gabe Rosenberg
Berita Rowe-Lewis
Melinda Saller
District 9 – Challenging
Karen Bivens
David Canton
Steve DeGrand
Daniel Garrett
Nancy Hill
Brad Macdowall
Roxana Walker-Canton
District 9 polling place: West Woods School, 350 West Todd St.
Wow, the Hamden Democratic Caucus process is as opaque and dysfunctional as Iowa!
One only needs to look at the opening photo to see a system dominated by white, older residents stacked with self-interested career politicians and town employees - Clearly not a representative group of citizens.
Does the average Hamden Resident even have an inkling about the local Caucus process and how it consolidates power, limits dissent and goes a long way in determining the next mayor?
Kudo's to those challenging the local power structure of the HDTC!
Is there an App for this?