James Gennaro takes lead in District 24 special election
James Gennaro Courtesy of Gennaro’s campaign
NOTICE OF SPECIAL ELECTION
O
o
York notice is here
TIMESLEDGER | QNS.10 COM | FEB. 5-FEB. 11, 2021
lionaires and instead investing in
everyday people in our community,”
Ahmed wrote. “We are incredibly
proud of the team we built & the energy
of our campaign.”
While some polling sites in the
district – which covers parts of Briarwood,
Electchester, Fresh Meadows,
Hillcrest, Jamaica, Jamaica
Hills, Jamaica Estates, Kew Gardens
Hills, Parkway Village and
Pomonok – reported seeing high
voter turnout, others saw a dismally
low number of ballots cast.
Though special elections typically
see a comparatively smaller
number of voters turnout, Tuesday’s
election followed a massive snowstorm
and a spike in COVID-19 infections
throughout the city.
A handful of the candidates running
for the seat called on Mayor
Bill de Blasio to postpone the special
election Monday afternoon, as the
nor’easter brought nearly two feet
of snow to some parts of Queens. By
Tuesday night, several candidates
stood by their plea.
“The mayor’s decision not to
postpone actively disenfranchised
voters who are not able-bodied and
seniors,” said Aaron Siegel, Nath’s
campaign manager. “It’s a shame
because New York City is supposed
to be a haven for progress.”
Rahman also blamed the low voter
turnout on the mayor’s decision
not to postpone the election because
of the snow storm.
“My community failed to vote
due to the weather,” he told QNS.
Michael Brown, a real estate
agent running to represent the district,
said he was glad Election Day
went on without postponement.
“I’m glad we got out the vote,”
Brown said. “The seat needs to be
filled. Someone has to do the work.
The district needs representation.”
Siegel, who had originally predicted
around 10 percent of the district’s
approximately 87,000 voters
would cast a ballot in the election,
feared Tuesday night that number
might be closer to 5 percent, including
ballots cast early and by absentee.
A
round 2,000 voters requested absentee
ballots from the city’s Board
of Elections, though only 600 had
been returned by Tuesday. Any ballot
postmarked by at least Feb. 2 will
be counted if it arrives to the board
at some point in the next 13 days.
The election’s early voting period,
which ran for nine days at the end
of January, saw a little more than
2,000 ballots cast – with over half of
them cast on Sunday, Jan. 31.
The city’s first test of rankedchoice
voting didn’t appear to be
much of a hurdle Tuesday, candidates
and voters reported. Though
the new ballot system, which sees
voters rank their top five choices,
one through five, instead of choosing
just one candidate, didn’t go off
without a hitch.
“I think a lot of people are unfamiliar
with ranked-choice voting,”
Brown said. “But I think it’s a good
system.”
Voters were given pamphlets explaining
the new system, which was
put in place after receiving overwhelming
support as a ballot referendum
in 2019. However, if voters
had questions Tuesday after they
began to fill out their ballots, poll
workers were unable to help.
Should Gennaro receive at least
50 percent of first-choice votes by the
end of the first round of ballot counting,
he will be declared the winner.
If no one tallies enough votes to put
them over the 50 percent threshold,
the candidate with the fewest votes
will be eliminated. Ballots that list
the eliminated candidate as their
first-choice will be awarded to the
voter’s second-choice. The process
will continue until a winner is declared.
The winner of the special election
will serve until the end of 2021
when Lancman’s original term is set
to end. Voters will head back to the
polls in June for the primary elections
and again in November for the
general election for the same City
Council seat.
BY JACOB KAYE, CARLOTTA MOHAMED
AND CLARISSA SOSIN
New York City’s first test with
ranked-choice voting remains ongoing
after polls closed at 9 p.m. for
Tuesday’s night special election in
Queens, but one candidate has taken
an early lead.
While the official results of the
City Council District 24 special election
— the city’s first election to feature
ranked-choice voting — likely
won’t be known for the next couple
of weeks as the city’s Board of Elections
tallies the votes, James Gennaro,
who previously served as a City
Council representative for District
24 from 2002 to 2013, seems to be on
the path to victory.
Gennaro took an early lead
Tuesday night, securing nearly 60
percent of the vote with 98 percent
of scanners reported, according to
unofficial results from the Board of
Elections as of Wednesday morning.
Other candidates for the non-partisan
special election to fill former
Councilman Rory Lancman’s seat
include Moumita Ahmed (15.6 percent
of the vote), Michael Brown (1.3
percent of the vote), Dr. Neeta Jain
(3.1 percent of the vote), Dilip Nath
(4.4 percent of the vote), Mujib Rahman
(2.2 percent of the vote), Deepti
Sharma (5 percent of the vote) and
Soma Syed (8.5 percent of the vote).
“I feel humbled that the early
returns show that our campaign is
likely to prevail in this election,”
Gennaro said in a statement late
Tuesday night. “I am grateful to all
the people who supported us, and
all our volunteers that gave so selflessly
of their time and talents to get
us to this special moment. I thank
my fellow candidates for engaging
in a substantive campaign on the issues,
and for being gracious and collegial.
I salute their commitment to
our community. I am of course compelled
to respect the process of the
counting of all the ballots. I eagerly
await those final results.”
Lancman vacated the Council
seat in October when he took a job in
Governor Andrew Cuomo’s administration,
leading to Mayor Bill de
Blasio calling for Tuesday’s special
election.
Ahmed, who received an endorsement
from Senator Bernie Sanders
and a handful of other progressive
stalwarts, took to Twitter to thank
her supporters, though she did not
concede the race.
“We are a people-powered grassroots
campaign that has been speaking
to voters in District 24 all day
about taking power away from bil-
THE CITY CLERK
OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK
Pursuant to provisions of Section 25(b)(1) of the Charter of the City of New
York, notice is hereby given that a special election will be held in the
Borough of Queens, County of Queens, on Tuesday, February 23, 2021,
between the hours of 6:00 AM and 9:00 PM for the purpose of electing a
candidate for the 31st Councilmanic District. Only registered voters in this
district are eligible to vote.
For any information on whether you are eligible to vote or where your poll site
is located, please call (212) V-0-T-E-N-Y-C. TDD for the hearing-impaired is
(212) 487-5496.
The City Clerk of the City of New York