Council Considers Town Letter's Influence on Elections

Name recognition is a big issue in elections. And some research suggests voters will even cross parties to vote for a name they recognize, making incumbents inherently more electable.

But when the Town Newsletter reaches voters’ mailboxes just a week or two before an election, does the inclusion of a letter from the Town Council chairman increase the chairman’s chances of getting elected? And is that an unfair advantage or an obligation of the office?

Those questions dominated the early part of the Town Council meeting Tuesday night after Mike Demicco, one of two Democrats on the council, broached the subject at a council meeting in August.

At that meeting Demicco told the board constituents had concerns about the chairman’s letter and he would like it either removed from the fall newsletter or for the mailing to be delayed until after the elections. Chairman Mike Clark was absent. The issue was recorded in the meeting’s minutes and dropped.

But Clark, back at the table Tuesday night, was outraged at what he viewed as a charge of ethical misconduct. Clark pointed to the meeting minutes, which quote Demicco as using the word ‘slanted’ to describe the letter Clark wrote for the October 2009 newsletter, just before an election.

“This is very upsetting to me personally,” said Clark, who is running for Connecticut’s Fifth District Congressional seat. He said he remembered allegations of ethical misconduct being made against a councilman and he vowed that he would never be in that spot.

“You show me one slanted statement or one slanted word or one paragraph that’s not neutral,” Clark said. “I’m focusing on you using the word slanted about my writing and I take offense to that.”

But Demicco quickly apologized, explaining that he didn't mean to suggest Clark’s writings were slanted, but that the possibility for slanting did exist.

“They certainly do give an advantage to a public official who is running for office because he gets his name and his face and his personality out to the people in a way that nobody else has the opportunity to do,” Demicco said.

Fellow Democrat John Vibert backed up the argument.

“It’s not about things going out, it’s about the timing of things going out,” he said. The newsletter, which highlights all of the accomplishments the current council has achieved over the past year “is free publicity that goes out just before the election. …It doesn’t slant the message … it makes everyone understand the great things that the incumbents did. And that’s a good message just after the election. It’s an unfair advantage when it comes out just before an election.”

Town Manager Kathy Eagen told the council that the October chairman's letter is reviewed by an attorney to ensure neutrality. She also said delivery timing intentionally precedes the election so residents will get important voting information.

Patty Stoddard, also a Republican, said she remembered the issue being raised in 2009 at the Town Council candidate debates.  

Demicco had requested a copy of the 2009 letter be provided for this week’s meeting and that the council get an opportunity to review the letter that will go out in the next week or two.

“I don’t think it’s an issue of material because I think it’s good material. Let’s just recognize that we disagree,” Vibert said of this year's letter, recognizing he and Demicco were again in the minority.

In the interest of moving on with the meeting, the council decided to review the issue at another time.