Saratoga Springs returns incumbents to office

PHOTOGRAPHER: Erica Miller

Meg Kelly, Robin Dalton, Michele Madigan, Skip Scirocco, and Matt Veitch declare victory in Saratoga Springs on Tuesday.

SARATOGA SPRINGS — Though vote totals were slow to come in Tuesday night from the Saratoga County Board of Elections, Spa City voters appeared to re-elect Mayor Meg Kelly and other incumbents to the Saratoga Springs City Council.

In the hotly contested finance commissioner race, incumbent Michele Madigan was leading over Democrat Patricia Morrison by about 200 votes, with more than half of all votes counted Tuesday night. Madigan was running for re-election on the Independence, Working Families and SAM ballot lines.

Madigan and Kelly both declared victory, though results remain unofficial.

In June, Madigan lost a Democratic primary to Morrison in a result that split Democrats, with a dozen members of the city Democratic Committee resigning so that they could continue working for Madigan’s re-election campaign.

Madigan ran on her record, which includes cutting or holding property taxes in the city steady for the eight years she has been in office. Morrison criticized her for being too close to developers in the city.

For mayor, first-term incumbent Democrat Kelly was seeking another two-year term. She defeated Republican Timothy Holmes, who had the GOP ballot line, even though the city Republican Committee didn’t support him.

More: Election roundup: Capital Region race results 2019

Public Works Commissioner Anthony “Skip” Scirocco — the only Republican on the five-member council and a 12-year incumbent — defeated Democrat Dillon Moran.

Republican Robin Dalton won the public safety commissioner post in another hotly contested race, defeating Democrat Kendall Hicks. The commissioner of public safety oversees the police and fire departments and building code enforcement. Current commissioner Peter Martin did not run for re-election.

Hicks, a career member of the National Guard, has faced criticism over a 2013 domestic violence arrest (charges were dismissed) and other personal matters, and was running without support from the city Democratic Committee.

Dalton will be the first woman to head the city’s public safety department. “If you do the right thing, you win,” Dalton said in a brief victory speech Tuesday night at the Holiday Inn.

In the city’s unusual form of government in which elected commissioners wield near-unilateral power over the government functions they control, the offices of mayor and commissioners of public works, public safety and finance were all contested. Only Accounts Commissioner John Franck, whose office performs the functions of a city clerk, had no opposition.

More: Election roundup: Capital Region race results 2019

On the county level, city voters re-elected incumbents Republican Matthew Veitch and Democrat Tara Gaston to represent the city on the Saratoga County Board of Supervisors. They defeated Republican Stephen Mittler.

Reach Gazette reporter Stephen Williams at 518-395-3086, [email protected] or @gazettesteve on Twitter.