There will be three new faces on the nine-member Cambridge City Council come January, according to unofficial results released late Tuesday: Jivan Sobrinho-Wheeler, Ayesha Wilson and Joan Pickett.
Sobrinho-Wheeler served on the council from 2019 to 2021 and is a democratic socialist firmly behind the swift rollout of bike lanes and Affordable Housing Overlay zoning; Pickett is an opponent of the bike lanes who took the matter to court, and also no fan of the AHO; Wilson, moving over from the School Committee, is a bridge between the positions and was notably the only candidate endorsed by the pro-housing A Better Cambridge and the group it often feels pitched against in civic discourse, the Cambridge Citizens Coalition.
It was the council incumbents who came out on top, though, with another leading show of No. 1 votes for Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui – 3,031 of them – despite a Boston Globe report from Oct. 16 that eight employees from her office over the past few years had complained of a toxic workplace. Though her totals were down from the 3,861 of two years ago, Siddiqui remained the only councillor achieving a “quota” of No. 1 votes that won office on the first round of ballot counts, a distinction of Siddiqui’s for three elections in a row.
Burhan Azeem, Marc McGovern, Patty Nolan and Paul Toner followed, with E. Denise Simmons the last incumbent reelected. Though Azeem was the next closest to Siddiqui on No. 1 votes, his count was more than a thousand behind Siddiqui and he did not achieve quota.
Pickett was the last candidate to get on the council in the unofficial results; a formal count in Cambridge’s ranked form of voting begins at 9 a.m. Wednesday at the Senior Center in Central Square.
The number of registered voters was slightly up this election to 69,849, and the ballots cast rose a bit to 21,177, the population of Cambridge also continues to rise – and the 30.3 percent of voters is only slightly higher than the 29.9 percent from two years ago.
School Committee results
On the School Committee, four incumbents remain – Rachel Weinstein, David Weinstein (no relation), Jose Luis Rojas Villarreal and Caroline Hunter – and will be joined by first-timer Elizabeth Hudson and Richard Harding, who like Sobrinho-Wheeler is returning to office. Harding served seven previous terms on the committee ending in 2017. (Update on Nov. 9, 2023: A count with more than 2,000 auxiliary ballots has moved Harding out of the seat and given first-time challenger Andrew King the win instead.)
The committee has a wide range of issues to address, including contract negotiations with the Cambridge Education Association for Units A and B (teachers and administrators), who have been working without a formal contract since Sept. 1; finding ways to address the learning loss that occurred during the pandemic; addressing racial and economic inequalities; and ensuring that all students are academically challenged and have the resources and knowledge they will need as adults.
Two new members were guaranteed for the committee as Wilson shifted her attention to the council and member Fred Fantini opted to retire after serving 40 years.
Balance of power
Similarly, three new councillors were guaranteed when vice mayor Alanna Mallon and councillors Dennis Carlone and Quinton Zondervan opted not to run again. It was the biggest turnover since 2017 – the year Zondervan was elected, though in 2013, four challengers were elected after only two incumbents opted not to run.
The new configuration does not significantly unsettle the balance of power on the council. There was no onrush by candidates seen as more conservative, such as John Hanratty, Hao Wang or Catherine Zusy, nor by those seen as a bloc of successors for Zondervan beyond Sobrinho-Wheeler: Ayah Al-Zubi and former legislative aide Dan Totten. In the first count of ballots, recent Harvard grad Al-Zubi trailed Pickett by around 100 No. 1 votes.
While incumbent Toner picks up a bloc member in Pickett with a charge of fiscal conservatism and concern over the effect of bike rollouts, Sobrinho-Wheeler was often allied with Zondervan during his previous term and is expected to pick up in some ways where Zondervan leaves off.
Season of scandal
Siddiqui’s was not the only scandal this election season. In September, candidates Robert Winters and Carrie Pasquarello were named by the city’s branch of the Democratic Socialists of America as the focus of a rally planned to “oppose bigotry.” Totten got the bulk of attention as an organizer of the event, though other candidates were on record as objecting to the challengers’ social media – described as including support for right-wing, racist, Islamophobic and transphobic accounts – and Winters’ online presence had drawn critiques back to June 2022. After vandalism and arrests of a Central Square business during protests for which Totten was seen as an advocate, his own social media drew accusations of anti-Catholicism and antisemitism.
Ultimately, Totten landed in the exact middle of the pack of candidates; Winters and Pasquarello languished toward the bottom of the rankings, contributing to a disappointing showing for CCC endorsements: Four of 11 of its candidates got council seats, or 36 percent, compared with six of ABC’s nine, or 67 percent. The Cambridge Bicycle Safety Group, seeing the city’s Cycling Safety Ordinance and its bike lane rollout at risk, put out a voting guide naming a dozen candidates as pledging or showing support and saw five elected, or 42 percent. (The Cambridge Residents Alliance endorsed eight and saw four elected, for 50 percent; the DSA endorsed Sobrinho-Wheeler, Totten and Al-Subi, seeing only one elected, and Our Revolution Cambridge endorsed five and also saw only Sobrinho-Wheeler elected to the council from among Al-Zubi, Totten, Joe McGuirk and Vernon Walker.)
The at-large councillors serve two-year terms, electing one of their own as mayor after they are seated in January. For the past two terms, that was Siddiqui with Mallon as her second. There were 24 candidates this year, a typically large field for Cambridge.
On the committee side, where the terms are also two years long, there were 11 candidates.
