Sue Viscomi has mounted a candidacy as an independent, making it a three-way race for two council seats. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank voters will have three candidates to choose from for two council seats in November.
For the second year in a row, none of them will be Republicans.
And for the second time in three years, Sue Viscomi is running as an independent.
Ed Zipprich, left, won a fourth term, and Michael Ballard, right, won his first in the 2017 election. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Two incumbent Democrats will defend their seats on the Red Bank council in the November election, the party announced Monday.
In an unsurprising move, the municipal and county Democratic committees unanimously endorsed Councilman Ed Zipprich‘s pursuit of a fifth three-year term, and Michael Ballard‘s quest for a second.
The Evergreen Terrace senior apartments and the nearby Montgomery Terrace units would get a more reliable source of funding for repairs, officials said. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Residents of Red Bank’s two publicly subsidized housing complexes will see improvements to their communities under planned funding changes, an official assured them last week.
Councilmembers-elect Kate Triggiano and Hazim Yassin embrace on news of their victories Tuesday night. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank’s Democrats regained full control of borough government in an election rout for incumbent Mayor Pasquale Menna and two first-time council candidates in Tuesday’s election.
Pasquale Menna is seeking his fourth term as mayor. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
On the ballot are: incumbent Mayor Pasquale Menna, a Democrat, and Republican challenger Pearl Lee; and council candidates Michael Clancy (R), Allison Gregory (R), Kate Triggiano (D), Sue Viscomi (I) and Hazim Yassin (D).
Here are Menna’s written responses to questions posed to all candidates recently by redbankgreen.
Republican council candidate Michael Clancy. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
On the ballot are: incumbent Mayor Pasquale Menna, a Democrat, and Republican challenger Pearl Lee; and council candidates Michael Clancy (R), Allison Gregory (R), Kate Triggiano (D), Sue Viscomi (I) and Hazim Yassin (D).
Here are Clancy’s written responses to questions posed to all candidates recently by redbankgreen.
Allison Gregory is running for council on the Republican ticket. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
On the ballot are: incumbent Mayor Pasquale Menna, a Democrat, and Republican challenger Pearl Lee; and council candidates Michael Clancy (R), Allison Gregory (R), Kate Triggiano (D), Sue Viscomi (I) and Hazim Yassin (D).
Here are Gregory’s written responses to questions posed to all candidates recently by redbankgreen.
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Kate Triggiano is on the Democratic slate as a council candidate. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
On the ballot are: incumbent Mayor Pasquale Menna, a Democrat, and Republican challenger Pearl Lee; and council candidates Michael Clancy (R), Allison Gregory (R), Kate Triggiano (D), Sue Viscomi (I) and Hazim Yassin (D).
Here are Triggiano’s written responses to questions posed to all candidates recently by redbankgreen.
Running as the only independent in this year’s council race is Sue Viscomi. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
On the ballot are: incumbent Mayor Pasquale Menna, a Democrat, and Republican challenger Pearl Lee; and council candidates Michael Clancy (R), Allison Gregory (R), Kate Triggiano (D), Sue Viscomi (I) and Hazim Yassin (D).
Here are Viscomi’s written responses to questions posed to all candidates recently by redbankgreen.
Democrat Hazim Yassin is seeking a council seat. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
At stake in Red Bank’s November 6 election: the mayor’s post and two council seats.
On the ballot are: incumbent Mayor Pasquale Menna, a Democrat, and Republican challenger Pearl Lee; and council candidates Michael Clancy (R), Allison Gregory (R), Kate Triggiano (D), Sue Viscomi (I) and Hazim Yassin (D).
Here are Yassin’s written responses to questions posed to all candidates recently by redbankgreen.
Hazim Yassin, with running mate Kate Triggiano, at the West Side Community Group candidates’ forum Tuesday night. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
One day after a low-friction debate, Red Bank Republicans went on the attack against a Democratic opponent Wednesday.
The GOP, chaired by council candidate Michael Clancy, posted on Facebook a press release titled “Who is Hazim Yassin?” questioning Yassin’s rapid ascent within the local Democratic party and accusing him of “fraud” on either investors or voters.
Yassin dismissed the attack, telling redbankgreen it was “littered with fabrications.”
From left, council candidates Kate Triggiano, Hazim Yassin, Sue Viscomi, Michael Clancy and Allison Gregory at the West Side Community Group’s forum Tuesday night. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
A management study that found widespread “dysfunction” in Red Bank’s government provided fodder for contenders at the annual Candidates’ Night hosted by the West Side Community Group Tuesday night.
In the case of Pearl Lee, the first Republican to challenge Mayor Pasquale Menna since 2006, it provided the spark for her to run, she said. For Menna, it’s a document he accepts “ownership” of. And all five council candidates alluded to it.
Council members Mike Whelan, in white shirt, and Mark Taylor at the Red Bank First kickoff Tuesday night at Red Rock Tap + Grill. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Hoping to bust through what they see as political gridlock, two lame-duck Red Bank council members kicked off a petition effort Tuesday night to change both the borough’s form of government and the way in which its officials are elected.
GOP Chairman Michael Clancy at last October’s Halloween parade. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
With its two incumbents dropping out, the Red Bank Republican party on Thursday chose its chairman and a newcomer to run for borough council this year, redbankgreen has learned.
