Mike Autuori’s on the ballot. John McNicholas isn’t — at least not yet.
Collecting more than 70 petition signatures, Dr. Michael Autuori petitioned his way onto the November ballot as an unaffiliated candidate for the Planning and Zoning Commission, seeking to maintain a seat he’s held as a Republican for 20 years. He had interviewed but didn’t get the Republican Town Committee’s recommendation, and wasn’t nominated by the party caucus in July.
“I decided to go the unaffiliated route,” Dr. Autuori said. “It’s more in keeping with who I am.
“I’ll do it on my own, or I won’t do it.”
John McNicholas, who had sought the Republican endorsement for Police Commission, didn’t turn in petitions that would have forced a primary by last week’s Aug. 7 deadline. But he said the next day that he’s working on another way to get on the ballot.
“I’m still exploring other options,” he said. “I’m trying to figure a way that’s best for me.”
With the Aug. 7 deadline passed, are there other means?
“You never know,” Mr. McNicholas said.
“I’m not going to let it go by,” he added.
One possibility would be endorsement by the Independent Party of Ridgefield. The party has mostly cross-endorsed Republicans and Democrats in recent elections, but it has run its own candidates as well. The Independents have a few weeks to name a slate of candidates.
“He will still have a chance to be nominated by the Independent Party, because they have until Sept. 4,” said Town Clerk Barbara Serfilippi.
Both candidates had two possibilities for petitioning their way onto the ballot:
• Gathering signatures of 5% of Ridgefield’s 6,029 registered Republicans — a total of 302;
• Or, collecting signatures of Ridgefield voters — not necessarily Republicans — equal to 1% of the 4,708 who cast ballots in the last similar municipal election.
Mr. Autuori chose the 1%.
The signatures collected by Mr. Autuori and three supporters were checked at town hall last Wednesday.
“We verified them all,” said Assistant Town Clerk Sandy Mossiello. “We needed 48; 72 were okay.”
This makes him a petitioning candidate, whose name will appear on a separate line on the ballot from either Republicans and Democrats.
“It’s called a nominating petition candidate,” Town Clerk Barbara Serfilippi said.
Under state election law, nominating petition candidates may list their party affiliation — Republican in his case — after their names on the ballot.
“He doesn’t want to,” Ms. Serfilippi said. “He’s just going by his own name.”
Mr. McNicholas didn’t present any signatures for verification, she said.
“He had until Wednesday at 4 to bring in petition signatures, and he didn’t bring anything in,” she said.
Collecting signatures equal to 5% of Republican registered voters would have landed Mr. McNicholas in a primary against the other Republican Police Commission candidates.
In Mr. Autuori’s case, gathering the 5% would have put him on the regular Republican line of the ballot, since the caucus had endorsed fewer planning and zoning candidates than allowed.
The town committee recommended and caucus chose to endorse only the number of Republican candidates who could win seats, under state minority representation rules — three, for the Planning and Zoning Commission. This avoided having party members run against each other.
The GOP-endorsed slate includes Chairwoman Rebecca Mucchetti, incumbent George Hanlon, and newcomer Steven Cole.
The Democrats are running four candidates for Planning and Zoning Commission: incumbent Joe Fossi, and James J. Coyle, Timothy Dunphy and Betty A Kloth.
Mr. Autuori said he’d interviewed with the Republican Town Committee and as a 20-year incumbent thought he’d be routinely nominated by the caucus — which he didn’t attend, due to out-of-town business.
“I wasn’t too pleased with the treatment I got from the Republican Party,” he said. “It kind of left a bad taste in my mouth.”
He considered calling it quits, but a number of people urged him to stay in the game.
“They wanted me to run, I said OK,” Mr. Autuori said.
Three supporters helped collect the signatures needed to get on the ballot.
He’s happy with it.
“Now, there’s a choice, there’s a real choice,” he said.
Mr. Autuori thought the issues in the campaign might include the commission’s adoption of a new “Gateway Zone” expanding the permitted business uses in the area of the Route 7 and 35 intersection to allow retail stores, which had been excluded.
Mr. Autuori was one of the ‘no’ votes in a 5-to-4 decision to adopt the new zone, which has since been challenged in court by a citizen’s group.
The two other Republican incumbents, endorsed by the caucus for re-election, voted for Gateway Zone retail.
“I think the Gateway Zone is going to be one of — if not the — pivotal issues people look at,” Dr. Autuori said.
“I was and still am vehemently opposed to that Gateway Zone.”
There’s a larger context.
“An overriding issue is to try to balance conservation and development,” he said. “But every time development moves forward, there’s that much less left to conserve.”
“You keep losing. If every project, half is conservation and half development, it incrementally gets smaller and smaller,” he said.
“Moving forward, ultimately, the buildings are going to win, the trees are going to lose.”
One of his goals is to work on new approaches that will induce private property owners to preserve woodlands and open space, perhaps by allowing denser development on small portions of the land.
“A lot of what we see as green space today is privately owned,” he said. “How do we incentivize preserving a lot of that?”
Dr. Autuori, a professor of biology at the University of Bridgeport, said he’s looking forward to the campaign.
“I think it’s going to be fun,” he said.