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Two long-time councilors on the way out
By adamg on Tue, 11/03/2015 - 8:43pm
Winners: Essaibi-George and Campbell.
The Dorchester Reporter calls District 4 for Andrea Campbell in a decisive win over three-decade Councilor Charles Yancey, in her first run for elective office.
Annissa Essaibi-George finished ahead of incumbent Steve Murphy for the fourth at-large seat, behind Wu, Flaherty and Pressley. Murphy, on the council since 1997, called Essaibi-George to congratulate her. Essaibi-George came in fifth for an at-large seat two years ago.
Their victories mean that, for the second time, four of the thirteen councilors are women.
In other district races, McCarthy, Baker and Jackson all won re-election. The other district races were uncontested.
Citywide turnout was just 13.6%.
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Comments
Even though I gave a bullet
Even though I gave a bullet vote for Annissa, I'm happy for Steve Murphy; now he can enjoy his time in Florida year-round.
He can take his ridiculous idea of politics
to his condo association.
How does a Bullet Vote actually work?
How does a Bullet Vote actually work? Does a Bullet Vote work? Do Bullet Voters loose by not voting on other Candidates?
Good question
In an election where voters can vote for multiple candidates for multiple seats (distinct from the single transferrable vote system in Ireland) all candidates are essentially running against each other. With a "bullet vote," a voter votes for only one candidate, thereby denying other candidates any support. This increases the value of a single ballot. Here's an example with candidates A through E vying for 4 seats.
ABDE
ACDE
BCDE
C
ABCE
CE
ABDE
ABCE
C
total-
A- 5
B- 5
C- 7
D- 4
E- 5
uncast- 8
C comes in first because 2 voters only chose her, while one voter chose her and another. If those voters chose other candidates, C might not have come in first.
I did a bullet in an election recently, since I felt the person I supported needed the boost. The ballots haven't been counted yet, but I am dying to see the results.
That's a perfect summation of
That's a perfect summation of voting strategy. The problem with Boston's at-large voting system is that one of your votes can cancel out another. So if I really want change and a new face on the council, it's only really worthwhile to vote for the one really preferred candidate, rather than the others you only "kinda" support.
Now, if we had Cambridge's STV system, that would be a whole different story. As much as I'd advocate that in Boston, I feel like the public information and education that would have to be spent in explaining the system outweighs the very real benefits.
Happy I gave Flaherty the bullet vote
And even more pumped Yancey got a swift kick in his nutts.
Peace!!!!
Women taking over the city
Women taking over the city council chamber,.
Still have a ways to go
Only four of the councilors will be women come Jan. 1.
City Council
Has almost no power. And the mayor bought them with the salary increase. I wouldn't worry about the scary women running things just yet.
Yancey was a great Councillor
Yancey was a terrific Councillor and represented the most progressive views on the Boston City Council.
He held hearings and actively opposed the Level 4 BU Biolab, to protect the neighborhoods. Many are grateful
to Yancey for his leadership. He was the only Councillor that was truly for the people and didn't bow to
corporate interests through campaign contributions. He will be missed by many in our city.
Bye Yancey!
Bye bye!
new day in Boston.
congrats to Andrea and Annissa!
11% of District 2 voters
11% of District 2 voters opted to write-in, rather than vote for Linehan.
UPDATE:
If I'm interpreting this correctly, it looks like 2/3rds of voters left the field blank, rather than vote for him.
http://www.cityofboston.gov/elections/currentelections/
Reddit voted for Keytar Bear over Bill Linehan
https://www.reddit.com/r/boston/comments/3rcsmo/who_to_write_in_for_bost...
A friend of mine worked for
A friend of mine worked for the Elections Department, and he said that there were a surprising number of write-in votes which basically said, "This dude sucks."
I've a feeling that may have been the instance here.
Think you're reading that
Think you're reading that wrong.
Total Votes 4026
Number of Uncast Votes 2708
BILL LINEHAN 3593 89.24%
Write-in Votes 433 10.76%
The total votes is doesn't include uncast votes, so 6734 ballots, ~53% of ballots cast a vote for him.
Anyone competent could easily knock him out of office.
You're right!
.
I wrote myself in against Linehan.
A few others did too. I should have probably talked with more people.
Linehan
Hmmmm, write-ins and blanks won a decisive victory over incumbent Bill Linehan. Sounds right to this blank voter!
But how much more awesome would it have been...
.... if all of us who left the slot blank or wrote in something random, had all agreed to write in, say, "Mickey Mouse"
Bully who? OOHHhh you mean no
Bully who? OOHHhh you mean no show Linehan
Big Night for the Ladies!
Congrats to Pressley & Wu for topping the ticket and to Campbell and Essaibi-George for toppling two incumbents!
So Pressley wins another office next year
And Murphy gets back on the council.
Eh?
How do you figure that?
Council Rules
If one councilor vacates there is no new election - the next highest person on the vote tally fills the seat. So if Ayanna - or anyone else leaves - Murphy is back in.
Re: Boston City Council Rules
Boston City Council Rules fail to address Records Management practices for vision impaired folks! New more knowledgeable appointees are needed in Council Central Staff Office and City Clerks Offices that know up to date technology/software.
Why, YES, I've heard!
smh...
Unless there is death
or serious illness, elected officals should be forbidden from vacating their office before their term is up.
Interesting
If two of them leave, I might be a city councilor?
I had my friends all write my name in for Councilor At-Large rather than vote for Murphy or Flaherty with their 4th vote. I might actually have won 6th place.
I can't upvote this enough.
