Tag / special election

by hereandsphere

5TH SUFFOLK DISTRICT : FOUR VISIONS AT CANDIDATES FORUM

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^ 4 visions 4 : from Left : Evandro C. Carvalho; Karen Charles-Peterson; Jennifer Johnson; Barry Lawton. (a fifth candidate, Roy Owens, did not participate in the Forum)

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Yesterday afternoon voters of the 5th District had this campaign’s only opportunity to see, on one platform answering questions, four of the five candidates who seek to represent them. About 100 of the District’s residents showed up. There was plenty of enthusiasm among them — which was a good thing, because every one of the four needs to up his or her speaking craft.

That’s OK; I don’t expect candidates for State Representative, in a special election hurriedly called after the February 5th expulsion of Carlos Henriquez following his domestic violence conviction, to be silver tongued orators or think tank masters. This was a neighborhood event, and its candidates sounded like neighbors.

Moderated diligently by Boston Neighborhood News’s Chris Lovett, all four candidates — Evandro C. Carvalho, Karen Charles-Peterson, Jennifer Johnson, and Barry Lawton — managed to give Forum attendees a pretty fair impression of who they are, why they are running, and what they are likely to work on as the District’s State House representative. Still, all had some difficulty focusing on State legislation matters rather than concerns more appropriate for a City Councillor.

This was true even of Barry Lawton, who in his opening remarks said “i am the only candidate on this stage who has written legislation” — which he likely did as a staffer to former State Representative Royal Bolling, Jr. — but then proceeded not to mention even one piece of legislation that he would sponsor if elected. Lawton did have plenty to say, however, about vacant city lots, jobs, and his long experience as an activist.

Evandro C. Carvalho did make at least one potential legislative point — to include expansion of vocational education in state school reform bills — but, curiously, given his history as a Suffolk County prosecutor of gun crimes, failed to mention the very detailed gun control legislation now before the legislature’s Public safety committee.

In fairness to Carvalho, neither did any of the other three candidates mention, much less discuss, this legislation. it was a curious omission considering the urgency, in neighborhoods of the 5th District, of curbing gun violence.

Karen Charles-Peterson at first spoke in the quiet voiced generalities that anyone who heard her chief political backer, Charlotte Golar-Richie, during lat year’s mayor election is quite familiar with. But half way through the Forum she suddenly became a different Peterson. She had sat; now she stood up. as Barry Lawton spoke loudly, with hand gestures like a preacher, so now did  Charles-Peterson. She ended strongly, announcing that “I will take all 40,000 residents of this District with me to the State House” and “I will give everyone my personal cell phone number, call me any time.” Charles-Peterson also discussed aid for the small businesses that string the length of Bowdoin and Hancock Streets, in the center of the District. that said, neither she nor any of the four, except Jennifer Johnson, uttered the place name “Uphams Corner” — despite its being the major crossroads of the District.

And now I come to Jennifer Johnson. Ostensibly she’s an unlikely candidate ; Caucasian in a District largely of color and an authentic issues voice among candidates unclear about which issues matter, and in what way, to a legislator. Johnson’s far from  being the polished, focused speaker she will need to be if she’s to make issues heard and understood; but she spoke in some detail about the formal, even bureaucratic, task that small businesses face as they seek loans; about how and why business development matters to a District among the lowest income of all; about how to frame affordable housing agreements with developers; about raising the minimum wage (strangely, this initiative, so vital to the District, was hardly mentioned by the other three candidates)and, most fascinating of all, about technology : connecting technology enterprises to the District and to schools, and the District to technology jobs.

Johnson could easily have delivered her remarks to the chamber of commerce or a Business round table. Odd it felt to hear a 5th District candidate talking enterprise and cutting edge innovation. But why not ? She called herself a  “Kennedy liberal,” a phrase as attuned to business success as to social justice. Would it be too much a reach to say that the two reinforce each other ? (It was shrewd of Johnson to talk so much about business. Business development was John Barros’s signature, and by talking it, Johnson sought to take up the banner of a man who was given 2,071 votes — first place — from the District in last year’s mayor race.)

