On Tuesday Mayor Joe Ganim brought his Runyonesque run for governor to Hartford where he opened a campaign office in the capital city. Hartford Courant reporters Daniela Altimari and Matthew Ormseth provide this perspective.
For Joe Ganim, the road to the governor’s office–and the next phase of his redemption–goes right through Hartford.
On Tuesday, the one-time political whiz kid who served time in federal prison on corruption charges before mounting a stunning comeback and winning another term as Bridgeport’s mayor in 2015, stood on a sidewalk in Hartford’s North End and basked in the adulation of more than two dozen energetic supporters.“I’m excited,” Ganim said in front of his newly opened campaign headquarters on Blue Hills Avenue. “This is about as grass-roots, person-to-person, neighborhood-to-neighborhood … as you can be in a democracy.”
Ganim, a Democrat, says he will try to win support from 15 percent of the delegates at the state party convention later this month, which would win him a place on the August Democratic primary ballot.
Full story here.
Dear Hartford Voters,
CT has been my home for 75 years. The day after graduating from college, I embarked on a career in the life and health insurance business. Within five years I had moved to the Bridgeport-Fairfield region where I have maintained an office serving individual families, small businesses and non-profit organizations with products offering guarantees of one type or another. My home has been in Bridgeport for 30 years, and my office too since March 1, 2017.
In my lifetime I have met no one who is perfect, that is without faults and imperfections which they may be working on or not at this moment. It is therefore important to know who is operating in an elected governance capacity in an OPEN, ACCOUNTABLE, TRANSPARENT and HONEST manner. Whether Joe pledged a firm purpose of amendment for the acts he was convicted and served time for or not, most folks who support “second chances” look for change. Joe has not changed and that became obvious when he campaigned on STOP RAISING TAXES and then promptly raised them a frightening amount.
He has blamed that on a $20 Million deficit he says he inherited. When one looks at each revenue or expense item that made up the problem and the way he solved it, the tax hike was not necessary. But Joe does not like to go into details. And he did not wish to look at finding wrongdoing and assigning consequences to his predecessors who caused the DEFICIT. Why not? There could have been great learning on the part of taxpayers and voting citizens. Ganim2 ignored it all. He is not a reformer of bad governance practices.
He will pursue his own goals. One of his early acts was to build a bridge from his first termination of employment due to the Federal conviction to his election in 2016 as Mayor. Despite frequent questioning on the pages of OIB, he has never provided an answer as to how this BRIDGE was constructed, on what basis he pleaded for his special inclusion, and what is the cost to the public for his financial benefit. (All the while he has steadily ignored the situation of the 21,000 youth of the community who depend on Ganim2, his fiscal staff, and an underpowered and under resourced City Council who can find no way to make up for this community vacuum. There is much more to be said, especially since Joe is present to the other 168 communities of CT more than the people of the City of Bridgeport these days. Is this fair, just or what he said he signed up for three years ago? Time will tell.
Say it ain’t so Joe.
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Joe Ganim is the most disingenuous politician in the United States of America: “This is about as grass-roots, person-to-person, neighborhood-to-neighborhood … as you can be in a democracy.” Not once since Ganim’s release from a ferpderal halfway hoise has he admitted to his wrongs. Even Marion Berry admitted “I fucked up” after the FBI serrepticiously recorded him smoking crack with a prostitute in a Washington, D.C., hotel room.
Not so with Joe. He used an invitation to address the congregation of Reverend Chares Stallworth’s East Rnd Tabernacle Baptist Church as a photo opportunity. Never said “I exercised poor judgement, I’m sorry, please forgive me.” Never, not once. Come election day he stooped to Mario Testa’s tried-and-true campaign tactics, ferrying busloads of voters to the polls, bribing them with double sawbucks and slices of pizza from a certain Brooklawn Avenue restaurant.
If Little Joe Ganim really believes that’s going to work on a statewide level he is delusional, or just a shameless crook.