.
That means Evita Pressley will need
to register to vote in Argentina. Unlikely..
Not necessarily
If Pressley hypothetically won a seat in the state legislature next year, she could retain her City Council seat at the same time. Tim Toomey serves on both the Cambridge City Council and in the House, for instance. I recall Ray Flynn doing this in Boston for a few years, and more recently Denise Provost in Somerville.
Why would Ayanna want to
Why would Ayanna want to serve in the State House? She has a bigger platform, makes more money and has a shot at the House of Representatives or Lt. Governor right where she's at.
My gut
Her goal is DC.
I'd agree with that, but I
I'd agree with that, but I think her path to DC runs through a spot on the Democratic ticket for Governor (or Lt. Governor) in 2018.
Has Yancey called Campbell yet?
Or is he being a sore loser?
He'll be a sore losser
I bet he shows up at every community meeting and give her shit...
What percentage of Registered Voters Voted?
a) What percentage of Registered Voters Voted? b) What percentage of the population Voted?
13.6% of registered voters
13.6% of registered voters went to the polls. You're clearly on the Internet, Google the rest of the info and maybe read the articles you decide to comment on. Jesus.
What a JOKE!!!!!!!!!!
I used to vote for Michael Flaherty all the time but i lost all the respect in the world for him. I would never vote for Flaherty every again. He obviously lost his juice after attacking Menino and all the unproven allegations with emailgate against Mayor Menino, etc. He votes himself a raise. Deval Patrick wanted him to be his Lieutenant Governor and he wanted no part of it. Then he should have waited 4years to run for Mayor but he was too greedy. He needs to represent the people of the city not himself.
I wouldn't vote for Annissa either. She was going was going to play dirty in the last election and make false accusations about Marty Keogh.
This was the last time I voted for Steve Murphy. It was about that time for Murphy to leave office too. He blow his chance for running again for Sheriff again or State Auditor instead of state Treasurer. He will probably run for Angelo Scaccia's seat next year when Scaccia retires.
This city needs new blood and new ideas becuase this city is just going down the toilet. Raising fees and taxes and giving themselves a raise and allowing the police department get that big raise. I was all for the police getting a raise but not that much of an increase. I would be in favor for the city council raise like in 2018 but only if they only did one job and if all of them were full time councillors.
views on campaign contributions
Mr. anonymous, do you think it is OK to have corporate interests bankroll campaigns?
Corporate?
Who's accused if taking corp money? I try to follow local news but haven't seen much on that.
Not in Boston municipal elections
Maximum donation is $500 per person. Unless you are a union - then it's like $5k - I'm opposed to corporations donating to campaigns - but unions should have to play by those same rules.
Or not
http://www.masslive.com/news/boston/index.ssf/2014/08/super_pac_that_bac...
Wasn't the maximum donation changed last year?
I think the maximum is $1000 now.
http://www.ocpf.us/Legal/ContributionLimits
http://www.masslive.com/politics/index.ssf/2014/07/massachusetts_house_p...
Thanks Marty K. But no one
Thanks Marty K. But no one cares ...your irrelevant, your writing is incoherent and u are barely one notch ahead of Doug Bennet...Annissa is the best, she speaks her mind and that is as refreshing as it gets.
Flaherty lost my vote almost
Flaherty lost my vote almost entirely because his (paid, I am certain) canvassers flung garbage door-hangers all up and down my street. There would be five of them in a stack lying on the sidewalk with NO effort to get anywhere even close to a front door. Walking up three steps was too much effort? Tells me how he views my part of the city.
Since the councilors are almost interchangeable it's very easy for something like that to sour voters on a candidate forever. His name is forever etched in my mind as the jerk who littered all over my garden and he'll never get a vote from me again.
awwwww
I'm sure Steve Murphy is upset.. he's not gonna get his monorail now. Poor guy
Oh no!
What have we done?! That "other city" is going to be ahead of us forever!
Other City?
Shelbyville?
They know who they are...
grrr...
West Roxbury
It's interesting that West Roxbury doesn't have any residents in elected city government. Wu and McCarthy are the closest in Roslindale and HP. Plenty of money and connections in WR, but for whatever reason, no candidates.
Wu
Only moved to Roslindale a few months ago (so it was cool that she had her victory party at a Roslindale restaurant).
Speaking of which, is there any neighborhood in Boston that is as carved up among districts as Roslindale? At least all of West Roxbury (which, yes, you'd expect to have somebody given how politically active it is) has a single city councilor, state rep, state senator and congressman.
Roslindale districts
Beyond its three district city councilors, Roslindale is represented by two members of U.S. Congress, three state senators, and six state reps, at least according to this search. It's hard to believe any other neighborhood could possibly be that broken up.
And, for the record, West Roxbury is actually represented by two congressmen and two state reps - in both cases the district border runs (mostly) down Washington Street through West Roxbury.
All this Boston City Council talks is great..
What is making this a wonderful Wednesday is that GOP troll Holly Robichaud's creation Geoff Deihl went down in flames. South shore wing nuts are foaming at the mouth as if Obama just got a third term!
Having read Howie Carr's column yesterday
I'm just so happy to imagine how pissed off he is this morning.
Can somebody explain why
election results are considered to be so important that the media needs to project (or "call") the winners BEFORE all the results are in.
Just one more facet of our electoral process that needs to go away.
Second time
Point of clarification: the City Council had four women on the body once before: Maura Hennigan, Peggy Davis-Mullen, Diane Modica, and Maureen Feeney.
Fixed!
Thanks.