There was plenty of applause for Johnson, and for Charles-Peterson; but the day’s noise prize was won by Carvalho, who, with John Barros unavailable, has picked up the banner of Boston’s Cape Verdean community. It dominates the 5th District, and if Carvalho spoke softly, seemed to be thinking out loud, and often rambled, he could afford to do so; his vote is energized and likely will be the largest bloc on the April 1st Primary day. Alone of the four, his vision seems to be : who i am. Or to phrase it another way, If I win, all Cape Verdeans win.

At the Forum, it worked. And though I think that the District’s Cape Verdeans could as well as any other District residents use the technology advocacy that Johnson would surely put in play, getting to that may well take much more time than the one week that remains for voters to consider who best can be their political clout — to the City or at the State House. Nor will there be another Forum to help them. Yesterday was it.

—- Mike Freedberg / Here and Sphere

 

 

by hereandsphere

SPECIAL ELECTIONS : WHERE THE MONEY IS … AND ISN’T

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^ big money winner in the 13th Suffolk : Dan Hunt campaigning on a wintry night

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If you want to know what’s likely to happen in the four (4) Special state legislature elections now reaching climax day in the Boston area, it’s well worth looking at the money.

Always when I talk money, I have to offer this disclaimer, so here it is : yes, money isn’t everything in politics; people do the voting. They count too.

Yet Massachusetts’ $ 500 limit on donations, and the almost complete absence of secret conspiracy money in special elections, allows the greenback trail to say a lot about how many people are walking that trail to the voting booth. Here’s the OCPF for all four races :

13th Suffolk district (much of Dorchester and one precinct of North Quincy)

Liam Curran —- raised 22,387.53
spent 13,197.92
balance 9,189.71
Gene Gorman — raised 9,795.00
spent 4,878.37
balance 4,916.63
Dan Hunt ——- started with about 45,000.00
raised 49,615.00
spent 61,297.06
balance 43,371.11
PJ McCann —- raised 15,070.00
spent 3,180.52
balance 11,809.42
John O’Toole — no report filed as of this morning

2nd Suffolk District (Charlestown and three-quarters of Chelsea)

Roy Avellaneda — raised 28,460.00
spent 5,884.49
balance 22,575.51
Chris Remmes —- started with 23,560.00
raised 26,460.00
spent 30,476.36
balance 19,420.85
Dan Ryan ———- started with 2,500.00
raised 4,039.18
spent 29,990.43
balance 17,370.11

16th Suffolk District (most of Revere; one-quarter of Chelsea; two precincts of Saugus)

Josh Monahan — raised 6,455.18
spent 2,772.17
balance 3,682.01
Linda S Rosa —– raised 5,100.00
spent 2,596.76
balance 2,503.24
Todd Taylor (R) — raised 7,115.00
spent 2,551.06
balance 4,563.94
Roselee Vincent – raised 42,598.92
spent 27,257.19
balance 15,344.73

5th Middlesex Senate (Malden, Melrose, Stoneham, Wakefield, Reading, most of Winchester)

Chris Fallon — started with 8,400.00
raised 52,947.00
spent 52,284.01
balance 9,566.59
Anthony Guardia — started with 2,550.00
raised 19,245.00
spent 11,284.42
balance 10,510.58
Jason Lewis — started with 109,723.25
raised 37,185.00
spent 89,242.69
balance 57,665.56
Monica Medeiros (R) — started with 2,443.60
raised 4,275.00
spent 2,101.78
balance 4,516.87

As you can read, in two of the three State Representative races there’s a clear donor winner. Dan Hunt, in the Dorchester-Quincy District, has raised more money than all his rivals combined (leaving out John O’Toole, who has yet to report.) Roselee Vincent, of the Revere-centered District, holds an even larger advantage over her combined opponents. Even before I researched the money, Hunt and Vincent looked like winners on March 4th Primary day. Their dollar results certainly don’t wrongfoot me.

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^ overall money leader in the 2nd Suffolk : Chris Remmes

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^ 2nd Suffolk money leader in this reporting period : Dan  Ryan

Things are less clear in the Charlestown and Chelsea District. All three men have raised credible money. Question is, will this race’;s dominant money raiser, Chris Remmes, dominate the vote ? On the ground, he looks like 3rd place, but the money says otherwise. The bulk of it comes from donors living outside the district, but that isn’t a disqualification. Perhaps the decider is how much money the three have raised in this reporting period. Dan Ryan is the clear leader — but not by a number overwhelming. My conclusion : these three men are very, very dissimilar, and in a district with many different voter strains, there’s money to support those dissimilarities. Primary day may tabulate a very, very close result.

