One Candidate For City Council, None for Mayor

The first Tuesday after the first Monday in November is Election Day. This year it's Nov. 8 and so far only one person has confirmed his candidacy for a seat on the Benicia City Council and no one has declared as a candidate for mayor though there are a few people considered likely candidates.

"Hell yes!" Councilman Tom Campbell said when asked if he will run for re-election. "Bob Livesay and I are running as a slate." Campbell then went on to say he hasn't  discussed running on a slate with him and that Livesay has not indicated he intends to run for office.

Campebell's council colleague Mike Ioakimedes is less sure about running for re-election. He said he was considering putting his name in for another four-year term but hasn't decided.

Other names that pop up in the "who is running for City Council" conversation are Christina Strawbridge, chairwoman of the Economic Development Board and owner of , a woman's wear shop on First Street, and Rick Ernst, a member of the Benicia Planning Commission and the driving force behind a possible ballot initiative to roll back city employee salaries to 2000 levels.

Strawbridge admits she's interested in the job but said she hasn't decided whether to run, while Ernst, a victim of the economy, has said he needs to focus on getting a new job before he can consider running for public office.

The decision to run for council is made a little more intriguing because of what is happening in the race for mayor, in which there are no declared candidates. 

Jerry Hayes, a former mayor and city councilman and self-described "recovering politician," said, "I've heard all three (incumbents) are in the race and running again." He was referring to Campbell and Ioakimedes running for another term on the City Council and Elizabeth Patterson running for another term as mayor.

"The only other name I've heard for City Council is Chris Strawbridge," Hayes said, quickly adding, "I've heard Rick Ernst's name bandied about, too."

Of the mayoral race, he said, "I assume Alan (City Councilman Alan Schwartzman) is going to challenge Elizabeth (Patterson) for mayor."

For his part, Schwartzman would only confirm that he is thinking about running for mayor and that he doesn't have a campaign manager. "Christina Strawbridge is not running my campaign," he volunteered Monday morning. He had just returned from Oregon, where he was practicing doting on his new granddaughter.

"I'm considering it (a run for mayor)," he said. "I have no idea if I will actually do it.  I don't know."

Patterson was equally vague about her political future, saying only that she is exploring running for re-election and that a decision and announcement would come around the end of May.

The wild card in all this is Councilman Mark Hughes. A month ago, he said he wasn't interested in being mayor but now has changed his tune. "I'm not ruling anything out," he said Saturday after the opening ceremony of the Little League season. "I'm going to see how it all plays out here in the near future."

Another former mayor, Steve Messina, and Hayes agreed that if Hughes and Schwartzman challenge Patterson for mayor they would split the vote of their natural base and might assure Patterson's re-election.

Messina also seemed to think Hughes' change of heart about running for mayor indicates that someone has approached him about doing so.

He said he doesn't think it will become a three-way race. "If they both (Hughes and Schwartzman) really want it, then I think one of them will decide the other is a stronger candidate and will back out."

"I can see that if they both ran they'd both lose." 

"If Mark jumps in then Elizabeth is a shoe-in for re-election," said Hayes. "That's if it stays a three-way race. Elizabeth should welcome that."

Asked whom he'd like to see run for mayor, Messina smiled and said, "Fred Deltorchio. He's retiring at the end of this year." 

Deltorchio, chief of police and city manager of Hercules, has lived in Benicia for many years and was a member of the Benicia Police Department.

If either Hughes or Schwartzman were elected mayor of Benicia, they'd be vacating a seat on the City Council. That seat would be filled by whoever came in third in the City Council elections, setting up a scenario in which someone could declare his or her candidacy for the council and then sit on the sidelines and await the outcome of the mayoral race.

As Hughes headed for his car after the ceremonies Saturday, he turned and said with a smile, "It's going to be an interesting year here, isn't it?"