Democratic voters are in the majority in the city, but this year’s slate of the party’s candidates for local offices has yet to be announced. The Republicans announced a full slate of candidates weeks ago.
Once upon a time there was an overwhelming Republican majority that held power in this town for decades. As the city grew and the demographics changed, Republican influence declined. In recent years they have not been mounting a full slate of candidates, and control of the Council has been in Democratic hands.
Just two years ago, Democrats won four of the five City Council seats and had consistently been running full slates in city elections. That was then.
This is now:
*Two Democratic incumbents, Mayor Meg Kelly and Commissioner of Finance Michele Madigan, decided not to run for re-election.
*The Democrats first choice to run for Mayor , Jason Golub, withdrew. A second candidate interested in running, David Snyder, has disappeared from the political scene. Ron Kim is now filling that slot.
. *After a long, fruitless search for a Finance Commissioner candidate, Democratic Committee Chair Sarah Burger put herself forward for the office. She has now taken herself off the ballot with no replacement in sight.
*Commissioner of Accounts John Franck, a 16 year incumbent who was running again, has now also just taken himself off the ballot.
*Dillon Moran, Democratic candidate for Commissioner of Public Works, has taken himself off the ballot. Mr. Moran was an unsuccessful candidate for this office in 2019.
It is possible that the Democrats will come up with new candidates to fill these three now vacant positions, but that must happen by this Friday, April 2.
Rumor has it that city Democratic Chair Sarah Burger will be stepping down at the committee’s April meeting.
I sent a text to Ms. Burger to call me for comment, but I have not yet heard from her. I will post whatever she has to say.
Saratoga Springs Politics 
The democratic party is an absolute embarrassment in this city, they can’t get out of their own way. Yepsen and her little pack of lap dogs are still trying to run the show, surrounded by wannabe socialists and hacks. I mean you really have to work hard in a city this progressive to lose as many times as they have in the last few years… will they ever realize they themselves are the problem?
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So Sarah and her cronies took over the group, seemingly without any plan beyond badmouthing two objectively successful female Democrats in office and the city charter, and have now ruined the reputation of the city’s committee to the point they can’t field qualified candidates? This, despite the fact that Saratoga Springs voted overwhelmingly for Biden, Tonko, and several local Democrats in the recent past? I would hope a failure this monumental would teach them that their brand of local politics does more harm than good, but based on how many times we’ve see a similar group fail at changing the charter I don’t think we’ll be that lucky.
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In addition to candidate vacancies almost 20% of the seats on the Democratic Committee are also not filled. I believe the 1st vice chair of the committee has stepped down as well so that position is also vacant. I don’t think they have had any fundraisers for quite a while. Wonder how their treasury is doing…
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As a life long Democrat and former member of the Democratic Committee in Saratoga Springs, this makes me sad. Rather than recognize a problem when so many left the committee they seemed to cheer and see it as a coup in their favor. In the past two years since that time, Sarah Burger and her minions, along with the unfortunate support of the County Committee chair, did nothing to heal the party but rather continued to add to the divide with antagonistic words. It is extra unfortunate that they have now put up a candidate for mayor that helped to lead this division and nastiness.
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It appears although Mr. Moran collected signatures to run for DPW commissioner, he actually intended to run for Commissioner of Accounts. I suppose he realized he would almost certainly lose against Skip again & is just trying to worm his way in wherever he can. Speaks volume about his motivations and the kind of campaigns he runs – honesty and transparency in short supply.
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