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State Rep. Al Paolillo Jr. will also be Alder Al Paolillo Jr. At least for a while.
Paolillo (pictured) won election Nov. 8 to the open 97th state General Assembly seat, representing the city’s east shore in Hartford. He takes office next month.
He also has another year left in his term representing the Annex neighborhood on the New Haven Board of Alders.
Paolillo said that for now he has decided to keep his alder seat and do both jobs. He has spent 15 years on the board, rising to the position of majority leader. He’s not ready to step down just yet.
“I love my position right now. I love what I do every day,” Paolillo said. “At some point I’m not going to do both [jobs]. At the beginning of the year, I’m going to do both,” then evaluate after a while whether he should continue through the years.
Newly elected state legislators throughout Connecticut routinely face that choice of whether to continue in a elected municipal position. Almost all choose to resign the local post. (Similarly, Toni Harp and John Daniels resigned as state senators upon assuming the mayor’s office in New Haven.)
Roland Lemar, the last New Haven alder to face that choice, resigned his alder seat immediately, leaving time for a special election for his successor.
“I thought it made sense for me not to do both at once. I didn’t think I could handle both jobs,” he said. “It’s really hard to do both.”
But there is local precedent. In 1984, New Haven Alders Pat Dillion and Bob Hauser were elected to the state House of Representatives. Both remained on the Board of Alders (then called the “Board of Aldermen”) through the end of their terms in 1985 before stepping aside. Like Paolillo, both held leadership positions on the board at the time.
Dillon said she remained on the board at the urging of then-Democratic Town Chairman Vincent Mauro, who told her she was needed to continue running the budget committee as important development proposals came up for review.
“They really hadn’t prepared for a successor,” she said.
Today, the late Mauro’s son, Vincent Mauro Jr., serves as Democratic town chair. Mauro said he did not tell Paolillo, “You’ve got to stay on the board,” but he did “encourage” him to continue serving in the local position.
“Al is a very important member of the board. He will do both jobs as well as he can,” Mauro said. “I think he can handle both jobs. To up and move right away, it would create a little bit of a vacuum.”