When Rev. Wade Hyslop learned that Barack Obama was elected president, his mind raced to something Robert Kennedy said in 1968.
“Remember,” said Hyslop, the deputy mayor of the city, “Robert Kennedy predicted in 40 years the country would have a black president. It was a bit of prophecy.”
Although the presidency had star billing on the ballot, city voters also decided against changing its form of government, resoundingly sent all incumbents back to Hartford, and overwhelmingly reelected Rep. Joe Courtney to Congress.
And voter apathy in New London was dealt a crushing blow, as people lined up at polls at 6 a.m. before many in the city had their first sip of coffee.
When the polls in the city’s seven voting wards closed 14 hours later, 85 percent of registered voters had cast ballots.
“This has been an historic day,” said Waldren Phillips, the head of the New London chapter of the NAACP, as his children volunteered at the polls.
For most of the morning, Phillips observed the polls at Bennie Dover Jackson Middle School, where the third and fourth districts vote. Traditionally those districts, which encompass the urban core of New London, suffer from low turnout.
Not last week. Both districts were well over 500 ballots before 11 a.m., and had a constant flow of voters streaming in throughout the day, and were a bellwether for the rest of the city.
Connecticut College students also voted en masse at the first district poll at New London High School. The college ran shuttles from the campus to the polls from the early morning hours until 8 p.m.
“We had full vans all day,” Matthew Daskal, a student van driver who was idling outside City Hall, said.
No Mayor for New London
While commentators and pundits were heralding change as electoral votes piled up in Obama’s column, New London voters sent messages for the status quo.
Voters rejected the charter revision that would have replaced the city manager with an elected mayor, 52 percent to 48 percent.
This is the second time the city has staged a vote on a switch to an elected mayor in as many years, and leading political figures say the issue will be moot for some time.
“The voters said they didn’t want it,” said Anthony Basilica, the head of the Democratic Town Committee.
The Democratic Party was split over the issue and did not launch its formidable get-out-the-vote organization to sway residents in either direction.
The charter change went down despite City Councilor Michael Buscetto, the city’s top vote-getter in 2007, saying he would seek the mayor’s office should voters assent to it.
Buscetto, however, said he did not campaign for the change.
“The voters said it was not necessary,” he said. “They are happy with the city manager.”
Critics of the elected mayor position included Democrats such as City Councilor Margaret Curtin, as well as members of the Looking Out For Taxpayers lobby, who balked at the proposed increase in the number of signatures required to petition council decisions from 10 to 20 percent.
The move was seen as a way to make it more difficult to force referendums on the budget, which LOT does with regularity.
Hyslop, an advocate for the change, attributed the charter revision’s demise to a “fear factor” about the mayor’s broad powers.
“People were concerned about the mayor making appointments without the consent of the council,” he said. “The city manager does that now.”
And the charter revision debate is over for the time being, as Hyslop and other city councilors said they would not appoint another commission to study New London’s governing document.
Hewett Cruises To Third Term
Rep. Ernest Hewett had a bit of a cold and was a tad husky as he made the rounds thanking supporters at The Radisson, where many of Eastern Connecticut’s Democrats were attending Joe Courtney’s victory party.
So Hewett’s normal ebullience was muted, but the former ceremonial mayor of the city was pleased to head back to represent the 39th District for a third term.
“It’s always good when the people send you back,” he said.
Hewett garnered 4,542 votes, defeating Republican challenger Jason Catala who received 1,109 votes and Green Party candidate Kenric Hanson, who got 529 votes.
Hewett promised “two more years of hard work.”
“Everything I’m going to do is going to be about New London,” he said.
The Blue Wave
Word came shortly after 9 p.m. to those in the Radisson ballroom that Courtney won reelection in a romp over Republican Sean Sullivan, the former Sub Base New London commander.
Courtney swept the district, even defeating Sullivan in his hometown of Ledyard.
The win, while expected, was nevertheless sweet for Courtney’s supporters, who two years ago had to sweat out a re-count against Rob Simmons, in what was the closest Congressional race in the country.
After Courtney gave his concession speech, the campaign’s communications director Brian Farber informed the crowd that 4th District Rep. Christopher Shays, the lone New England Republican in the House, conceded to challenger Jim Himes.
So complete was the defeat of the GOP in New England that Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain won only one county in the region, Piscataquis County in Maine.
By Stephen Chupaska
Senior Staff Writer