Crusader Oz Griebel Dies

Oz Griebel, a sunny crusader who injected an independent spirit and passion into state politics, died Tuesday from injuries suffered eight days earlier when he was jogging and a car hit him.

He was 71 years old.

Griebel ran a change-themed third-party campaign for governor in 2018 and went on to lead the state chapter of an electoral reform group called the Serve America Movement, or SAM. Before that he advocated for businesses as head of the MetroHartford Alliance. He claimed to speak for the state’s ​“radical middle” fed up with Democrats and Republicans. His causes included ranked-choice voting, open primaries, and an end to mass incarceration.

“We can all take a page from his commitment to work across the aisle and remove politics from policy,” Gov. Ned Lamont stated in a release issued Wednesday evening. ​“He will be missed, and I extend my deepest sympathy to his family. There is no place like Oz, and there was no one like Oz.”

Griebel’s optimism and passion will live on. You can watch and listen to some of that in the following WNHH and New Haven Independent videos of him in the FM studio and on the campaign trail. Read about some of his causes here, here, here, here, and here.