News Blog

Some of you have asked, so I thought I’d fill you in on how the candidate designation process is playing out for city Democrats. It’s a bit “inside baseball,” but some people like keeping box scores.

The committees of the various legislative districts in the City of Rochester have been meeting over the last few weeks to choose who they want to run for elected offices this fall. The big races, of course, are mayor and City Council.

There are, so far, two Democrats running for mayor: incumbent Tom Richards and challenger Lovely Warren. Warren is City Council president. Richards has come out on top in all of the east-side committee votes, except one. Richards and Warren tied in the 29th Legislative District committee, 13 votes to 13 votes.

The west-side committees that have met have only designated candidates for City Council and City Court. Democratic insiders aren’t sure when the committees will make their pick for mayor.

There are 11 contenders for the Democratic endorsement for five open seats on City Council. Five of the 11 candidates are incumbents: Jackie Ortiz, Loretta Scott, Matt Haag, Carolee Conklin, and Dana Miller. The results so far in these races have been a bit of a mixed bag.

On the east side: the Council incumbents won the 21st, and 29th Legislative Districts. In the 23rd, it was: Haag, Ortiz, Conklin, Miller, and newcomer Tom Hasman, who ran for county clerk in 2008. In the 24th District, the top vote-getters were: Haag, Ortiz, Conklin, Scott, and Hasman.

On the west side, it was Conklin, Haag, Miller, Ortiz, and Hasman in the 26th Legislative District committee; Conklin, Haag, Ortiz, Hasman, and Lisa Jacques (owner of Park Avenue Pets) in the 7th; and Haag, Ortiz, Conklin, Hasman, and Scott in the 28th.

To my knowledge, the 22nd, 25th, and 27th districts have yet to meet, and the head of the Monroe County Democratic Committee didn’t have dates.