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^ scant money raised, in a District arguably Republican : Monica Medeiros of Melrose

The State Senate special election taking place along Route 28 north of Everett, from Malden to Reading, offers surprises of its own. For 22 years this was Republican Ricard Tisei’s seat almost uncontestably; yet now, the lone Republican candidate, a Melrose City Alderman, has raised almost no money at all. There are three Democrats running; two have raised large money. The big name, Chris Fallon, has, however, been significantly beaten in the money game by Winchester state representative Jason Lewis. I haven’t covered this race at all and have no opinion on who will likely win the Democratic nomination — though the twitter-verse has recently talked up Lewis.

If he wins, he will face the Republican, who in a District quite competitively two-party ought to be a serious opponent and even, given the disconnect going on right now between suburbs and Beacon Hill, the favorite. But the money record tells a much different story. Why Monica Medeiros shows so weakly, I don’t know, but given the anti-voter turn being taken by right wing activists — who have all but sharked our State’s local-level GOP — I can think of a reason : there’s no constituency, outside of right-wing cocoons, for anti-voter politics, and hopefully there never will be. Whether Medeiros shares this anti-voter bent I will try to find out during the run-up to an april 1st Final.

—- Mike Freedberg / Here and Sphere

by hereandsphere

2ND SUFFOLK SPECIAL ELECTION : SOME NOISE AT LAST, AND DRAMA

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^ hush hush meets its opponent — until Avellaneda met her, this well informed Chelsea voter hadn’t known there was an election

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PREFACE : On January 6th, Gene O’Flaherty, said to be Mayor Marty Walsh’s best legislator friend, at last accepted the offer to become Boston’s Corporations Counsel. He resigned this seat in the legislature, giving up a powerful committee chairmanship and thus setting up the Charlestown versus Chelsea fight here chronicled. — MF

A week ago, Roy Avellaneda, five-term Chelsea City Councillor and one of the three men seeking to take the State Representative seat that had been Gene O’Flaherty’s, told me, after a discouraging day of voter shrugs, that he would wake up the voters of his city. That he would overcome the Charlestown side of things and win the seat. I was skeptical and told him so. “Come tomorrow night to Crest Avenue and you’ll see,” he said.

Of course I was there. So were about 35 “Roy” supporters. We heard Avellaneda’s election day warrior, Michael Albano, sound the warning : “Either we win this seat his time or there’ll never be another Chelsea State Rep. Never,” Albano yowled. “They’re already planning to cut up Chelsea three ways,’ Albano roared, his sandstone voice piqued. The room trembled with vigor and joy. “Roy ! Roy ! Roy !”

I have seen this sort of thing before. Campaign people always cheer and roar, or they wouldn’t be in a campaign, they’d be at home watching TV reruns. So I remained skeptical. I’d seen what was going on across the Mystic River, in Charlestown, which outvotes the Chelsea portion of “the 2nd” by about six to five. I’d seen the campaign of Dan Ryan, 16 years an aide to powerful Congressman Mike Capuano. Ryan, who with his perfectly parted black hair and chiseled face looks like Tyrone Power, seemed to have every political Townie on his team. Ryan had run for office once before — District One City Council, in a Special Election, no less — nad had won 94 percent of the Ward 2 vote, barely losing the race to Sal LaMattina from much larger East Boston. If Ryan wins 94 percent of the Charlestown vote this time, the seat is his.

Avellaneda can count just as well as Ryan. He wasn’t angry that I seemed skeptical of his wake up calls. He just smiled that chin to eye smile that makes him look like a high school prom king. “We delivered Chelsea for Elizabeth Warren,” he reminded me. “We’ll do it again.”

He has spent the past week doing exactly that. Though it’s not clear to me that he will arouse enough Chelsea for Avellaneda votes to win — Ryan has plenty of Chelsea votes himself — he has definitely upped the noise. The race had been as quiet as a well behaved high school study hall. Now it was brimming with huzzahs, as Avellaneda challenged his two C Town rivals — for there are, indeed, two Townie candidates running — to declare themselves on issues vital to his Latino vote base : did Ryan and Chris Remmes support the DREAM Act ? Did they favor driver’s licenses for undocumented immigrants ? In-state tuition for undocumenteds ? The Massachusetts Trust Act ?

