With 26 of 32 precincts reporting, Village 14 is calling the mayor’s race for Mayor Setti Warren.
Mayor Setti Warren re-elected
by Nathan Phillips | Nov 5, 2013 | Newton | 16 comments
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With 26 of 32 precincts reporting, Village 14 is calling the mayor’s race for Mayor Setti Warren.
Crazy Divers: Men be like...
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Oh, come on. The polls have been closed for what, 34 hours, and no one has any comment about the mayor’s re-election?
But Max, even your comment isn’t really a comment on his win.
i am happy Setti won reelection because what he inherited 4 years ago was a deep morass than couldn’t have been conquered in just 4 years.
The city has made remarkable progress in 4 years, but there is still plenty to be done, and I’m glad there will be continuity of leadership to build upon the work of Setti’s administration in his first term.
Setti earned a second term not by his campaign activities ,but rather based on first term performance.
Agreed. Newton residents are pleased with the job Mayor Warren is doing. Most have forgiven him for his run for Senate. Most voters stayed home because they either didn’t know there was an election, they didn’t care, or they knew the mayor was going to win regardless. Those who came out to vote for him gave him a resounding — and completely expected — stamp of approval. Alderman Hess-Mahan had no chance to cut into that.
@Dan Fahey, my comment was maybe too coy/subtle. My point was that although the mayor won by 70/30, that still left over 82% of the electorate that did NOT vote for him. THM raised several points of difference with the mayor (whether you agree with them or not) and was active out in the streets and at every venue he could find to publicly articulate those differences. The mayor made appearances at a couple of obligatory debates.
More telling, however, was how narrow the mayor’s coattails were. The anointed candidates of “the powers that be” were not swept along by the mayor’s tide.
Max –
I’m not sure the mayor endorsed anyone in any of the contested races. I don’t think he did. Somebody will correct me very quickly if I’m wrong, but if I’m right that would mean that he didn’t lay down his coattails for anyone. There were clear divisions in the “powers that be” this time around. I saw many lawns that held both Setti Warren and Margaret Albright signs. Some voters might have seen that as a link between the two, which might have helped Margaret.
@Gail – the mayor did endorse Deb Crossley for Alderman
… and she won that race
Gail,
You honestly believe that the people that voted for the Mayor knew what happened in the past 4 years?
90-95% of the people couldn’t tell you one of the Mayors issues. They voted for him based on a hug or a handshake from an event and he’s an incumbent. You think this Mayor or Voters are differnt than the past? Think again. It’s all name recognition.
Tom – It’s not that they know what happened in the past four years, it’s that they know that they are satisfied with living here. That’s all that matters to them. Why make a change in the executive leadership when they are content when they are satisfied? That’s why Cohen was re-elected twice. At the end of his third term they were no longer satisfied with the government that was running the city.
What I found very helpful in the years I wasn’t keeping up w issues was the annual mailer from the League of Women’s Voters. I didn’t see one in the mail this year. I hope we’re not so “green” as to discontinue printing a valuable summary of election issues.
Gail – If anything Setti Warren signs/sign holders were ALWAYS with Andrea Steenstrup. Especially on Social Media and I know for a fact as I saw MANY sign holders on election day with multiple Signs on one poll – Setti Warren ,Andrea Steenstrup , Deb Crossley and Chris Steele. Even during the village days – they all were together holding signs and keeping all together. They held Standouts last week together.
So if in your mind -seeing 2 signs on a lawn gave Margaret an advantage – then why didn’t 3-4 poll holders with multiple Andrea and Setti Signs give Andrea the advantage? She should have gotten 70% of the votes too.
I know I am sure it is very difficult for the 5 SC members who supported Andrea to deal with their Loss – I am sure the most disappointed being your BFF. But dont say that having 2 signs on a lawn one of them being Setti Warren who did not even endorse Margaret give her an advantage.
What gave her an advantage is her knowledge of Education and her platform. And the fact that the Voters were smart enough to see through the Gang of 5 SC members motives.
Joanne – Please tell me who my BFF is. I’ve never been one to label my friends but I’d probably say my best friend is a woman named Joan who lives in Fairfield, CT. Apparently you know otherwise, so please do share.
BTW, I can’t remember socializing with anybody on the School Committee, but again you may know otherwise.
Finally, I was intending no offense toward Margaret whatsoever when I wrote that I saw her signs on the same lawns as Mayor Warren’s. I guess we see what we want to see.
People vote the way they do for all sorts of reasons. Some may have voted for her because they were charmed by Geoff’s voice during the robocall. Some voted for her because they thought she should have a shot already. Some voted for her because they want full-day kindergarten. But not everybody voted for her because they knew how she stands on the issues. Margaret is smart enough to know that. She won for a lot of reasons,but mostly she won because she was the better candidate.
Joanne, there were six SC Members that endorsed Andrea (Claire Sokoloff, Matt Hills, Margie Ross Decter, Angela Pitter-Wright and Diana Fisher Gomberg). I wonder how this will affect Diana’s efforts to become SC Vice Chairperson.
I thought that Steve Siegel was the most likely candidate for SC VC myself because of his engineering background and the fact that Newton has a lot of capital projects on its plate over the next six years. Hopefully, he will use that background to ensure that the school committee/school department/administration has a better due diligence process for future projects.
Read more: http://village14.com/netwon-ma/2013/11/is-newton-better-off-now-than-it-was-four-years-ago/#comment-39095
Gail, we are in total agreement about you’re above comments. The people were also content with 12 years of Mayor Cohen in which he caused a larger structural deficit, a declining school system, etc. The winning of an election doesn’t have anything to do with the real issues. The typical person (90% of the people) couldnt give a definition of structural deficit, etc. Therefore, it’s disingenuous to say that they do know what the Mayor is doing and that the citizens are giving the administration their stamp of approval. All they know is that their lives haven’t been impacted, they dont know whats about to happen.
When I ran for Governor’s Council last year, 99.9% of the people didnt know what the Governor’s Council does or that it even exists. The incumbent got 275,000 votes and in her thank you letter she stated that she thanks the 275,000 voters for approving of her work, etc. This is showing a real big ego, in my opinion.
If I may clarify some misinformation because I was the one who solicited people to hold signs for Setti Warren on election day about 6 weeks ago. Many people were very happy to hold signs for the Mayor, but were also clear that they had two hands and may be holding a sign for another candidate as well. At Williams School, we had two sign holders-one held Setti and Andrea signs and the other held Setti and Margaret signs. All the sign holders were requested not to place another sign on the Mayor’s stake. To my knowledge, this request was respected (I was at many polling places on election day). I was the only Setti Warren sign holder to attend the village days, and chatted with many people, including Jim Cote and Tom Mountain.
As for the visibilities, during the last two weeks, there were 4 Setti Warren visibilities -at Four Corners, in Newton Centre, at the Union St. subway station, and in Auburndale Square. No other candidates joined us, which was perfectly fine – they were all busy running their own campaigns. At one large visibility two weeks ago, we walked from Newton Centre to Newtonville, and some candidates joined in and some did not, but all had the same information about the event.
Election Day is over, and it’s time to move on. This weekend I’ll be happily raking and bagging my leaves.
I was glad to hear that the Mayor did some campaigning. I heard he was shaking ands at one of the “T” stops. Thats what election season is about.