RED BANK: GOP TO RUN MAYORAL CANDIDATE

Pearl Lee at the Bank Street block party earlier this month. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)

By JOHN T. WARD

Her name has appeared on campaign lawn signs for weeks, but on Tuesday, a Red Bank political neophyte made it official: she’s running for mayor.

Pearl Lee, a retiree and singer from Alston Court, will top the Republican ticket ballot in November’s election. She’ll also be the first GOP opponent of Democratic incumbent Mayor Pasquale Menna since he won the seat in 2006.

September 26, 2018 - 8:00 am | Comments ()

RED BANK: GOP ATTACKS RIVAL OVER THREAT

Council candidate Michael Clancy at the Red Bank Classic race in June. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)

By JOHN T. WARD

In the first attack of Red Bank’s 2018 election season, the two Republican council candidates claimed they saw one of their Democratic opponents “cavort” with a man who had made “menacing and threatening gestures” toward one of them at a local government meeting.

August 17, 2018 - 10:00 am | Comments ()

RED BANK: GOP CHAIR TO SEEK COUNCIL SEAT

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.

March 30, 2018 - 8:00 am | Comments ()

RED BANK: GOP INCUMBENTS WON’T RUN

Mike Whelan, left, and Mark Taylor kicking off their campaign in 2015. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)

By JOHN T. WARD

Red Bank’s two remaining Republican council members won’t run for re-election this year, they said late Thursday night.

The bombshell news from first-termers Mark Taylor and Mike Whelan would appear to end a chapter of brief resurgence for the local GOP after having been frozen out of power for a generation.

March 30, 2018 - 6:48 am | Comments ()

RED BANK: VISCOMI ADDS WILD CARD TO RACE

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.

March 27, 2018 - 7:00 am | Comments ()

RED BANK: CLANCY QUITS COMMUNITY PANEL

Michael Clancy, center, at the Red Bank Middle School in 2015. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)

By JOHN T. WARD

HOT-TOPIC_03 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.

April 6, 2017 - 9:59 pm | Comments ()

RED BANK: CLANCY DISAVOWS DIVISIVE TEXT

Michael Clancy in 2015. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)

By JOHN T. WARD

HOT-TOPIC_03 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.”

April 5, 2017 - 4:35 pm | Comments ()

RED BANK: VISCOMI DOUBLE-BARRELS CLANCY

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

HOT-TOPIC_03 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.

April 4, 2017 - 3:59 pm | Comments ()

RED BANK: DI SOMMA QUITS AS GOP CHAIR

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

HOT-TOPIC_03 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.

June 16, 2016 - 1:54 pm | Comments ()

RED BANK: INCUMBENTS KEEP SCHOOL SEATS

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

Election 2015 graphic 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).

November 3, 2015 - 10:52 pm | Comments ()

RED BANK: FORUM PIVOTS ON CLANCY ISSUES

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

Election 2015 graphic 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.

October 16, 2015 - 9:00 am | Comments ()

RED BANK SCHOOLS: CLANCY

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.