The New Rochelle City Democratic Committee held its convention on Thursday evening, February 16, at New Rochelle United Methodist Church, to endorse candidates for Mayor and the six City Council seats in this year’s elections. 

The votes decided who would receive the party’s official support in each contest.  All candidates, however, must collect petition signatures to appear on the ballot, and in contests with more than one candidate, a primary election on June 27 will decide the party’s final nominee. 

In the contest to succeed Noam Bramson as Mayor, Westchester County Legislator Damon Maher and current District 3 City Councilmember Yadira Ramos-Herbert are candidates.  At the convention, Maher lodged a procedural protest and withdrew his name from consideration before the vote, and Ramos-Herbert was endorsed unanimously.  Maher has declared his intention to seek the mayoral nomination in the June primary. 

In the contest to succeed Ramos-Herbert as District 3 Councilmember, four candidates were nominated.  Kwamaine Dixon and Margaret Chadwick, who received relatively few votes, withdrew their names after the first ballot.  On the second ballot, Liane Merchant narrowly defeated David Peters, and Peters promptly announced his intention to challenge Merchant in the primary. 

In other contests, Shane Osinloye withdrew his name before the ballot for District 4, and the party unanimously endorsed incumbent Councilmember Ivar Hyden for re-election.  The party also unanimously endorsed incumbent City Councilmembers Martha Lopez (District 1) and Sara Kaye (District 5) for re-election and newcomer Matt Stern to replace retiring Councilmember Liz Fried (District 6), all without opposition.  The party did not endorse a Democratic candidate in District 2, which is represented by Republican Al Tarantino.

The convention was marred by a dispute over the allocation of “weighted votes” among the party’s district leaders.  Ordinarily, weighted votes are distributed based on the number of Democratic votes in each election district in the last election for Governor.  This year, because some district lines were redrawn based on the 2020 census, votes in the election for governor were not available for the new  districts, and, according to state law, the number of registered Democrats was used to assign weighted votes instead.  However, the convention was scheduled to occur only a day after the county was required to release the new numbers, and some candidates were left with inadequate time to adjust their campaign strategies.  An effort at the convention to postpone the balloting was voted down.

Candidates for Mayor and City Council will begin circulating nominating petitions on February 28.  All those collecting enough signatures (1000 for mayor, 500 for Council) by April 6 will appear on the June primary ballot.