Party head Michael Clancy will be joined on the ticket by Bank Street resident Allison Gregory on a ticket in which the mayoral slot will be blank, Clancy said Friday.
Viscomi serves on the board of ed, where she leads the finance committee, and is on a number of borough committees. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
The 2018 race for two Red Bank council seats looks like it will have a wild card.
Sue Viscomi, a board of education member and former Republican stalwart who has expressed increasing antipathy in recent years to the local arm of the party, has started gathering signatures for a run as an independent in the November election, she told redbankgreen on Monday.
Her entry would appear to add to the challenge for the two presumptive Republican candidates, already facing the prospect of an anti-Trump backlash in a majority Democrat town, and could eat into support for the two Democrats in the race, both newcomers to elective politics.
Mayor Pasquale Menna at Riverside Gardens Park in September. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Holding off a challenge by activist Ben Forest, Mayor Pasquale Menna secured the top spot on the Democratic ticket in the November election Sunday.
Menna, going for a fourth four-year term, will be joined by two council contenders seeking their first elective office.
Council candidates, from left, Dana McArthur, Ed Zipprich, Michael Ballard and Linda Schwabenbauer at Monday’s event at River Street Commons. (Photos by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
The four candidates for two seats on the Red Bank council faced off Monday night in a debate-like forum that focused in large part on parking and tax issues.
The polite exchanges gave residents in attendance a chance to compare a three-term incumbent, a political newcomer, and two candidates who work with numbers all day.
Michael Clancy, center, at the Red Bank Middle School in 2015. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank Republican Chairman Michael Clancy resigned from the borough Human Relations Advisory Committee Thursday night, continuing to disavow a text message that the committee’s chairman had termed “extremely threatening” to immigrant children.
Michael Clancy in 2015. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank Republican Chairman Michael Clancy on Wednesday disavowed a text message that a party loyalist had termed a “disgusting” slap at the borough’s immigrant community.
Amid renewed calls for his resignation from the borough Human Relations Advisory Committee, Clancy sent redbankgreen a statement in which he expressed a “deep empathy for immigrants and children of immigrants, who live in fear of deportation.”
Sue Viscomi at a 2015 board of education meeting. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
[Correction: The date of a controversial text was incorrectly reported in the original version of this article. References to it below have been corrected.]
By JOHN T. WARD
A Red Bank Republican loyalist blasted party Chairman Michael Clancy Tuesday, one day after she was bypassed in favor of a political newcomer to run for borough council this year.
Sue Viscomi, who serves on the board of education, also took aim at Clancy for what she said was a “dumbfounding” and “disgusting” text she claims he sent to her and three GOP council members last month in February asking for a list of undocumented alien students so he could “mail it to ICE,” referring to the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency.
Incumbents Kathy Horgan, a Democrat, and Cindy Burnham, running as an independent, at Wednesday night’s event at the Pilgrim Baptist Church. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
The Republican candidates for Red Bank council sent emissaries who watched from the sidelines at a community event Wednesday night.
First-time GOP candidates Brian Hanlon and Kellie O’Bosky Colwell disputed the circumstances under which the event, billed as a “community conversation,” came together, leaving them unable to attend, they told redbankgreen. Their expected absence had been termed an “insult” by one of the event’s organizers.
But the event itself turned out not to be as partisan as GOP chairman Mike Clancy had feared, he said afterward.
Sean Di Somma, right, with successful council candidates Mark Taylor, left, and Mike Whelan last November. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Sean Di Somma won’t be staying on as Red Bank Republican chairman after all, according to a published report.
Di Somma informed Monmouth County GOP officials by email Thursday that he won’t seek a second term, which was to have begun this month, according to the report by More Monmouth Musings, a conservative publication based in Highlands.
MMM’s Art Gallagher reports that Michael Clancy, whose failed Red Bank board of education candidacy last fall was studded with controversy over his eligibility to run as well as his positions, is hoping to succeed Di Somma.
Incumbents Ann Roseman, Fred Stone and Carrie Ludwikowski won clear victories over three challengers. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
An unusually newsy Red Bank Board of Education election ended with the status quo Tuesday night as the incumbent slate swept to victory.
Led by Carrie Ludwikowski, who garnered 795 votes, the incumbent slate of Ann Roseman (712) and Frederick Stone (569) outpolled Richard Stout (536), Michael Clancy (493) and Irwin Katz, (464).
Challenger Michael Clancy, right, with incumbents Carrie Ludwikowski, left, Frederick Stone and Ann Roseman on stage at the middle school Thursday night. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
If there was a hot seat at the Red Bank Board of Education candidate’s night Thursday, Michael Clancy was in it.
The 33-year-old former offensive lineman at Rutgers was on the defensive at several points during the 90-minute event, pressed to explain his decision to stay in the race even though, according to one opponent, he wouldn’t be able to recite a truthful the oath of office should he be elected November 3.
Michael Clancy. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
Six candidates are vying for three three-year terms on the Red Bank Board of Education in the November 3 election. To help voters compare the candidates in terms of personal background and positions on key issues, redbankgreen emailed them identical sets of questions late last week. Here’s what Michael Clancy had to say in response.