Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Candidate Residency topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Brockton elections official seeks one-year residency requirement for candidates
Summary
Cynthia Hogan, Brockton's elections director, urged the Joint Committee on Election Laws to allow cities to require candidates to live in the city for at least one year before running for office, citing repeated cases of nonresident candidates using business addresses to qualify.
Cynthia Hogan, executive director of elections for the City of Brockton, urged the Joint Committee on Election Laws to approve a local measure that would require candidates for municipal office to have lived in the city for at least one year before running.
"I want to have the people that are running for office live in the city for a year," Hogan told the committee, saying that in her 23 years at the elections office she has seen at least three candidates who used business addresses or property ownership to claim residency while living elsewhere.
Hogan described enforcement challenges under current law when property owners assert domicile at a local address. "If they own property, they say they live at this property that they own... I can't call the landlord and say, 'hey, does he live there?' because they own the property," she said. Hogan said one case involved a candidate claiming to live "in the basement of his restaurant," and another involved a registrant who actually lived in Whitman.
Hogan said the Brockton city council had unanimously passed a local petition calling for the change; she said voters tend to see through clearly nonresident candidates but that the Elections Office expends staff time investigating claims.
The committee did not vote on the proposal; Hogan's testimony was part of a larger hearing on multiple election-related bills. Chair Dan Hunt said written testimony would remain open until the committee takes action.
