City primaries start to heat up
STAMFORD — Election Day is five months away, but preparations are well underway.
It’s a year for challengers, which will make for interesting primaries on Aug. 14.
That’s the day voters from each major party will go to the polls to choose among nominees who want to run for top state offices and General Assembly seats in November.
Among Stamford Democrats, the race for a state House of Representatives seat in District 146 — downtown, the South End and Shippan — will be particularly competitive.
The first clue came last week, when members of the Democratic City Committee failed to endorse the two-term incumbent, state Rep. Terry Adams, who sits on the committee and is a longtime member of the Stamford Board of Representatives.
In a 4-3 vote, committee delegates instead chose David Michel, an environmental activist and former Green Party candidate who tried unsuccessfully to unseat Adams in 2016.
A third contender, newcomer Corey Paris, got no votes, but has the support of a number of city Democrats and several in the state, and the endorsement of a national group
that supports young progressives. Paris said he is out collecting the signatures he needs to petition his way onto the ballot in August.
Adams did not return requests for comment, but Stamford Democratic Registrar of Voters Ron Malloy confirmed Friday that Adams and Paris have taken out petitions. Signatures are due June 12, according to the Secretary of the State’s Office.
Change in direction
Democratic City Committee Chairman Josh Fedeli said the vote against the incumbent was surprising, sort of.
“I’ve stopped expecting anything,” Fedeli said. “The thing is that only seven people on the committee live in the 146th District, so they were the only ones who could vote on the endorsement. When all you need is a majority of four people, things can change quickly.”
A primary outcome would be equally difficult to predict, Fedeli said.
“Adams is the incumbent, so that’s a factor. Michel and Paris will work hard and, from everything I can see, run competent campaigns,” he said. “For Michel, the party endorsement means his name will appear in Row A, the most advantageous ballot position.”
The other advantage is that this time Michel, who is accustomed to the lower ballot lines reserved for challengers, does not have to collect signatures for the primary. But he was out Thursday night in the rain meeting people in the South End.
The cleanup vote
“For five years, I did a lot of ground work with conservation. I’ve been fighting against polluters, including one of the biggest developers in the city, BLT,” said Michel, 43, an eyewear designer who has lived in Stamford for 10 years.
Michel worked to stop BLT from polluting Stamford Harbor with particles of Styrofoam used to insulate buildings going up in the company’s Harbor Point development. Cleanups of parks, beaches, streets and wetlands that he organized have resulted in the collection of thousands of pounds of trash.
Michel said he believes those efforts won him endorsement votes.
“I think it was my energy and relentlessness in trying to make things better for people,” said Michel, who moved to the United States from France when he was 14. “Working in conservation helped me see the bigger issues that allow problems to occur. Choices made in local government affect public health, air quality, water quality and other issues.”
Government also needs cleaning up, Michel said.
“I try to document things and put them in the public eye, so people know when there is a lack of attention to something,” he said. “That’s why I want to go to the state. There is more of a chance to make changes, to represent the people’s interests and block special interests. The way to attract more people to Connecticut is to fix the infrastructure, improve the parks, end homelessness — not give tax rebates to big companies.”
Shining city
Paris, 26, is an Arkansas native who grew up in Kansas and moved to Stamford in 2011. He said he moved to Danbury to attend Western Connecticut State University for two years, and lived in Bridgeport for a year before returning to Stamford.
Paris said he examined the demographics of District 146 and found that people are generally transient, 30 percent Latino, 41 percent millennial, 54 percent female and 13 percent black.
“My fiancee and I say there is nowhere we would live other than Stamford,” said Paris, who will be married in November. “The culture, the diversity, the amount of opportunity — it’s just bustling. It’s a great place to raise a family.”
Stamford is “the shining city on a hill compared to other cities in Connecticut,” he said, “but we have our challenges, which means they can be overcome.”
One is traffic gridlock, he said. Another is strengthening the school system, and a key one is good housing that people can afford, he said.
“I’ve studied what’s happened in Stamford over the last 40 years — where we’ve been going with building and development. History indicates the boom will burst,” Paris said. “Developers are taking over the open spaces and not offering enough options for single-family homes. People want the option to purchase housing. Now they can only rent.”
Paris has been endorsed by Run for Something, a nationwide activist group launched last year to recruit and back young Democrats for state and local races.
August attendance
Adams, 59, is a longtime Pitney Bowes employee and South End community leader who has lived in Stamford for four decades. After he won his second term in the House in 2016, Adams said he would step down from his District 3 seat on the Stamford Board of Representatives. But he ran for an eighth board term last year and won. He did not return multiple requests for comment.
Fedeli said several factors will make for a higherthan-usual turnout Aug. 14.
Connecticut will be one of 36 states electing a governor. Stamford native Dannel P. Malloy, a Democrat who was the city’s mayor from 1995-2009, will not seek a third term.
Democrats endorsed Greenwich cable TV magnate Ned Lamont in his second bid for governor. Republicans endorsed Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton. Both have challengers within their parties.
“There are primaries not just for governor, but for lieutenant governor, attorney general, secretary of the state, treasurer,” Fedeli said. “It will be a very busy season.”