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By Nate Clauser

The Somerville Democratic City Committee (i.e. the “Somerville Dems”) is a local organization that, despite its name, includes many voting members who hold unelected, lifetime-tenure seats. Last week, they voted to endorse Councilor Jake Wilson for mayor of Somerville. He got 63% support from their members. For context, last year, the Somerville Dems endorsed, with 64% support, a moderate challenger to one of Somerville’s progressive state representatives. But, when the city’s voters weighed in at the ballot box, that challenger got just 31% of the vote, while the more progressive incumbent got 69% of the vote. The Somerville Dems’ current endorsement of Councilor Wilson should be understood with this recent context in mind, and progressive Somerville voters should continue discounting the advice of groups like the Somerville Dems and other unrepresentative, undemocratic establishment voices that are consistently more conservative than our community as a whole. But who should we vote for?

This year’s mayoral race in Somerville features two candidates, both of whom are current, two-term city councilors at large. Councilor Wilson, who has now been endorsed by the Somerville Dems, is a 48-year-old, straight, white, male homeowner. He largely self-financed his 2021 run for the city council, spending $27,000 of his own money to get himself into local elected office. His opponent, Councilor Willie Burnley, Jr., is a 31-year-old Black, queer, democratic socialist, community organizer, and former union steward. Like nearly 2/3rds of Somerville’s residents, Councilor Burnley is a renter, and he was previously displaced from the city when his landlord jacked up the rent by hundreds of dollars. In addition to his job as a city councilor, Councilor Burnley currently works a second job in order to make ends meet; he’s a self-defense instructor for an anti-abuse organization.

Both of Somerville’s mayoral candidates at least pay lip service to broadly-supported community values like transparency, accountability, accessibility, housing affordability, support for city workers, solidarity with immigrants and the LGBTQIA+ community, and effective communication with constituents. Despite the candidates having these stated priorities in common, there are important differences between them that Somerville voters should pay close attention to:

• Developer Money: Councilor Wilson is leaning more on donors outside of his household than he did in ’21, but campaign cash can come with conflicts of interest. That’s why Councilor Burnley, since his very first campaign and continuing into this one, refuses to take any contributions from for-profit real estate developers, who are often large contributors to local campaigns but have strong financial incentives to prefer particular city policy outcomes that personally benefit their own bottom-line. Councilor Wilson promised in 2021 not to take campaign contributions from for-profit real estate developers, but he hasn’t made the same promise this year and has accepted developer money.

• Funding Somerville’s Schools: Councilor Burnley has made a commitment to fully fund Somerville schools, promising to meet the demand of teachers and parents for a 10% increase in the school budget. Councilor Wilson hasn’t made the same commitment.

• Respect and Dignity for Our Unhoused Neighbors: As our housing affordability crisis has worsened, so has the crisis of homelessness. Unfortunately, unhoused people are some of the most scorned and marginalized members of our community. Devastatingly, Councilor Wilson has said that he supports sweeps of our unhoused neighbors and their belongings. Though he has said that the sweeps should be done in a “humane and compassionate way” and that any possessions taken should be “kept for the owners to retrieve,” the truth is that sweeps are inherently traumatic and frequently result in people’s possessions, including important identification and legal documents, getting damaged or lost. Councilor Wilson has also received large campaign contributions from individuals who have opposed the construction of a new shelter in Somerville. By contrast, Councilor Burnley opposes sweeps, unequivocally supports the construction of the new shelter, and is committed to forming a new city office that would create city-owned social housing.

• Solidarity with the Somerville’s Union Workers: The current mayor dragged out contract negotiations with – and delayed cost of living raises for – the city workers in the Somerville Municipal Employees Union (SMEU) for two years. Last year, amidst the protracted negotiations, SMEU asked the city council to put pressure on the Mayor to finally settle the contract. Specifically, SMEU asked the council to refuse to approve raises for top city managers until SMEU workers got their contract (and their raises). Councilor Wilson voted against this request from Somerville’s city workers. Councilor Burnley, a former union member and steward, voted with SMEU.

• Human Rights: We live amidst rising authoritarianism and rampant inhumanity, both at home and abroad. Councilor Burnley has made clear that he will use every power at the city’s disposal to protect Somerville’s values and defend human rights. This includes a specific commitment to refuse to accept federal grants that are conditioned on the city’s cooperation with ICE. It also includes a commitment to implement the genocide divestment ballot question (Question 3) if it is passed by Somerville’s voters. Councilor Burnley is the only mayoral candidate to make either of these commitments. Meanwhile, Councilor Wilson’s campaign has received thousands of dollars from individuals supporting the anti-democratic effort to keep Question 3 from even appearing on the ballot.

A common thread running through these differences between the candidates is whether each of them is basically comfortable with a status quo that is leaving working people and marginalized people behind or whether they are committed to act boldly and urgently to change that status quo. Though establishment voices like the Somerville Dems may be pretty comfortable with the way things are, progressives in the city shouldn’t be. That’s why I’ll be voting for Willie Burnley Jr. for mayor. I hope you’ll join me. A better Somerville is possible; let’s make it happen.