CT Post: It’s Time To Work With Ganim For Benefit Of The City

Failing to influence the general election race against Joe Ganim on the front page and the editorial page, a commentary in the Connecticut Post urges opponents of the mayor-elect to “suspend those feelings and work with the new mayor for the benefit of the city.”

When Ganim was cast in the underdog’s role in his Democratic primary challenge of incumbent Bill Finch, the Post’s front page coverage had a titillating edge of Ganim’s comeback bid with the former mayor taking Finch to task on public safety, taxes and quality of life issues. The editorial page wrote little about the primary except giving Finch a tepid endorsement. After Ganim gored Finch in the primary, the front page and editorial commentary took on a hand-wringing harsh edge rehashing Ganim’s past in numerous stories. The Post endorsed Mary-Jane Foster in the general election. A solid majority of voters sided with Ganim, as if to say, we know his baggage, who cares. In fact Ganim won every demographic group in the city including neighborhoods where the Post’s circulation is strongest.

Now that high-ranking elected officials who had opposed Ganim have now come around, the Post’s editorial page declares it’s time time to look ahead … “what’s good for Bridgeport is good for the state.”

The Post commentary follows:

To the shock of many–and the dismay of others–Joseph P. Ganim, the Bridgeport mayor who went to jail for corruption in 2003, on Nov. 3 reclaimed the job as chief executive of Connecticut’s largest city.

Ganim’s opponents, including two-term incumbent Democrat Bill Finch–incumbent for 19 more days–warned that Ganim’s election would make the powerful and the influential, from developers to elected officials at all levels, turn their backs on the city and would halt whatever positive forces are moving.

It’s become clear in the last few days that Gov. Dannel P. Malloy, who did not endorse his fellow Democrat, and other high-ranking Democrats, including U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal and Chris Murphy are resigned to working with the once and future mayor.

As we have said–and as Mayor-elect Ganim has said–he has to prove himself a new man. He will have to earn the trust of those who remain wary.

It’s understandable when trying to size up an elected official who was driven out of office the first time by convictions on 16 counts of corruption.

But shunning or undercutting him, whether it’s by influential figures in Fairfield County, Hartford or Washington, does nothing other than drop yet another load on the backs of the people who live in Bridgeport, a city that still needs every bit of help it can get.

And what’s good for Bridgeport is good for the state.

Ganim may fail on his own–and we hope he succeeds–but he should not fail because people who are in a position to help the people of Bridgeport choose not to because of who the mayor is.

The onus, for sure, is on the 56-year-old mayor-elect to prove his integrity and to live up to his vow that his administration will be the most transparent in the history of the city and that any good project under way, will continue.

He’s also pledged there is “no more other side” and that, again, he will incorporate all that’s good for the city of Bridgeport, whether that’s people, projects, ideas, businesses, and so on.

Ganim retakes the mayor’s office on Dec. 1.

Once again, he is, as improbable as it once seemed, merely the frontman for a community of just under 150,000 people, many of whom are among the neediest in the state of Connecticut.

So we urge legislators, chief elected officials and, frankly, anyone with the influence to do something good for those people to do that.

However dismayed they may have been by the election outcome, it is time to suspend those feelings and work with the new mayor for the benefit of the city.