(Updated 10:44 p.m.) Mayor John DeStefano sailed to a record-tying eighth two-year term Tuesday night. But grassroots dissatisfaction with his regime registered in two close aldermanic challenges to two of his loyalists — including an upset by the Green Party’s Allan Brison (in top photo) in East Rock’s 10th Ward. Westville’s incumbent Alderwoman Ina Silverman (at left in second photo), meanwhile, beat first-time challenger Tom Malone, a Republican, 648 – 484 on the machines.
(That means the tally doesn’t include absentee ballots.)
Both aldermanic elections — the only two truly contested ones in the 30-ward city — were closer than expected. Both pitted critics of the DeStefano administration against loyalists backed by the citywide Democratic machine.
Malone’s forces were vastly outmatched, both in numbers and expertise, by the citywide operation that worked Westville’s Ward 25 Tuesday. Malone ran a campaign centered on criticism of the Democratic Party for supporting tax increases and not independently challenging City Hall.
“I assume so,” Malone, asked if he would run again in two years, said at the Edgewood School polling place after the results came in. “It’s a job I want.”
The big story of the night was Brison’s 386 – 283 victory in Ward 10, which incorporates much of the East Rock neighborhood. The ward also encompasses the isolated Cedar Hill section, whose neighbors’ complaints of being ignored by city government resonated during the campaign.
“Halleleujah!” the Green Party’s local leader, Charlie Pillsbury, called out at an intimate victory party at his St. Ronan Street house. Besides Brison’s victory, the party was celebrating the election of a first selectman in the Connecticut town of Windham.
“I’ll be screaming for Cedar Hill” to get more attention from the city, Brison declared.
Savoring his victory Tuesday night, he said, “It’s the first time a Green candidate has unseated a well-entrenched incumbent Democrat with all of the support of the mayor and City Hall. I not only beat him, but I beat him soundly! It shows ther might be a weakness in the machine.”
Brison (pictured with daughter Rebecca) added that if the next term sees a rematch in the race for board president, he will support Jorge Perez over Carl Goldfield. (Goldfield narrowly defeated Perez this past term.)
Click here and here for stories on debates in the Ward 10 race.
The 30-member Board of Aldermen will now have 28 Democrats, 1 Green and 1 Republican. This is a similar situation to the one that followed the 2001 election, when the Greens and Republicans had two aldermen each. They battled over which counted as the “minority party” until then-Board President Jorge Perez worked out a compromise. (The issues at stake concerned who got to deliver the minority “state of the city” address and who got to sit on which committee.)
Other results Tuesday night (based on machine results): Republican Arlene DePino held onto her aldermanic seat in Morris Cove’s Ward 18, defeating Democratic challenger Larry Morico 556 – 370. Downtown Alderwoman Bitsie Clark, a Democrat, beat Green Daniel Sumrall 200 to 42.
In The History Books
By crushing his two opponents, who ran symbolic campaigns, Mayor DeStefano will become the second mayor to serve eight two-year terms by popular election. (That assumes he’ll serve out the term, which he said he has every intention of doing.) He joins Mayor Dick Lee in the history books; Lee served from 1954 – 1970.
The reason for all the qualifiers for the historical achievement: in the early 1800s Elijah Goodrich served as mayor for 18 years. But he was elected once, by a limited electorate, then merely reappointed each year by the General Assembly.
(Click here to read a story about that.)
DeStefano’s challengers, Republican Rick Elser and Green Ralph Ferrucci, never developed citywide organizations. They failed to raise even the minimum 200 contributions of $25 apiece required to qualify for public matching funds. They ran to give voters a choice in a year marked by a police scandal, outrage over the decline of community policing, and anger over rising taxes. There was also lingering sentiment that DeStefano had neglected the city during the last two years of his run for governor, and that his fellow Democrats on the Board of Aldermen had failed to offer the public independent scrutiny of the administration.
Those sentiments Tuesday spilled out not in the mayoral race but in the two aldermanic challenges.
At a party at the Playwright, Mayor DeStefano (pictured) declared victory with 71 percent of the vote, with 23 of 30 wards reporting. He called the victory a “special day.” He rejected the notion that the aldermanic results reflected on his own record. “The aldermanic races resulted in who worked the hardest,” DeStefano said. They were more “candidate-specific” than a reflection of the mayoral votes. Allan Brison “adds another voice” to the board — “another voice never hurts.”
Democratic Town Chairwoman Susie Voigt said she was “very, very disappointed” about Ed Mattison’s loss. “Ed’s a real New Havener” and has done a lot of good work, including being “a champion for the homeless,” she said.
Republican candidate H. Richter Elser took the results on his black cellphone in the downtown bar that bears his name. (Richters — he founded it but no longer runs it.)
Sitting at a table by a fireplace at the back of the dining area, Elser looked tired as the results came in. “With the resources we had available, we ran a good race,” he said, sitting alone. “The end goal was to have a presence.”
Meanwhile, fellow Republican Tom Malone was celebrating at Delaney’s in Westville center. Close to 20 supporters were on hand. Yes, they were celebrating; they saw their showing as a victory, even if Malone didn’t win the 25th Ward seat.
Malone, 38, called the results a “moral victory” since he moved to New Haven only in March and started his race, from scratch, a few months ago. “I think we did an amazing job of building a base of support. The concern of the people in this neighborhood showed in the results.”
Melissa Bailey, Paul Bass and Leonard J. Honeyman reported this story.
Weren't the folks in Cedar Hill told by their incumbent alderman that they weren't going to get much attention until they got politically organized? Hmmm, looks like they got politically organized. Congrats.