I am at Raleigh-Durham start up week and a panelists just said he is running for district E. Name is John Cerqueira, Seems like he has good business leadership experience and said he got involved with bringing the skate park to downtown, and that started him on the path to run.
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MAB not running for re-election, gets real personal in this update.
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Man, that stinks. Personally, I was hoping to vote for her again. I feel that she never had a great chance to do the level of building she wanted due to the difficulties COVID posed. But, I do think she set us on the right path.
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Real unfortunate. Best mayor Raleigh has had in a long time.
So who’s in the running now? Any chance Melton throws his hat in the ring?
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I know she has a lot of people who dislike her for whatever reasons, real or imagined, but I am a big fan of hers. I appreciate her service to the city.
Now I have to decide between Corey and this Janet Cowell. I think I like both of them, but Janet is an unknown at this point in terms of how she views downtown development.
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Can we get Mitchell Silver to up the ante and put his hat in the ring for mayor?
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Candidates are:
Janet Cowell (see above)
Corey Branch
Terrence Ruth
TBD (Republican?)
Melton announced he was running for re-election at large and I’m pretty sure he knew MAB wasn’t running again when he made that announcement.
I honestly think Corey has done an excellent job on the blocking and tackling in providing city services - every single time our household has had an issue with a sidewalk/garbage collection/pothole he’s been incredibly effective at ensuring they’re addressed by staff and I think he’d make a good mayor, especially given that the job is essentially being a board chair and not being City Manager. Having a young(er) non-white mayor who has represented the district that has been most impacted by the housing affordability crisis would be a big plus.
I really like Janet too - she’s incredibly smart and has significant experience at multiple levels of government. I have significant concerns about the statements she’s made about missing middle housing reforms and their impact on neighborhoods like Hayes Barton, but I think it’s early and she’s moreso acknowledging that people are sincerely mad about potential changes (regardless of whether that anger should warrant a policy response). She’s also backed by Charles Meeker which wouldn’t have happened if she was a dyed in the wool NIMBY candidate (which TBC she isn’t).
I like Terrence Ruth personally but he made a real lapse in judgment by going all in on the Livable Raleigh slate last time and he hasn’t really done anything in the 2 years since to alter that fact.
Don’t think anyone else who is serious will jump in. At this point the bigger fight will be the E and A races - honestly a council with Mitch Silver, Melton, and someone I’ve heard as potentially running for C (not public yet) is going to be a pretty kick-ass city council.
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I was thinking of announcing a run. My platform is removing all homeless people from public view, no bikes allowed on streets without dedicated bike lanes, mandatory right on red, downtown-wide rezoning to 60 stories, sky gondolas connecting all nodes near downtown, water gondolas on the new Fayetteville Street canal, and a citywide requirement that all parking decks must be completely covered in screening AND murals.
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Ah yes, the William Needham Finley IV platform
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He must’ve stolen it from me!
Btw on a more serious note, I just saw more about MAB’s personal reasons in her announcement. Jeez! Wishing her and her husband the best.
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This is what I found out on another page of current candidates:
"Current candidates are:
Corey Branch — Raleigh City Council member for District C SE Raleigh since 2015
Janet Cowell — Former North Carolina state treasurer, former City Council member and current CEO Dix Park Conservancy
Delmonte Crawford — Local Civil Rights Activist
Paul Fitts — Mortgage broker and lone conservative Republican Candidate
Terrance Ruth — NC State professor. Ruth got 40% of the vote against Baldwin in 2022.
James Shaughnessy IV — Raleigh native and Pre-law student at William Peace University
So that’s Six! Honestly think Melton made the smart move doing at-large again, and Silver doing a district seat. If only for them to avoid this overcrowded field.
I do kinda want to hear more from Cowell—if she got Meeker & Macfarlane endorsing her, there’s gotta bit of pro-downtown vibe there. My memory of her time on Council is way back in the cobwebs via my aging brain cells, but I do seem to feel that she went along with all of Meeker’s urban moves like reopening Fayetteville Street and such.
It’s early and I could be persuaded on any of them except Fitts.
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Trying to locate this, do you have a reference?
Do Raleigh elections go to a runoff is no single candidate gets 50% +1? If so, this thing will definitely go to a runoff. If so, expect Janet to win in a runoff. If not, expect the lone Republican to win with 30% of the vote.
Yes, and yes it will - it literally always does and it’s kind of a pain in the ass, IMO.
I thought the last round of changes to election cycle / process (2021) moved to plurality?
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/election/article281403933.html
Did anything else change? The state law, at the request of the Raleigh City Council, also changed the type of elections that Raleigh has. The Raleigh City Council elections used to be a nonpartisan election with a runoff, with the first contests held in October. Now, the elections are a nonpartisan plurality, meaning the elections are held in November and those with the most votes win even if they do not get the majority of votes.
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Actually, I believe this has changed. MAB did not win a majority last time, IIRC, so I believe, at elast for mayor, the one with the most votes wins.
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I’ll probably end up voting for whichever of Branch or Cowell I think has a better shot – I think that either would be greatly preferable to Ruth.
I do really like Cowell’s interest in “uncovering” the many underground streams in/near downtown.
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So what you’re saying is, I have a chance!?
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uh wait. Is this your announcement? Are you running?
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