Saying Ansonia could no longer afford scandals, apathetic leadership and high taxes, city Republicans officially nominated businessman David Cassetti for mayor Tuesday.
“Ansonia’s promise is eroding before our eyes,” Cassetti told about 40 fellow Republicans July 23 at Molto Bene on Wakelee Avenue.
“A rising tax burden is punishing many long-term residents that have worked hard for all their life. A failing school system is short-changing our children and closing the door on the future. Big city problems of crime and corruption are becoming far too commonplace,” Cassetti said.
Cassetti has served on the city’s police commission and the economic development commission. The father of five owns BIRM-I Construction on Riverside Drive.
During an acceptance speech that lasted about six minutes, Cassetti said Mayor James Della Volpe‘s administration has grown tired, with little to show after 14 years in power yet still talking about an Ansonia “comeback.”
“(The administration) waited while factories closed. They waited while the unemployment rate climbed. They waited while the grand list dropped. They waited while their own employees and officials put their own interests above the good of the city,” Cassetti said.
Click the play button below to listen to Cassetti’s full speech.
The GOP pointed out two “scandals” recently in Ansonia — improprieties by the former tax collector, and an ethics problem within the former leadership at the Ansonia Housing Authority.
Ansonia Republicans are just 13 percent of registered voters in the city. About 38 percent are registered as Democrats. The GOP will have to target the roughly 4,600 unaffiliated voters in the city.
To do that, the Republicans who spoke at Tuesday’s nominating convention repeatedly pointed out they’ve been the ones pushing for economic development, not the Democrats who control the mayor’s office and the Board of Aldermen.
The Republicans resuscitated the city’s economic development commission while fighting for tax incentives to lure new business and storefront loan programs to help merchants, said Alderman John Marini.
Without the tax revenue generated from real economic development, the city will never be able to improve its struggling school system, Marini said.
Yet the city’s last economic development director was “saddled” with two other job titles in Ansonia City Hall, Marini said, a reflection of the Democratic Party’s view of economic development.
Meanwhile, taxes are higher than surrounding towns, the school district is among the lowest performing in the state, and the Democrats just keep spending money, Marini said.
Marini also accused the Democrats of blaming the city’s school district for rising taxes in the city.
“They said it was the cost of education. They said they needed to fund education and that caused the tax increase. That’s not true,” Marini said. “That’s misleading. The tax problem was caused by a drop in the grand list.”
Marini said the city needs economic development “in the heart of the city,” something the current administration has failed to do.
In a surprise move, Marini declined his party’s nomination to run for a third term on the Board of Aldermen.
Instead, Marini is going to become the chairman of the Ansonia Republican Town Committee. The RTC’s current leader, Patrick Henri, is running for the Board of Aldermen.
Marini was elected to the Board of Aldermen in 2009, the first Republican to serve on the board in a decade. He was re-elected in 2011 and the once-dormant Republican Party picked up three more seats on the board.
Henri said the Republicans provide an important check to the Democratic majority on the Board of Aldermen by forcing elected officials to discuss, in public, what they’re doing.
“We have a chance now to get a majority of the Board of Aldermen,” Henri said. “We have a chance to get the mayor’s seat. We have a lot of ammunition to go after them for the good of the people of Ansonia and the good of the party.”
Charlie Stowe, an incumbent Republican who currently represents the city’s Second Ward on the Board of Aldermen, will be running in the First Ward.
This is happening because a city commission studying ward boundaries found Stowe’s street isn’t in the Second Ward.
Ansonia GOPers interviewed Tuesday said the city’s charter described the physical boundaries of the Second Ward one way, but those boundaries didn’t translate precisely to a map the city used to define the boundary.
The following candidates were nominated by the Republicans:
(An asterick indicates incumbent)
Mayor
David Cassetti
Board of Education
Aretta Kotalis
Vinnie Scarlata
BOARD OF ALDERMEN
Ward 1
Charlie Stowe * (incumbent, but currently serving Ward 2)
Natalie Biasucci
Ward 2
Phil Tripp *
Lorie Vaccaro
Ward 3
Kelsey Zdep
Danielle Bradshaw
Ward 4
NO CANDIDATES NOMINATED
Ward 5
Joan Radin *
Anthony Cassetti
Ward 6
Patrick Henri
Joseph Dempsey
Ward 7
Dave Blackwell
Dan Evans
City Clerk
Joanne Czeczot
Treasurer
Judy Larkin-Nicolari
Marshals
Ron Henri
Roy Tidmarsh
Peter Gujski