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^ an issues candidacy ? Chris Remmes welcomes it. (at Durty Harry with supporters three nights ago)

For Chris Remmes, a new-Boston issues guy, this was manna from heaven, a chance for him to prove his progressive platform; and he did so on all the points that Avellaneda listed. Dan Ryan then stated his support, too, for every one of Roy’s points and with common sense arguments.

One might be tempted to tag this play a loss for Avellaneda; but it was a gain, because merely by forcing Remmes and Ryan to respond to him, he accrued much voter attention. Albano had told me, at that first campaign rally, that he wanted to see 2,000 votes cast in Chelsea; and Roy had, by his gambit, given them reason to vote on March 4th.

And then Roy turned up the heat again. At his father’s shop — Tito’s Bakery, a Chelsea institution — he held a Latino Chelsea rally; Felix D. Arroyo — who is running for Suffolk County Register of Probate — was there, and Gabriel Gomez, who ran against Ed Markey last year for US Senate, tweeted his support. Next day, Dan Ryan announced that Suffolk County Sheriff Steve Tompkins endorsed him, as did three labor unions; but Ryan’s announcement, given so quickly, helped Avellaneda’s cause too by showing, to a still mostly disconnected people, that there was an election coming and that competition in it was intensifying.

Until that first Avellaneda ally the race had been far too quiet for it to be an accident. Nobody in Charlestown wants to lose this race — the Town hasn’t had a State Representative of its own since 1974 — and if that meant campaigning hush-hush, hush hush it would be. The fewer Chelsea votes the better, especially with two Town candidates running hard. And now — I am speaking of last Friday — the hush hush was going away. By now, it’s almost gone. Avellaneda has mounted yet another issues challenge — cleaning up the Mystic River waterway for use as commuter transport and shipping, and he has forced the casino issue as well, advocating for the Mohegan Sun Revere casino plan even as Chris Remmes opposes all casinos.

The casino issue is a dangerous one for Dan Ryan. Many of his solidest Town supporters intensely oppose the Steve Wynn, Everett casino that is almost certain to win gaming Commission approval. Mayor DeMaria of Everett has given Charlestown no choice. “If you don’t go for this plan, that land will be a stadium, with more people and more traffic and no mitigation,” DeMaria told 400 Townies at a recent casino plan meeting. For Ryan to support the Mohegan Sun casino plays into Avellaneda’s hands; for him to say nothing makes him seem to duck.

Yet the Dan Ryan I have come to know doesn’t duck any issue at all. He will probably first see what happens in tomorrow’s Revere casino vote and then make his statement. and then return to the phone banking, meet and greets, and senior citizens election day networking of the message that, after all the issues have been fought to a conclusion, is probably worth a 2500 vote Ward 2 turnout and thus cannot fail him : “after 40 years, this time it is Charlestown’s turn.”

Voting day is March 4th, eight days away.

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^ forty years waiting — and if C Town has anything to say about it, now is the time. Candidate Dan Ryan with C town’s last state Rep, Jim Collins

—- Mike Freedberg / Here and Sphere

by hereandsphere

FALL RIVER, FREETOWN — 6TH BRISTOL SPECIAL ELECTION — SEPT 10TH

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^ Fiola : state transportation funds will help Fall River. Steinhof : too much EBT and MBTA fraud going on to ask for new funds

Next Tuesday voters of Freetown and the North End of Fall River will go to the polls to choose a new State Representative. The vacancy results from the resignation several months ago of State Representative David Sullivan.

The candidates are David Steinhof, a third-generation Fall River dentist, and Carole Fiola, whose husband Ken Fiola is vice-president of Fall River’s Economic Development Office.

At a debate a few nights ago, as reported in the Herald News, Fiola said that she supports the State’s new gas and cigarette tax but not the software services tax; Steinhof favors n o new taxes. Fiola said that she supported the two taxes — but not the software tax — because Fall river needs new funds to improve transportation to and from the city’ Steinhof says that Fall River doesn’t need new funds because it’s already got a great, deep water port, as he put it.

Steinhof also said that with all the “fraud,” as he put it, going on in the EBT program and in the MBTA, the State can find funds by eliminating the “fraud.”

Polls open at 7 A.M. next Tuesday.

—- Michael Freedberg / Here and Sphere