Reardon Won’t Seek Rep. Seat in Fall

City Councillor Stephen Reardon said this week that he will not run for state representative this fall, leaving a much clearer shot for newly elected State Rep. RoseLee Vincent.

The councillor did, however, hint at a possible councillor at-large run.

Reardon has contemplated a run for quite some time, and said as much publicly last winter when the Special Election for the seat was just underway. However, signatures to get on the September Democratic Primary ballot are due later this month, on April 29, and Reardon still hadn’t pulled papers.

On Tuesday, he confirmed that he will not be running.

“I did consider it and, unfortunately, it would have required a positive decision before now,” he said. “After thinking it over and consulting with people I trust and who advise me, I have decided not to run. It would essentially have been a trade off of the work I do in court with the work I would do as a state representative. Plus, I would be out of the house most every night of the week and I talked with my wife and I don’t think that’s best. I like the job I’m doing now.

“To be honest, the remuneration is rather poor for a state rep,” he continued. “People ask me all the time why it is we get such lousy representative. I always tell them you get what you pay for. I won’t be running.”

Reardon said he will continue to work at being the Ward 4 councillor, but also said he isn’t ruling out an at-large run in the 2015 City Election.

“I expect to be a candidate for the next election, probably in Ward 4,” he said. “I haven’t eliminated the possibility of running at-large next year, but I don’t see that right now. I like being the Ward 4 councillor.”

The upcoming election cycle seems to literally piggy-back on the fresh Special Election win by Vincent – who will be sworn in today but already has had to start collecting signatures for her bid for re-election.

According to the Secretary of State’s Office, Vincent has already taken out papers.

Also, a newcomer, Cheryl Ann Elizabeth, has taken out papers for a run. It wasn’t immediately known where she was from and there was no contact information immediately available for her.

On the Republican side, Chelsea’s Todd Taylor took out papers again to run in the November general election against the Democratic nominee. Taylor ran in the Special Election earlier this month and lost decidedly to Vincent in the abbreviated race.

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