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Plainfield Democrats met Saturday. |
UPDATED with the Booker-Hamm race. -- Dan. At Saturday's Plainfield Democratic City Committee meeting, the line for citywide at-large was given to Steve Hockaday, currently Ward 4 councilor. Ward 3 incumbent Charles McRae got the nod for another run.
Both were unanimous recommendations of the screening committee Chairman Adrian O. Mapp had previously appointed.
Ward 1 committee member Robert Graham and Plainfield activist also screened for the at-large seat. McRae was the only person screened for Ward 3.
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The Union County team (l to r): Rajoppi, Corvelli, Hudak, Garretson, Leon, chair Nick Scutari. |
Our Congressional representative, the very popular Bonnie Watson Coleman will also be on the ballot this year.
Sen. Cory Booker is also running for reelection, now that he has bowed out of the presidential race. With only $73K in his warchest, he is faced with a challenge by longtime Newark activist Larry Hamm, who has aligned himself with the Progressive faction of Bernie Sanders.
Discussing the presidential primary -- which is the same day as the county primary -- Chairman Mapp said that the Union County committee had taken no stand on any candidate yet.
He is personally in favor of Mike Bloomberg at this point, but said he will support the County committee's choice. Union County will decide at its convention in March.
It seemed to me a good opportunity while the discussion was being had to conduct a straw poll of the members present (there were about 23 from what I could tell) as to where their thinking was at this moment. However, it was not to be.
Though some counties have moved to a more participatory form of decision-making, Union County still follows the old-timey pattern of top-down machine politics.
Today (Sunday), the Hunterdon County Dems will meet in convention and decide on a candidate. As the first county convention in the primary season, Hunterdon is often referred to as "the Iowa of New Jersey."
The presidential primary has another significance for Plainfield as the local challengers (David Rutherford for citywide at-large and Emily Morgan for Ward 3) have aligned themselves with the Bernie Sanders campaign. Sanders' followers -- heavily weighted to younger voters -- are intensely loyal. We shall see what that amounts to in June.
After Chairman Mapp invited the candidates to say a few words, he took the time to review some of the many projects currently under way or soon to come to the Queen City -- including a large residential project across from Seidler Field, The Station at Grant, $2M+ in upgrades (including an artificial turf field) at Rushmore Playground, and construction to begin this spring on the townhomes to replace now-demolished Elmwood Gardens.
Chairman Mapp also advised the County is looking for poll workers and interested parties should reach out to him. The requirements and an application form are on the County's website. Poll workers are paid $200 for election day (twice a year) -- but it is a looooong day, from before 6:00 AM to after 8:00 PM.
Petitions were circulated, and will be circulated in the community over the next few weeks (they are due April 1 -- no joke).
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