Mayor’s Race Off To Clean (Money) Start

New Haven this year is in line to have its second mayor’s race with two candidates running with public financing — and the first time in which one is an incumbent.

It may or may not have a ​“do-over” general election.

Karen DuBois-Walton announced Thursday that, four days after officially announcing her candidacy for mayor, she has already qualified to receive public money from the Democracy Fund by raising at least 200 donations from registered New Haven voters. She made the announcement before 100 supporters at an official campaign launch at Fair Haven’s waterfront Quinnipiac River Park, at which she vowed to ​“take this moment of community and political will to make real change” and ​“chart a new way” to tackle ​“inequities,” including in education and policing.

“If we choose the right leadership in this moment,” she declared, ​“we can achieve incredible things.”

Meanwhile, Mayor Justin Elicker, whom DuBois-Walton seeks to unseat in a Democratic primary, has qualified for the public-financing program as well. Like DuBois-Walton, he collected enough donations to qualify for the program’s $20,000 grant, which candidates receive once they qualify for the ballot. Elicker has also qualified for $23,716 in matching funds after submitting names of 521 donors, and will receive that check by week’s end, according to Democracy Fund Administrator Alyson Heimer.

That means that for only the second time will two mayoral candidates qualify for public money since New Haven launched the state’s first municipal public-financing program in 2007. Under the voluntary program, candidates agree to limit individual contributions to $390 and forswear political-committee donations in return for a $20,000 grant and 2 – 1 matches of the first $30 in contributions from registered New Haven voters.

And it will be the first time that an incumbent participates in the program when facing a serious competitor. The only other time two candidates qualified was when Elicker and Kermit Carolina were among four candidates for the Democratic nomination in 2013 for the then-open mayor’s seat.

That matters because public-financing programs are often a response to public pressure to limit the influence of money in politics, to enable more candidates to run, and for ideas and grassroots support to make more of a difference in who runs the government.

The rapidity with which both candidates qualified for public financing (and raised money in general) also signals that both have the support to wage competitive campaigns.

Two other potential mayoral candidates have also submitted paperwork indicating a desire to participate in the Democracy Fund this year if they end up raising the money and pursuing campaigns, according to Heimer. One is Mayce Torres, who lives in the Hill. She has filed official papers to run for mayor and created this website. (Torres ran for alder in Ward 4 in 2017 as an independent in the general election.) In October she filed this legal complaint against the city concerning its failure to contain drug-dealing and violence in her neighborhood. The other potential candidate seeking a ballot spot, Elena Grewal, a graduate of Yale and Hopkins School who lives in East Rock, has filed papers to create an exploratory committee for a Democratic mayoral run but has yet to form an official campaign committee.

Diverging On Double-Runs

DuBois-Walton and Elicker are taking different approaches about whether to run once, or potentially twice, for the seat this year.

Running twice has become a new normal of sorts in competitive mayoral elections as the ranks of unaffiliated voters, who can’t vote in party primaries, have risen.

In 2013, Elicker collected petitions to make the ballot as an unaffiliated candidate and run again in the general election after he lost a Democratic primary to Toni Harp. Harp won the general election as well.

In 2019, Mayor Harp collected petitions to make the ballot as an unaffiliated candidate and run again in the general election after she lost a Democratic primary to then-challenger Elicker. Elicker won the general election as well.

New Haven may or may not see a rerun of that pattern this year, depending who wins the Democratic primary.

DuBois-Walton said Thursday that she will definitely not run in the general election as an independent-line candidate if she loses the primary to Elicker.

“I don’t like that trend,” she said. ​“I’m a Democrat. That’s a game my opponent plays. I’m in this for the Democratic nomination. It left a bad taste in my mouth” when then U.S. Sen.Joe Lieberman pioneered that approach after losing a 2006 Democratic primary, and when it emerged in local New Haven mayoral politics in 2013.

Asked his intentions Thursday, Elicker did not rule out an independent November run should he lose the primary.

