{news} New London...

[Ronna Stuller]

John Russell placed 3rd (out of 14 candidates) to win a seat on City  
Council.
Ronna Stuller placed 5th (out of 14 candidates) to win a seat on Board  
of Ed.

Both of us ran as Greens and were cross-endorsed by the Republicans.



http://theday.com/article/20091104/NWS05/311049893


City Goes Green, Sort Of
By David Collins
The Day
Published 11/04/2009 12:00 AMUpdated 11/04/2009 03:14 AM


John Russell, who won a seat on the City Council Tuesday, went right  
to an analogy last week, when I asked him how he came to be a Green  
Party candidate cross-endorsed by the Republicans.
"When logs come down a river, they sometimes jam up, and someone has  
to kick them free," Russell said.
And in a city long dominated by Democratic Party rule, what better way  
to kick than for the two weaker parties to join forces.
"I believe the city needs a shake-up. There is too much nepotism and  
cronyism," Russell said last week. "Coalition building would be a way  
to change the balance of power in the city."
And indeed, the coalition built by the Greens and the Republicans on  
Tuesday helped unlock the Democratic majority on the council, a  
remarkable win given an overwhelming voter registration handicap.
(It didn't hurt that dysfunctional Democrats, busy locking out one of  
their own, practically handed them the keys to the election.)
Not only was Russell the third highest voter-getter in the council  
race, Green candidate Ronna Stuller finished fourth for Board of  
Education.
That's quite a showing for a party with only about 50 registered  
voters in the city.
Russell and Stuller are the first Greens to win council or board seats  
in New London and are among only a handful from the party to hold  
elected office around the state.
At their campaign headquarters Tuesday night, a corner of the lobby of  
Union Station, the Greens were reliably understated, although a small  
cheer went up when preliminary results showed their only two  
candidates had won.
"The Green Party had a clean sweep," someone offered slyly.
"I guess Green is in," said a grinning Stuller, who is also chairwoman  
of the party.
Clearly the cross endorsements of Russell and Stuller by the  
Republicans were instrumental in the party's success this election,  
and in a curious way the arrangement supports some of the party's  
unorthodox political thinking.
They are not people easily herded.
Russell was actually a lifelong Democrat before changing parties and  
running for the legislature as a Republican. He ended up as a Green  
council candidate this election when he didn't at first find a place  
on the Republican council slate.
"I am not a party guy and I vote across party lines," he said. "I  
don't see the big issue of parties at this level."
Stuller, too, told me she votes for individuals, whatever their party  
might be.
Stuller said she and other Greens supported a lot of Republicans this  
year, mostly because they wanted more of the city's business done in  
the open, rather than in closed party caucuses.
"When one party has a monopoly on power, even one as fractured as the  
Democrats are now, everything becomes a done deal," she said.
By that same thinking, she said, the Greens didn't want to see a  
Republican sweep either. Even the Greens, she added, wouldn't want all  
seven council seats to themselves.
"The Greens have never wanted to run the city. We just wanted to be in  
the mix," she said.
When I heard her say that I tried to imagine Anthony Basilica,  
chairman of the Democratic Town Committee, saying the same thing, and  
I had to chuckle at the thought.
I might have tried calling Basilica Tuesday night to run the idea by  
him, but I figured, given the Democrats' poor showing, that he might  
already be home in bed, right where he was the October night when the  
top vote-getter in the last council election (he fell to seventh in  
Tuesday's voting) was busy locking the mayor out of his campaign  
headquarters.
This is the opinion of David Collins.

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