A stronger
Please consider making a financial contribution to maintain, expand and improve Cambridge Day.
We are now a 501(c)3 nonprofit and all donations are tax deductible.
Please consider a recurring contribution.
the voters have spoken, yes? and they didn’t stutter…;-)
Congratulations to our new council and may you always act in the best interest for ALL of us!!
PS: I am beyond happy that little Danny Totten was defeated!! Definitely addition by subtraction, -now if we can just get him to go away!!
> Sobrinho-Wheeler served on the council from 2021 to 2021
Minor correction: 2019 to 2021.
So much for all the bluster about no one in Cambridge wanting bike lanes.
Can someone comment / explain how the ranked piece comes into play now. Pretty close vote totals at the margin there between Picket, Al Zubi, Totten and Zusy. So could this picture still change significantly?
Huge thank you to the many volunteers and employees who worked on this election and continue to do so!
There could be a change, though I think past counts (and recounts) have usually validated the original order.
@cambridgeresident This reported”bluster” is also mirrored in the Bike pledge camp. I know Joan from her CSFA days, and she was never vehemently against bike lanes like her opponents claimed her to be.
She’s more data driven towards our infrastructure needs, including bike lanes, which the CSO lacks in its current form. The City government has already publically admitted the short-sightedness of the Porter Sq. extension, and there’s a plan to redesign that section which includes the bike lanes.
Most of the opposition towards the CSO has been fueled by the early corrosive rhetoric of the cyclist advocates, and the fact the city caved to such pressure and reneged on conducting the appropriate studies which would have avoided this situation in the first place.
Very happy with the 9 we got. Feel like the many different perspectives of our city will be well-represented, with a variety of experiences and areas of expertise.
Echo Scott, thanks to the people who make democracy possible!
Ok after looking into it, about 900 Siddiqui ballots will be allocated to their 2nd choice (if I understand how this works) so you’d have to believe that almost those go to Al-Zuni by like a ~11% margin over Pickett for it to change
Edit: Al-Zubi
Ughh. We lost a true climate champion (Q Zondervan) and did not elect any candidates to give the climate crisis a priority. I hope to see candidates Vernon Walker and Dan Totten run and win in two years. Adam: the newly elected candidate Joan Pickett is currently suing the city to remove all bike lanes. If that is not “vehemently against bike lanes” I don’t know what is.
@cportus: I apologize if I’m misunderstanding and you already know this, but the city has already run its ranked-choice algorithm on the preliminary results – you can see the round-by-round count here: https://www.cambridgema.gov/Election2023/Council%20Round.htm
The writer of this article didn’t make a big distinction between the top 9 #1-vote-getters and the 9 candidates elected by the ranked-choice count because, this year, as is the case I think more often than not, they’re the same set of 9 people.
The only ordering difference, in fact, is that Patty Nolan got more #1 votes than Marc McGovern but Marc was elected earlier in the count than Patty was (due to receiving significantly more of Sumbul’s transfers – 163 to Patty’s 69).
Also, the elected council will now be a majority-woman and majority-nonwhite council. Is that a first for Cambridge on both counts?
What I appreciate about the new make-up, even though not far from the original council, is that perhaps the new members will change the dynamic in civility, respect, PATIENCE and protocol- and inclusion of ALL voices, not just loud special interests. With the encouragement of full discussion and community outreach, maybe we will have better and longer lasting outcomes instead of the ubiquitous “amendments” because not enough research or questions were initially asked.
Many of the policies had a twinge of legacy or ego attached, which doesn’t consider the residents at large. and many of those new policies were influenced by people who don’t even live in Cambridge but pass through both figuratively and specifically. I want better behavior– less ageism, racism, anti-homeowner who through no fault of their own, may have inherited from generations. They are property rich but cash poor. They are being ignored- even dismissed as NIMBYs which is ridiculous. I believe the ills of Washington DC are infiltrating local government with effective but unfair branding. This has got to stop.
And whether you realize it or not, older people have tons of expertise and experience which should be mined instead of shelved for the bright shiny penny.
I did not know that! Thanks for sharing.
“a formal count in Cambridge’s ranked form of voting begins at 9 a.m. Wednesday at the Senior Center in Central Square.”
I read this to mean that all this showed was an unofficial count of first choice votes!
I consider myself reasonably intelligent but I find this system pretty confusing…
Pete, I am confused. You want ALL voices included, but then you list voices that you don’t like, and say that has to stop. Do you not understand the contradiction? What you call “special interests” might be someone who doesn’t want their kid to be hit by a car while cycling, or a family that wants a home to move into. By ALL voices it sounds like you mean the voices YOU like. Conversations are a two-way street, and everyone needs to learn that we need to listen too, and accept that we can’t have everything.
lousy election lol
If you do not feel represented by this Council I cannot help ya. Sorry to see that Joe didn’t make the cut. McGovern and Azeem crushed. Glad to see Wilson made it. This might be the most even handed council I’ve ever seen. Congrats to all (even the ones I don’t like or agree with). Can we maybe get two years of calm? That would be incredibly nice.
Cportus, it can be a little confusing. But the numbers from election night do complete the voting procedure. That is, the ballots are rolled over to 2nd, 3rd, etc choice if necessary. (Thus, the article has one graphic of who got #1 votes in the first count, and another graphic with the winners at the end of evening.
The “official” count later includes any uncounted ballots, such as oversea ballots. (Though in theory things can change at the bottom of the ranking, it virtually never changes who’s elected.)