DuBois-Walton Makes Mayoral Run Official

Promising new leadership that inspires New Haven to work together to tackle public safety, development and education challenges, Karen DuBois-Walton filed papers Monday to make her run for mayor official.

DuBois-Walton filed the papers with the City Clerk Office’s staff outside the 200 Orange St. municipal office building.

She also filed papers to participate in the Democracy Fund, limiting individual contributions to $390 and swearing off political-committee donations in return for public dollars.

She is challenging first-term Mayor Justin Elicker in a Democratic primary.

DuBois-Walton, 53, filed the papers on the first weekday of her leave of absence as president of Elm City Communities/Housing Authority of New Haven, which she’s taking to proceed with her mayoral run. She has run the public housing authority for 14 years.

She filed the papers and fielded questions while standing beside her treasurer and deputy treasurer, Donald McAulay Sr. and Robin Golden; and campaign manager Will Viederman, a 2017 Yale graduate.

In her remarks, DuBois-Walton focused more on broader goals than specific proposals, which she said would come later.

“New Haven is looking for new, strong leadership. New Haven is expecting more,” she said. ​“Leadership that listens. Leadership that paints a big vision. Leadership that knows how to bring people together and inspire bold action.”

She said she heard a desire for that kind of leadership while speaking with people in neighborhoods throughout the city in her ​“exploratory” phase of her campaign.

A former city chief administrative officer who also worked at the Yale Child Study Center on a project pairing cops with child psychologists to help kids who experienced trauma, DuBois-Walton Monday spoke of the need of a ​“reset” in the relationship between police. She spoke as well as the need for greater action to promote public safety. She has spoken out recently against the promotion of ​“Thin Blue Line” culture in the department.

The public is ​“embarrassed by the discord” — i.e., infighting — at the Board of Education, and ​“concerned” about how long it took to reopen schools safely during the pandemic, she said.

And she spoke of including more truly affordable housing in new development across the city, with more neighborhood-based development. She said pegging ​“affordable housing” to the area median income (AMI) doesn’t make it truly affordable enough, especially when AMI is calculated regionally.

“The needs are urgent and the time is now,” she said. ​“We cannot miss this moment to take action and to make lasting and transformational change. Change that will bring about community safety. Change that will increase economic opportunity. Change that will strengthen our public schools.”

In one sense, DuBois-Walton’s candidacy would take on more than a century of history in New Haven by challenging a one-term incumbent. The last one-term mayor, Thomas Tully, was elected in 1929; he wasn’t on the ballot in 1931. But no one-term mayor has lost a reelection campaign since 1917: His name was Samuel Campner. But Campner (New Haven’s first and only Jewish mayor) was actually a half-term mayor: As president of the Board of Aldermen (as it was then named), he ascended to the mayoralty in 1917 when the previous mayor died, and he served out the term.

DuBois-Walton, 53, came to New Haven to study at Yale. She worked at the Yale Child Study Center in the early years of its joint program with city cops to help children exposed to violence address their trauma. Besides heading the housing authority, DuBois-Walton has served as mayoral chief of staff and city chief administrative officer, overseeing line departments like police, fire, parks, and public works. She serves on the state Board of Education. In the past four years she has organized community-wide forums about how to respond to the Trump administration; and, with her husband, she has organized Storytellers New Haven, events at which a diverse group of people active in the community have shared personal life stories. DuBois-Walton and five fellow Black women in September launched a political action committee called Ella’s Fund aimed at translating this summer’s grassroots uprisings for racial justice into lasting state and local political power.

“I welcome Dr. DuBois-Walton to the race and look forward to the conversation about the direction of our city,” Mayor Elicker told the Independent Monday morning when asked for comment on DuBois-Walton’s official mayoral challenge.

“New Haven has come together through one of the most challenging times in our history and led the state on everything from our response to COVID, to investing this summer in our youth, safety and neighborhoods, to supporting our most vulnerable residents. I am proud of our team and believe our City is on the right track to leap forward out of the pandemic. There is still much work to be done. I’m looking forward to working together to ensure that everyone in our city has the opportunity to thrive.”