“I’m focused on getting the endorsement and the primary. Like in the past, I leave my options open,” he said.

Blue Lines

DuBois-Walton and supporting speakers at Thursday’s rally stressed a theme of leadership, competence, experience, and commitment to equity.

Immigrant-rights advocate Kica Matos spoke about the time she and DuBois-Walton worked alongside each other in City Hall as deputy mayors. Matos said DuBois-Walton played an important behind-the-scenes role in helping her roll out immigration reforms (like an immigrant-friendly ID card and a new police policy forbidding officers from inquiring into people’s immigration status in most instances). She noted that as chief administrative officer, DuBois-Walton oversaw, among other line departments, the police. In that role, DuBois-Walton promoted community policing, ​“something we so desperate need a return to in this city,” Matos said, ​“a police department that will serve and respect and protect our community.”

Matos and early-education advocate Allyx Schiavone spoke as well about a need for leadership at the conflict-wracked Board of Education and a renewed focus on the needs of children.

DuBois-Walton echoed those points, among others, in her speech. Without naming names, she spoke out against ​“messages from leadership that tolerates mistreating this community,” a reference to the controversy over a public embrace of the military-spawned ​“Thin Blue Line” concept by Elicker’s choice to lead the NHPD. (Click here to read a previous story in which DuBois-Walton addressed that issue directly.)

The pandemic, waves of coming federal aid, police accountability protests, and uptick in gun violence have created an opening to tackle ​“inequity” challenges in the schools, on the streets, in the NHPD, argued DuBois-Walton. She began working with Yale Child Study Center and cops on childhood trauma in the 1990s, served as mayoral chief of staff, and has run the housing authority for the past 14 years. ​“New Haven has never been more ready to rectify these inequities.”

The ​“current mayor,” she said, not mentioning Elicker’s name, ​“does not meet the moment. … I have the experience to solve these problems. I have been working on these problems my entire career.”

Current Mayor Elicker agreed that New Haven has a chance to think big and tackle big problems in this moment. He said his administration is doing that.

He cited its response to the Covid-19 pandemic, its work on crafting a ​“crisis intervention team” to handle some emergency calls that now go to police, and a prison re-entry initiative.

“I’m proud of the way that New Haven has led the state through Covid, but beyond that we have begun the process of reimagining the way that we see public safety through a creation of a crisis response team, implemented police training and accountability measures, supported a deeper way for individuals returning from incarceration, and addressing in a long-term and deep way the city’s financial challenges,” he said in a conversation after DuBois-Walton’s rally.

“We are leading at this time. I’m grateful for the work that my team has done to move this city forward despite odds during the pandemic.”

“Imagine,” Updated

John Lennon did not attend Thursday’s campaign rally. But candidate DuBois-Walton did invoke him in a way, making a riff on the late Beatle’s trademark solo single the crescendo of her address.

“Imagine with me,” she told the crowd, ​“a boy born at Yale New Haven Hospital in 2027. To a family living on Grand Avenue or Dixwell Avenue or Columbus Avenue or any street in our city.

“And imagine that when he wakes up every day, he doesn’t have to fear violence either in his community or from his sworn protector.

“Imagine him growing up without the risk of environmental toxins and without the increased risk of asthma.

“Imagine him going to Fair Haven School every day excited to learn in a place that’s well resourced and where he feels valued and supported.

“And imagine him at age 12 being exposed to potential workforce programs where he can start to develop the skills that can keep him supported throughout his whole life.

“Imagine his graduation ceremony, ready for college or ready to jump into a well-paying job.

“Imagine him some day starting a business right here in New Haven so he doesn’t have to leave New Haven for opportunity.

“And imagine him a few years later buying his own home just off Grand Avenue, starting a family and building community right where he grew up.

“Envision that with me, and then understand that that’s not a dream. We can make that a reality. We have the power to make that dream real if we act in this moment. If we choose the right leadership in this moment, we can achieve incredible things.”