Vacant Alderman Seat - Upcoming Special Election

Our former Alderman has been appointed by Mayor Slay to serve as the Recorder of Deeds for the City of St. Louis. Our ward’s loss is the city’s gain, and I’m sure Jennifer will do a great job (and already is!) serving as Recorder of Deeds.

This has left a vacancy in the Alderman position for the 15th Ward. I have heard from many of you with questions or input about filling this position. I wanted to lay out for you the process for filling the position as well as other details about the special election we’ll have next year.

The position will be filled in a special election in the 15th Ward on October 7, 2014. In order to determine who will run as the Democratic nominee on that ballot, the 15th Ward Democratic committeepeople will nominate an individual for confirmation by the St. Louis City Democratic Central Committee (SLCDCC). Then, the voters of the 15th Ward will vote on October 7.

The SLCDCC is meeting this Saturday, 8/16 as required by its by-laws to elect new officers and to vote on filling vacancies, among other business. In that the time is short, I am asking any interested parties to provide feedback to me directly about filling this vacancy (tod@todamartin.com). To date, I have heard from 4 candidates who have publicly stated their interest in filling the position:

• Megan Green
• Missy Pinkerton-McDaniel
• Tom Pratt
• Rhonda Smythe

If you wish to provide input about these four candidates, please email me directly. If you know of someone else who has publicly thrown their hat in the ring for this position, please also let me know that or ask them to contact me.

It is important to note that the person elected to fill the vacant seat will serve approximately 6 months through April 2015. In March and April 2015, our ward will participate in another special election to fill the remaining two years of Jennifer’s term. At that point, there will be a standard Democratic primary open to all individuals interested in running, and the 15th Ward Democrats organization will carry out our normal, thorough process for assessing candidates and endorsing one of them. We will distribute questionnaires to all interested candidates based on questions deemed important by members of our group and feedback from neighbors, will publish the candidates’ answers on our website, will hold a candidate forum and will hold an endorsement meeting. This will give the candidates 6 months to make their case to the entire ward about why they should fill the remaining 2 years of Jennifer’s term. I think this will also serve as a great opportunity for the 15th Ward as a whole to fully participate in the election of our Alderman. Finally, we will have our standard municipal election in 2017 to fill the Alderman seat for 2017-2020.

Again, if you have any questions, input, comments, please contact me offline at: tod@todamartin.com.

Sincerely,
Tod A. Martin
15th Ward Democratic Committeeman