It’s a week and a day until the preliminary election, the day when the field of candidates for mayor will be narrowed down from three to two, and the field of at-large Council candidates from 12 to 10, with the lucky winners going on to the Nov. 8 general election. (And no—sigh—not one of the eight ward Council seats has generated enough interest to trigger a preliminary. Indeed, only one of the eight ward incumbents even faces a challenger: Ward 8’s John Lysak, who is fighting Orlando Ramos, the candidate he beat for the seat back in 2009.)
Still trying to decide whom to vote for? On Tuesday, Sept. 13, the McKnight Neighborhood Council will hold a mayoral candidates’ debate, from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sprague Cultural Arts Center, on the American International College campus at 1000 State St. (Doors open at 6.)
The debate, to be moderated by Walter Kroll, president of the McKnight council, should be a good one: the three candidates (that would be incumbent Mayor Dom Sarno, School Committee member Antonette Pepe, and City Council President Jose Tosado—although, really, if you don’t even know who’s running for mayor at this point, you’re probably not planning to go to the debate) will be asked to answer three sets of questions, all submitted in advance of the debate. One set will come from members of the neighborhood council, another from a few local reporters (Mike Dobbs of the Reminder, Pete Goonan of the Republican, and, well, me), and—here’s the fun part—the last from the candidates themselves, who were asked to submit two questions to be asked of each of their opponents.
The McKnight Council, in an announcement of the event, says it “promises to be a vigorous and hard hitting debate.” I’ll say, if the last couple of months on the campaign trail have been any indication.
Meanwhile, if you prefer your politics with a bit of a party atmosphere, check out the Democracy Fiesta planned for Friday, Sept. 16, from 2 to 6 p.n. at Kenefick Park on Plainfield Street. Organized by a coalition of the city’s core social-justice groups, the event is billed as a chance to “Celebrate Your Community and Your Power to Vote,” and will include food, music and activities for the kiddos.
The Fiesta is part of an effort to engage more residents in the electoral process, especially in its black and Latino neighborhoods. As a chart on the website of the Springfield Institute shows, voter turnout in the 2010 election was a rather dismal 32 percent—and that was among registered voters, and didn’t include voting-age residents who didn’t even bother to register. And the numbers were even worse in those city neighborhoods with largely poor and largely minority populations: only 16 percent of registered voters came out to the polls in Ward 1, and only 15 percent in Ward 3. In contrast, in the largely white and more affluent Ward 7 the figure was 51 percent.
“This election season is an historic opportunity to increase voter participation rates in severely underrepresented communities in Springfield,” the Springfield Institute notes. “There are more candidates of color running for city council than ever before. And for the first time in Springfield’s history, there is a Latino candidate for mayor.”
