Primary Elections: Progressives Strike Out —Again

By Geoff Kelly /Part2 Conclusion

For the past four years, a majority bloc of five (and sometimes six) Council members have proved willing to buck the mayor on some issues. On budget matters, they’ve only tinkered at the margins.

That majority bloc comprises Wyatt, Bollman, Pridgen, Niagara District Council Member David Rivera, and Fillmore District Council Member Mitch Nowakowski.

The minority bloc comprises Golombek, Wingo, and South District Council Member Chris Scanlon.

Delaware District Council Member Joel Feroleto moves between the two factions, depending on the issue.

Brown lost a reliable factotum with Wingo’s departure, but also shed a powerful counterweight in Pridgen, whose power base rivals the mayor’s.

The mayor supported Everhart and Halton-Pope, though he remained largely invisible during their campaigns. (“Brown’s polling numbers are terrible,” a Democratic insider who supported Everhart told Investigative Post.) He also backed Golombek, who usually supports the mayor’s agenda, but not Bollman or Wyatt, who sometimes do not.

Brown has good reason to believe the balance of power has swung in his favor: The mayor, Peoples-Stokes and Kennedy are allies, and Everhart’s and Halton-Pope’s candidacies arose from that alliance.

Indeed, the two first-time candidates raised astonishing sums of money for their races, aided by the extensive donor networks of their bosses. A parade of Democratic officials — including several incumbent Council members and even state Democratic Party Chair Jay Jacobs — offered endorsements and money. So did a host of real estate developers, lobbyists and other political insiders.

“Our candidates were faced with decades and generations of entrenched mediocrity, corporate backings and status-quo politics that serve a small and powerful group of Buffalonians,” OCAB said in its post-election statement.

Turnout was low on Primary Election Day: About 16.5 percent of eligible voters cast votes in the five Council districts that had races. That’s comparable to turnout in Council races four years ago, which suggests the insurgents failed to bring new voters to the polls.

“OCAB’s candidates missed the mark when it came to connecting with voters,” Fillmore District’s Nowakowski told Investigative Post.

He described the primary results as a victory of “progress over platitudes.”

Nowakowski faced no challenger in the primary and has no opponent in the Nov. 7 general election. He was first elected in 2019 with the party endorsement, after serving as a Council staffer. His husband won a Buffalo City Court judgeship last year, with backing from Democratic leadership and the mayor — two parties that rarely agree on anything.

He’s a dealmaker.

At the same time, Nowakowski has been a key member of that majority bloc of five (and sometimes six) Council members that occasionally stick their finger in the mayor ’s eye. That majority ended Brown’s school zone speed camera program, for example, and codified a reserve fund policy against the mayor’s wishes. Just this week the majority bloc voted down a $562,000 subsidy to Braymiller Market downtown — a subsidy the Brown administration pushed hard. Early in his first term, Nowakowski used that majority to compel the Brown administration to adopt and implement a long-stalled program to combat lead poisoning. Nowakowski said he believes Everhart — assuming she beats Walton again in November — will fill Pridgen’s spot in the current majority’s caucus.

“What we lost, we gained,” he said. “I think next year you’ll see at least five members acting independently of the mayor.”

The proof of Nowakowski’s assertion will manifest in January, when the new Council chooses a president. Scanlon — an ally of the mayor who rallied vital South Buffalo support to re-elect Brown in 2021 — has been angling for the job. So has Nowakowski.

A compromise candidate could emerge, possibly even one of the newcomers. Regardless, Halton-Pope’s and Everhart’s votes will win the day for someone.

Meantime, OCAB looks to the future.

“Our City Action Buffalo and our endorsed candidates are building a movement that will set the table for generations to come through smart,strategic and people-focused policy platforms that just make sense. Our work is far from over,” said Leighton Jones, the organization’s communications coordinator.

They might find inspiration for their work in Cheektowaga, a bastion of conservative Democratic politics.

There, two-term Town Council Member Brian Nowak — like Walton, a self-described democratic socialist — is mounting a campaign for town supervisor.

Nowak didn’t have a primary on June 27. He’ll appear on the Democratic and Working Families party ballot lines in November. He will face Michael Jasinski, who has the Republican and Conservative Party lines.

Voter registration numbers suggest Nowak has a good chance of prevailing.

There are about 28,000 registered Democrats in Cheektowaga and 400 members of the Working Families Party. There are 12,000 Republicans and 1,300 Conservatives. Another 13,000 registered voters are independents.

Investigative Post is a nonprofit investigative reporting center based in Buffalo. You can find their work at investigativepost.org and on WGRZ, Channel 2. You can subscribe to their free weekly newsletter by emailing info@investigativepost.org