Here’s a novel approach to fill a City Council seat: you apply. Following the death of Evette Brantley, 132nd Town Committee District Leader Tom Gaudett, also a key aide to Mayor Joe Ganim, shares the vetting process for district pols to issue a recommendation to the legislative body for approval.
Normally, pols identify friends and lure them in to fill vacancies. Who knows, maybe a gem will emerge in this process.
When it comes to fingers (not middle, necessarily), Bridgeport’s 10 City Council districts feature an assortment of map twisting turns that may cause motion sickness.
The district largely covers the area west of Park Avenue below Suburban Avenue to Brooklawn Avenue along the Fairfield border, south below North Avenue to Howard Avenue, taking in pieces of Fairfield Avenue and State Street.
Bridgeport’s council districts encapsulate two representatives. Marcus Brown, in lieu of filling Brantley’s seat, is the lone occupant for neighborhood constituency.
The process, set below, covers a timeline to fill the seat for the new year.
Due to the unfortunate passing of Councilwoman Mary Evette Brantley, there exists a vacancy in the Office of City Council for the 132nd District. While the 132nd Town Committee would have welcomed the opportunity for a special election to fill the seat, the clear language of the City Charter directs the City Council to fill the vacancy with a Democratic elector of the district by majority vote. While this leaves the 132nd Town Committee with no formal or legal role in the process, it is the tradition that the town committee of the district in which a vacancy exists makes a recommendation to the City Council on whom that person should be.
In order to appropriately exercise this advisory function, the 132nd Town Committee has decided to give potential candidates an opportunity to express interest in the position and be vetted prior to the Council’s consideration of the matter. Any 132nd Town Committee members interested in the position must recuse themselves from the vetting process. The Town Committee will forward all materials collected in the process to the City Council for its consideration, and may by majority vote endorse one of the candidates. Ultimately, the City Council will use its discretion pursuant to its Charter powers to fill the vacancy.
While the Charter only limits the potential candidates to fill the vacancy to registered Democrats who live in the 132nd District, the Town Committee has decided to add the following criteria for the purposes of exercising its advisory function:
➔ No City employee will be considered for the 132nd Town Committee endorsement;
➔ The candidate should have been a Democratic elector within the 132nd District as of November 18, 2021. Candidates who switched their registration to Democrat or moved into the district at a later time will not be considered for the endorsement;
➔ Preference will be given to a candidate who resides in the Bassick precinct, since
Councilman Brown currently resides in the Central precinct.What to Submit: Short Questionnaire (attached) and a resume highlighting civic/community engagement.
How to Submit: Email all materials and contact information to ThomasGaudett@gmail.com
Timeline:
Wednesday, December 15th by 8pm — Deadline to submit questionnaire and resume.
Friday, December 17th after 5pm — Interviews to be scheduled with the 132nd Town
Committee; Discussion of candidates and potential vote to endorse a candidate
See questionnaire here 132nd Council Vacancy_Expression of Interest.
This should be a District run off only and keep Mario and the Mayor out of it!
Lol!! Good luck with that!
Cheers!!
Too late….
Reported that Tom Gaudett was at Testo’s bright and early this morning with a list of name for Mario’s review.
HAHAH..Oh please,stop the dog & pony show and just give it to the person Mario selected already,it’s Bpt,everyone knows how these things work….”submit questionnaire and resume.” HAHAHAHA
This reminds me of the “national search” for police chief..lol
Wait ……you mean AJ was NOT the finest applicant??????? But Joe….. and Mario…
and….. thought….. ah …never mind…..
Cheers!
Drag the City Attorney and Charter into Court and there will be run off!
Voting Rights Act of 1965
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Voting Rights Act of 1965
Great Seal of the United States
Long title An Act to enforce the fifteenth amendment of the Constitution of the United States, and for other purposes.
Acronyms (colloquial) VRA
Nicknames Voting Rights Act
Enacted by the 89th United States Congress
Effective August 6, 1965
Citations
Public law 89-110
Statutes at Large 79 Stat. 437
Codification
Titles amended Title 52—Voting and Elections
U.S.C. sections created
52 U.S.C. § 10101
52 U.S.C. §§ 10301–10314
52 U.S.C. §§ 10501–10508
52 U.S.C. §§ 10701–10702
Legislative history
Introduced in the Senate as S. 1564 by Mike Mansfield (D‑MT) and Everett Dirksen (R‑IL) on March 17, 1965
Committee consideration by Judiciary
Passed the Senate on May 26, 1965 (77-19)
Passed the House with amendment on July 9, 1965 (333–85)
Reported by the joint conference committee on July 29, 1965; agreed to by the House on August 3, 1965 (328–74) and by the Senate on August 4, 1965 (79–18)
Signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on August 6, 1965
Major amendments
Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1970[1]
Voting Rights Act of 1965, Amendments of 1975[2]
Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1982[3]
Voting Rights Language Assistance Act of 1992[4]
Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott King, César E. Chávez, Barbara C. Jordan, William C. Velásquez, and Dr. Hector P. Garcia Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006[5][6]
United States Supreme Court cases
South Carolina v. Katzenbach (1966)
Katzenbach v. Morgan (1966)
Allen v. State Board of Elections (1969)
Oregon v. Mitchell (1970)
Beer v. United States (1976)
City of Rome v. United States (1980)
City of Mobile v. Bolden (1980)
Thornburg v. Gingles (1986)
Growe v. Emison (1993)
Voinovich v. Quilter (1993)
Shaw v. Reno (1993)
Holder v. Hall (1994)
Johnson v. De Grandy (1994)
Miller v. Johnson (1995)
Bush v. Vera (1996)
Lopez v. Monterey County (1999)
Reno v. Bossier Parish School Board (2000)
Georgia v. Ashcroft (2003)
League of United Latin American Citizens v. Perry (2006)
Bartlett v. Strickland (2009)
Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District No. 1 v. Holder (2009)
Shelby County v. Holder (2013)
Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee (2021)
vte
Civil Rights Movement in Washington D.C.
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting.[7][8] It was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson during the height of the civil rights movement on August 6, 1965, and Congress later amended the Act five times to expand its protections.[7] Designed to enforce the voting rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, the Act sought to secure the right to vote for racial minorities throughout the country, especially in the South. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the Act is considered to be the most effective piece of federal civil rights legislation ever enacted in the country.[9] It is also “one of the most far-reaching pieces of civil rights legislation in U.S. history.”[10]
The act contains numerous provisions that regulate elections. The act’s “general provisions” provide nationwide protections for voting rights. Section 2 is a general provision that prohibits every state and local government from imposing any voting law that results in discrimination against racial or language minorities. Other general provisions specifically outlaw literacy tests and similar devices that were historically used to disenfranchise racial minorities. The act also contains “special provisions” that apply to only certain jurisdictions. A core special provision is the Section 5 preclearance requirement, which prohibits certain jurisdictions from implementing any change affecting voting without receiving preapproval from the U.S. attorney general or the U.S. District Court for D.C. that the change does not discriminate against protected minorities.[11] Another special provision requires jurisdictions containing significant language minority populations to provide bilingual ballots and other election materials.