Tuesday, October 26, 2021

Break the Two-Party Stranglehold, Make Local Elections Nonpartisan

Update: Patch Brookfield community contributor Scott Benjamin wrote a story about this column and interviewed a few notables, including Prof. Gary Rose, who chairs the government department at Sacred Heart University and disagrees with my proposal. My response is in the comment thread.

My latest column for CTNewsJunkie.com:

You might think Connecticut's election laws and procedures are normal, especially if you've lived and worked here all your adult life. But I've got news for you. They are anything but normal. Indeed, I'd say they're oppressive.

Over the last few years, I’ve noticed that even local races, such as those up for grabs on Nov. 2, are becoming more contentious as national issues have crept into campaigns. It seems especially bad in Connecticut where, for some strange reason, it seems that all elections — from town registrars of voters to planning and zoning all the way up to the governor’s mansion — are partisan ...

I would urge Connecticut lawmakers to consider adopting a model similar to that of Massachusetts, where not only are local races nonpartisan but unaffiliated voters may vote in either party’s primaries. 

Read more ...

The op-ed has received a fair amount of notice. It even caught the eye of Paul Pacelli of WICC-600AM in Bridgeport. Paul kindly invited me on-the-air to talk about it with him yesterday. Click on the link in the Facebook post below to listen to the podcast/replay.

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