Paterson election guide: Who's running, how to vote and why naming a winner may take weeks

PATERSON — In a city where elections tend to be multi-week marathons rather than one-day dashes, more than 500 people using mail-in ballots already have cast their votes in the five-way race for mayor.

The calendar says Paterson’s election day is Tuesday, May 10. But that seems like an outdated way to describe the time frame for political contests in New Jersey's third-biggest city.

The handling of mail-in ballots stretches out over weeks before and after election day , there will be three days of in-person early voting before the 10th, and hundreds of people likely will file provisional ballots that day that will remain in limbo until close to Memorial Day.

On top of all that looms the possibility — and, in Paterson, almost inevitability — of seeing losing candidates seek a recount and file legal challenges to the results.

We will be tracking the Paterson race on election night, so check NorthJersey.com for updates or sign up for our news alerts to get results straight to your inbox.

Who's running for mayor of Paterson?

Paterson, like other New Jersey cities that conduct municipal races in May, holds nonpartisan elections, which means the candidates run without any formal connection to the Democratic or Republican parties. Of course, there often are allegations of interference by political party leaders in the nonpartisan contests.

In the mayor’s race, incumbent Andre Sayegh is seeking a second term and faces four challengers: former Councilman Aslan Goow and three current council members, Michael Jackson, Alex Mendez and Luis Velez.

Who else is on the ballot?

Meanwhile, 10 people are running for three at-large City Council seats. That group is composed of two incumbents, Maritza Davila and Lilisa Mimms, as well as Jeyss Abreu, Melissa Baralt, Gilman Choudhury, Sonia Deliz, Mark Fischer, Casey Melvin, Juan "Mitch" Santiago and Md Forid Uddin.

State law required that election officials send out the 11,000 mail-in ballots requested by voters by March 26. But lawsuits filed by Sayegh supporters who unsuccessfully tried to bump two of his rivals from the election delayed the printing of the ballots by four weeks. Mendez claims the delay could hurt him because many of his supporters use mail-in ballots.

A judge also rejected an attempt to knock Goow out of the race by alleging he isn't a Paterson resident.

How to vote: early, in-person or by mail

Under state law, mail-in ballots must be postmarked by May 10 and delivered by the postal service to the Passaic County Board of Elections by May 16 to be counted.

This year, Paterson residents have the option of three days of early, in-person voting this weekend on May 6, 7, and 8. Election officials will set up two polling sites: one at Paterson fire headquarters at 300 McBride Ave. and another at the Islamic Center of Passaic County at 152 Derrom Ave. Polls will open at 10 a.m. on all three days and close at 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and 6 p.m. on Sunday.

Finally, on May 10, people will be able to go to their neighborhood polling sites to cast ballots. Voters can find the location of their polling place from the sample ballots sent to them by mail, or by going to the state elections website, voter.svrs.nj.gov/polling-place-search.

After the polls close at 8 p.m., the Passaic County Clerk’s Office will begin releasing partial and preliminary tallies.

A referendum on Sayegh?

The mayor's election is shaping up as a referendum on the past four years' performance by Sayegh, who has a huge fundraising advantage over the rest of the field.

The mayor's opponents point to the record-breaking crime statistics and garbage-strewn streets as evidence of Sayegh's failure. They have accused him of selling out Paterson's best interests to developers who have contributed to his political campaign.

In response, Sayegh has highlighted his opponents' personal baggage, including pending election fraud indictments against Mendez and Jackson. Sayegh says he has restored integrity to City Hall, led the city through the COVID-19 pandemic and earmarked more than $6 million for Paterson park improvements.

More: With Paterson police force under fire, mayoral candidates split on reform efforts

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When will the winners be clear?

It could take weeks.

The election night results won’t include whatever provisional ballots get cast. Nor will they include most, possibly all, of the mail-in ballots.

In essence, the final election night numbers will be like the score of a football game after just three of the four quarters have been played.

Elections officials won’t be putting out full returns that include mail-in votes until after the mail delivery deadline of May 16. Several times during the past decade, Paterson City Council candidates were winning their contests based on election night numbers, only to end up losing after all mail-ins were counted. But that hasn’t happened in any of the city’s mayoral elections.

The county Board of Elections then will have until May 27 to complete its provisional ballot report, according to state deadlines. Voters can file provisional ballots when they go to the polls and there’s a discrepancy with information on file, perhaps due to a change in address or a missing signature in a poll book. Without unsealing the actual votes, the election board reviews each provisional ballot to determine whether it is legitimate and should be counted.

In Paterson’s last mayoral election, in 2018, officials ended up counting 3,546 mail-in ballots and 765 provisional ballots, in a race with almost 23,000 total votes. In 2021, there were 3,470 mail-ins and 1,279 provisionals.

May 27 also is the state’s deadline for candidates to request recounts, which tend to be more common in Paterson’s ward elections than in its citywide contests for mayor and at-large council seats.

The state doesn’t set any deadline for filing a legal challenge to an election result. In 2020, the losing candidate in the 3rd Ward council race, William McKoy, filed his challenge in mid-June and the courts ruled in his favor, nullifying Alex Mendez’s victory, just days before he was to take office.

But Mendez ended up capturing the seat anyway by winning a do-over election in November.

Joe Malinconico is editor of Paterson Press.

Email: editor@patersonpress.com

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Paterson NJ election guide: Who is running, how to vote in mayor race