Brookfield Republicans elect 25-member town committee slate

By Scott Benjamin

BROOKFIELD – Thirty people applied this week for a volunteer job which includes sending texts, making phone calls, posting lawn signs and encouraging your friends and neighbors to participate in a system, where, at the national level, the two major organizations often throw javelins at each other, which has left many young people “disillusioned.”

Twenty-five of the applicants were selected for the opening day roster.

“To think that thirty people came forward,” Brookfield Republican Party Chairman commented Bobby Guarino about the field that competed for seats on the GOP town committee. “I think that says a lot.”

“The engagement for the Republican Party is up,” he said after 86 people voted at the Whisconier Middle School cafetorium Thursday night, January 8, as the local GOP caucused to select the town committee members for the two-year term that starts in March.

The departing Republican Town Committee had recommended a 25-member slate. There were five challengers and three of them were elected, including former longtime selectman and Board of Education member Harry Shaker.

Democrat First Selectman Steve Dunn annexed 53.2 percent of the vote last November to win a fifth non-consecutive term.

However, in a year where Connecticut had a Democratic municipal election wave, Brookfield Republicans took three of four seats on the Board of Finance and two of three seats on the Board of Education.

Guarino has said that due to “time constraints” it is “less likely” than “more likely” that he will seek a second two-year term as chairman when the Republican Town Committee elects its new slate of officers.

However, he was elected to a new term as a member of the panel.

Republican Selectman Karl Hinger and Republican Vacancy Committee Chairman Stephen Harding Sr. have said that former Zoning Board of Appeals Chairman Alan Donnelly will likely be a prime candidate for the chairmanship. Donnelly has commented that, if the members are supportive, he would accept the position.

As for the next two-year term, Guarino added, “We need to get more people comfortable with early voting.”

Dunn had about 500 more votes than Hinger through the two weeks of early voting last fall.

Guarino commented, “If you get more votes early, you have less ground to make up on Election Day.”

Republican Town Committee members have praised Guarino for getting members from the two factions that were engaged in a 2023 municipal primary to work together over the last two years.

Explained Hinger, “I think the focus starting in March will be more external. How do we help the town, how do we help the state, and less about the matters that divide our local party.”

“It was a much more divided Republican Party two years ago,” Hinger explained. “You didn’t see two slates tonight the way you did two years ago” at the January caucus.

For decades, Republican candidates in Brookfield have prevailed in the state legislative races during the even-numbered years.

The GOP has held the 107th state House District, which includes all of Brookfield, since the 1976 election and the 30th District seat, where Brookfield is one of 18 municipalities, since the 1980 election.

Guarino said that Rep. Marty Foncello (R-107) and state Senate Republican Leader Stephen Harding Jr. (R-30), both of Brookfield, have strong resumes and he expects that they will seek re-election.

The marquee race should be for governor as Democrat Ned Lamont seeks a third term. He is being challenged for the party nomination by state Rep. Josh Elliott (D-88) of Hamden.

For now, the Republican campaign is between former New Britain Mayor Erin Stewart and state Sen. Ryan Fazio of Greenwich.

Hinger, who was re-elected to the town committee, said that since Harding Jr. leads the GOP state Senate, he anticipates that most if not all of the Brookfield delegates will support Fazio.

Hinger, who is 31, said he is encouraged that two millennials – Stewart is 38 and Fazio is 35 – are vying for the nomination.

He said younger voters are registering unaffiliated at a greater rate than their parents. He added that has made it more difficult, for example, to recruit local town committee members.

“With divided government in Washington, it leads to a lot of younger people feeling disillusioned in the two-party system. Not as many younger people are getting involved with the town committees.”

The Republicans have not won a gubernatorial race since 2006, when Brookfield’s M. Jodi Rell captured a full term. The GOP has not prevailed in a U.S. Senate election since 1982 or a U.S. House race since 2006. The party has fewer than 33 percent of the seats in both chambers of the General Assembly.

Three years ago, Sacred Heart University Government Professor Gary Rose wrote a book on the Connecticut Republican Party which recommended that the GOP hold open primaries in which unaffiliated voters would participate.

Rose said it would produce more moderate nominees and also probably generate more votes for GOP candidates in the November election.

“I don’t know much about Gary Rose and I don’t know much about open primaries,” commented Guarino. “We have a great chairman in Mr. [Ben] Proto and he’ll make those decisions and push the party in the right direction.”

In a 2019 interview with Patch.com, then-Secretary of the State Denise Merrill, a Democrat, said if one of the major parties in Connecticut adopted open primaries it would be to their advantage if the other major party didn’t take that step.

Hinger commented, “That makes sense to me. If you did have the unaffiliated voters vote in one primary, you are much more likely to pick a much more moderate candidate.”

Wall Street Journal columnist William Galston wrote in November 2020 that Donald Trump remade the Republican Party.

Hinger commented, “Starting in 2015, 2016 there was a big focus on populism. He took the party away from the neoconservative era.”

However, he said some of Trump’s recent decisions, such as the military action in Venezuela are similar to "W. Bush. Maybe we’re seeing a return to form.”

Proto, the state Republican chairman, recently held a news conference to say that affordability will be the prime issue as Lamont seeks a third term.

Remarked Hinger, “With all the drama that’s going on, whether is the culture war stuff or Venezuela, immigration, no matter what, affordability is rough right now for people.”

The 25 members of the Brookfield Republican Town Committee for the term that starts in March: Jeffrey Bronn, Mel Butow, Sara Coffey, Harry Shaker, Andy Corea, Sarah Devine, Lesley Couig, Ernesto Davila, Rose DeMarco, Chris Dickinson, Alan Donnelly, Michael Einzig, Victoria Guarino, Bobby Guarino, Anne Marie Harding, Stephen Harding Sr., Karl Hinger, Leanna Hinger, Elena Lopez, Elliott C. Morales, Greg Petriccione, Erin Scalera, Donna Sedlack, Joellen Stipak and Gavin Zaletsky.