Paul Bass Photo
Without any rallies or public announcement, Mayor Toni Harp has formally launched her reelection campaign.
Harp (pictured), the city’s first female mayor, has filed papers in the City Clerk’s office to form a campaign committee and scheduled a fundraiser.
Former Alder and Arts Council chief Frances “Bitsie” Clark is listed in the filing as Harp’s campaign treasurer, Larcina Wynn as her deputy treasurer.
The campaign address is listed as 419 Whalley Ave.
Harp has scheduled a campaign fundraiser for Monday, March 30, at Barracuda Bistro & Bar at 1180 Chapel St. A flyer for the event shows Harp posing with the new 100 College St. Alexion tower in the background; the flyer’s slogan: “Help Keep New Haven Moving Forward.”
Harp confirmed Friday that she is indeed seeking a second two-year term. She said doesn’t plan to make a formal announcement until she firms up the campaign team. She has not yet selected a campaign manager, for instance, she said.
“I filed so that I can begin to raise money so we can begin to pull resources together,” Harp said.
Harp’s first term expires at the end of this year. Her reelection campaign is expected to highlight the city’s decline in violent crime, new youth projects, the removal of the fence separating Hamden from the West Rock neighborhood, and the reopening of the Palace theater as the College Street Music Hall. (Click here to read a story detailing highs and lows in her first year in office.)
Potential opponents have not yet filed papers to run against Harp this year. Conversations with some people who opposed or simply didn’t support Harp in 2013 revealed no immediate signs of a challenge.
Republican Town Chair Richter Elser, for instance, said his party is more focused on finding at least four or five candidates to run for seats on the 30-member Board of Alders. The party had four alder candidates in 2013; none won.
Elser credited Harp for her administration’s “transparency” in acknowledging problems with snow removal its first year, then “learning from its mistakes” and improving in year two. He also praised the work of her traffic and parking chief, Doug Hausladen.
“She’s done some good stuff. She’s taken heat for some stuff,” Elser said, declining to define the latter stuff. “Any mayor who comes in after [a 20-year incumbent] is going to take some heat. You’re changing things.”
Justin Elicker, who ran a spirited general-election campaign as an independent against Harp in 2013, said “at this point” he does not “plan on running. Unless anything dramatic changes, I won’t run.”
“I’ve been impressed at how visible she’s been,” Elicker said. “It’s clear she really cares about the job.
“Obviously when you put so much into running for mayor as I did, you look at things and think about what I’d have done differently. There are things I would have done differently. But I’ve been impressed that she’s thrown her all into the job.” He declined to identify what he’d have done differently.
Asked if she’ll support Harp’s reelection, one sometimes-critic, Anna Festa, replied, “We’ll have to see who else is running.” Festa backed Elicker in 2013; beginning her first term in 2014, she joined a short-lived “People’s Caucus” that opposed the Harp administration.
Festa praised Harp for “doing a pretty good job” after a “rocky start” with some controversial appointments.
“The city overall, I think, is being managed more reasonably,” Festa said. “I’m willing to give her the benefit of the doubt to improve policies that needed to be improved over the past 20 years.”
Public works has stepped up its game, Festa said. She said the city did a much better job clearing the streets in this year’s first snowstorm than it did last year. With the second storm, she observed, street-clearing went back “down a few” notches. Festa said both the government and citizens (who need to move their cars to make room for plows) showed signs of improvement but still have plenty of work to do.