Mayoral Debate Q: Who’s Got Right Experience?

The city’s two Democratic mayoral candidates sat side by side on stage and agreed on policy — but split on leadership experience, strategy, and vision.

That was the scene inside Hill Regional Career High School at 140 Legion Ave. Tuesday night as two-term incumbent Mayor Justin Elicker and challenger Liam Brennan pitched themselves as better suited than the other to fill the city’s top office in advance of a Sept. 12 Democratic primary.

They did so as part of a debate hosted by the New Haven Independent and the New Haven Democracy Fund. Both Elicker and Brennan are participating in that local public financing program, which provides candidates with public grants and matching dollars if they forswear committee contributions and limit individual contributions to no more than $445 apiece. 

Over the course of an hour, the pair answered pre-selected questions from community members as well as questions from three panelists — New Haven Independent founding editor Paul Bass, who also served as moderator, local radio reporter Michelle Turner, and La Voz CT Publisher Norma Rodriguez-Reyes — about issues like education, traffic, housing and public safety.

Read in detail about some of the other topics touched upon briefly Tuesday night in previous articles about housing conditions, homelessness, and public green spaces. Watch a full video of Tuesday’s debate below.

Whoever wins the primary will compete against Tom Goldenberg, who is not participating in the Democracy Fund and has secured ballot access on the Republican and Independent Party lines, and Shafiq Abdussabur, who is participating in the Democracy Fund and is running as an unaffiliated candidate, in the Nov. 7 general election. Wendy Hamilton and Mayce Torres have also filed to run as unaffiliated candidates for mayor in November.

With the exception of a heated back and forth between the candidates regarding how to approach arrests related to drug consumption and distribution — an argument which took nearly the same turns as in a previous debate and can be read about here — the most obvious distinction between the two candidates appeared to be experience.

In particular, Brennan, a Westville-based attorney and Hartford inspector general, was asked whether he’s qualified to manage a city the size of New Haven — with upwards of 1,276 employees across City Hall, or 3,562 public employees if counting the Board of Education. How many employees had Brennan supervised in past jobs? 

Brennan worked for 11 years with the federal Department of Justice, seven of which he spent overseeing the state’s public corruption task force, where he worked to help send ex-Governor John Rowland back to prison. During that time as a federal prosecutor, he said, he directly managed 15 team members while standing in charge of around two additional agents assigned per case while around 50 cases were open at any time. Brennan also worked as an attorney with the New Haven Legal Assistance Association for just over a year and then as the executive director of the Connecticut Veterans Legal Center, where he said he managed around 17 people. 

Elicker, meanwhile — who served as an East Rock/Cedar Hill alder for two terms and then as the director of a local environmental nonprofit for half a decade before becoming mayor at the start of 2020 — pointed to the challenges the city has faced under his leadership, citing each as a key experience that would further inform his next hoped-for term in office. 

“We have some different policies, but ultimately this is about experience,” Elicker said of the race. ​“We together have had the experience of pushing the state and Yale to dramatically increase their payments to the city.” Together, he said, the city has persevered through Covid-19; has dealt with the consequences of a partial building collapse; has created alternative ways to approach policing, such as a non-cop crisis response team (COMPASS), in the wake of national unrest over police brutality and misconduct.

“It’s not just the over 1,000 employees that I manage in City Hall,” he said. It’s about leading the whole city.

Brennan, meanwhile, said that Elicker’s four years at the helm of New Haven does not necessarily translate to strong ​“managerial” experience.

“Do you know where the city wants to go?” Brennan asked the audience. ​“I don’t know where the city wants to go” under this current administration.

“I think this question of experience is really important,” he said. As the leader of the public corruption taskforce, and a statewide veteran legal services organization, Brennan said he became practiced in identifying goals and creating a vision to sustain and support the achievement of those issues. He has a vision, he said, of housing rights and overhauled zoning codes, of clearer communications through public databases like lists of housing inspection requests and infrastructural repair timelines. 

After Brennan’s 60-second statement, Elicker’s 30-second response, and Brennan’s quick rebuttal, the time to prove their personal qualifications to the public was up. 

Beyond differences in managerial experience and expertise, a fast-paced ​“lightning round” of ​“yes” or ​“no” questions cemented similarities in the pair’s political thinking.

Other than a rift on the topic of Tweed airport, with Brennan opposing the airport’s expansion as currently planned and Elicker supporting the endeavor, the answers were nearly identical.

Are delineator poles effective tools for establishing protected bike lanes? ​“No,” said Brennan. ​“Not entirely,” said Elicker.

Do the pair support the state’s decision to increase funding for charter schools in this year’s budget? ​“This is not a yes or no question,” Elicker said. ​“It depends. I agree with the Mayor,” Brennan said.

Should the city undo a merger of the Public Works and Parks Department, which some have criticized as robbing parks of necessary attention and oversight? ​“Yes,” both replied, even Elicker, who previously supported the reorganization.

Four year terms for mayor and alders? Yes, four year mayoral terms, both said. Yes to four year terms for alders, Elicker said. ​“Maybe, I don’t care,” Brennan said of the latter. 

“I’m trying to get you guys to disagree,” Bass said. ​“Aren’t you running against each other?”