Copyright MassLive
(*This developing story will be updated) Voters in Brockton made history on Tuesday night, electing the city’s first Black mayor to lead the majority-minority city. Moises Rodrigues had declared victory over Jean Bradley Derenoncourt, GBH News reported. Both are at-large members of the City Council. With his apparent victory on Tuesday, Rodrigues will serve for two years. Rodrigues, who has roots in Cape Verde, and Derenoncourt, who came to Brockton from Haiti after that nation’s earthquake in 2010, pledged to be mayors for all city residents, according to the local Enterprise newspaper. Both emerged from September’s preliminary election as the top vote-getters. Somerville With 30 of 32 precincts reporting, unofficial tallies showed City Council member Jake Wilson defeating fellow Councilor Willie Burnley Jr. in an open-seat race in this city west of the Charles River. Wilson, who declared victory in the contest, took 52.2% of the vote to Burnley’s 46.%, putting him on track to replace outgoing Mayor Katjana Ballantyne, according to unofficial tallies. City voters sent Ballantyne packing in the September preliminary election. Burnley called Wilson to concede the race, GBH News reported on Tuesday. Wilson is set to take over a city at odds with the federal government. Partnering with nearby Chelsea, Somerville sued the Trump administration in February, seeking to protect funding that the government had threatened to cut over the two cities’ local laws limiting cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. City voters also were set to decide a ballot question calling on the city government to stop doing business with any companies with ties to Israel over the country’s occupation of Palestine. Taunton Incumbent Mayor Shauna O’Connell fended off a third challenge from City Councilor Estele Borges, WPRI-TV in Providence reported, citing both campaigns. The two pols clashed on such issues as policing, the budget, and development during a debate last month, according to the local Taunton Gazette. Borges’ criticisms of O’Connell boiled down to concerns over transparency and community involvement, the newspaper reported. “Why I’m running: decisions are being made on the fourth floor in the mayor’s office without including anyone else,” Borges said, according to the Gazette. O’Connell, meanwhile, punched up what she said was a “record of real results” during her six years in the mayor’s office. Newton With 75% of precincts reporting, Newton City Council President Marc Laredo was leading challenger Albert Cecchinelli in the race to replace outgoing Mayor Ruthanne Fuller, who chose not to run for reelection. Unofficial tallies showed Laredo taking 84% of the vote to Cecchinelli’s 14%. During the campaign, Laredo vowed “to build a much greater center of community,” according to the local Newton Beacon. “I need to set the tone from the top down that we are going to have respectful dialogue, and City Hall is not going to be in the business of telling people, ‘you should do this,’” he told the local outlet. “I never liked that attitude. I think it breeds a lot of mistrust and anger, and I don’t want to see that in our city.” Cecchinelli, who made his third bid for the Mayor’s Office on Tuesday. The city native, who has a long history of nonprofit work, told the Beacon that he felt called to run for office to make a change in his hometown. Recent reforms such as upzoning, housing development, and bike lanes on Washington Street are pushing the city in a direction he doesn’t recognize, he told the outlet. “Part of the reason that I’m running is because I love Newton,” Cecchinelli said. “I just love the city, and I see it changing to a point of being unrecognizable.”
