Civil District and First City clerks’ races on ballot November 6
22nd October 2018 · 0 Comments
By Christopher Tidmore
Contributing Writer
If you have been confused at the composition of candidates in the two clerks of courts contests, you are far from alone.
Inexact media coverage has merged these two, separate races into an amorphous mass of a seemingly single electoral bid, yet they stand as very different elections with very different slates of candidates.
To explode the first myth, former State Representative Austin Badon is NOT running against District “D” Councilman Jared Brossett. The two well-known public officials contest two separate, and very disparate, clerk’s races.
Badon seeks the Clerkship of First City Court, East Bank New Orleans’ equivalent of small claims court. Brossett aims to be the next Clerk of the Civil District Court, Orleans Parish’s unique non-criminal court that deals with business lawsuits, civil matters, juvenile issues, and divorces — to name a few areas. Mostly, the CDC hears court cases that do not send someone potentially to prison.
Both men are running for something akin to an open seat—thanks to the previous clerk winning election to a judgeship. Moreover, Badon and Brossett each face the handpicked successor of the previous incumbent Clerk, yet that’s where the comparisons end.
Ellen Hazeur departed the Clerkship of First City Court after winning election to a Civil District Court judgeship on March 24. She hired her campaign manager Timothy David Ray to serve as her deputy in the office, and he became her interim replacement upon her formal ascension to the bench on April 25, 2018.
Ray, who had run for the open District “B” Council position a few months before, enjoyed a degree of name recognition usually not afforded to interim clerks. However, a lawsuit against the sitting judges on the First City Bench did antagonize some of their Honors’ allies, rendering Ray’s political support far from ubiquitous. Of course, the legal canons prevent judges themselves from openly supporting or opposing candidates in an election, but this has also meant that Ellen Hazeur cannot campaign for her former deputy.
This underlying antagonism has proven asset for Austin Badon. Despite not being an attorney (not required for the Clerk’s job, though, an issue in the race), considerable political support has lined up behind the former State Rep., including Most of the Orleans City Council, legislative delegation, School Board, and former U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu. Ray has earned a few endorsements of his own including the AFL-CIO and the IWO, but not nearly as broad a support base as his opponent.
In contrast, political endorsements have been pretty evenly divided in the Orleans Civil Clerk’s race, with Councilman Brossett having a slight edge in political support, but not an overwhelming one. Part of the reason is that Chelsey Richard Napoleon has served for over 20 years in the Clerk’s office, and a decade as Chief Deputy. No one questioned Napoleon’s experience or qualifications when Dale Atkins vacated the CDC Clerkship upon winning a seat on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.
That does not mean judgment has not been an issue in this race. Brossett has attacked Napoleon with some success on the decision not to accept an offer made by Jefferson Parish Clerk of Court John Gegenheimer.
The computer system for filing and other operational matters has long been a major complaint at the CDC, despite the Clerk’s office spending considerable sums on consultancy. Gegenheimer, who had developed a state of the art computer operating system for clerks’ offices (in his tenure as head of the technology committee for the Louisiana Clerk of Courts Association), offered the Jefferson Parish Clerk’s computer operating system to the CDC for free. Napoleon’s boss Dale Atkins turned down Gegenheimer, an ongoing point of contention made by more than a few members attorneys who have frequent interactions with the CDC.
However, the Interim Orleans Civil Clerk is quick to point out that the decision to refuse John Gegenheimer was not her call. It was her then-boss.
Early voting starts October 23 and runs through October 30, with the general election on November 6.
This article originally published in the October 22, 2018 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
