Three first-time candidates compete for the Milwaukee council seat vacated by Mayor Cavalier Johnson

Three candidates are vying for the Milwaukee Common Council seat that had been occupied by Mayor Cavalier Johnson until he was elected in April. And a second vacant council seat will have only one candidate on the ballot.

The three candidates who will appear on the August primary ballot to fill the north side District 2 seat are all first-time candidates for elected office.

Two of them — Jerel Ballard and Keyellia Morries — would have to move into the district before they could assume the duties of the office. The third candidate, Mark Chambers Jr., already lives in the district.

And, Democratic state Rep. Jonathan Brostoff will be the sole candidate for the east side District 3 seat vacated by Nik Kovac, who was appointed budget director in Johnson's administration last month.

Ieshuh Griffin, who has long run in various local and state elections, had filed to run for both aldermanic seats. However, the city's Election Commission determined she had not submitted enough valid signatures from voters in either district to appear on the ballot.

The special election for Johnson's former District 2 seat will take place in conjunction with the Aug. 9 primary and Nov. 8 general election. With only one candidate, the District 3 seat will not be on the August primary ballot.

Here are what the candidates said about their campaigns, in the order they filed to run:

Jerel Ballard

Although young himself, Jerel Ballard has long focused on supporting other young people through the founding of Milwaukee's Finest Scholarship Foundation, his help with launching youth leadership group Lead2Change and more.

"I think that it's important to make sure that we have young people at the table," Ballard, 27, said of his run. "I understand that I will be the youngest person on the Common Council if elected, but a lot of issues our city is facing impact younger people."

Ballard currently lives in the city's downtown aldermanic district but said he grew up on North 46th Street and West Capitol Drive a couple of blocks outside District 2 near Midtown Center. He said he would be moving into the district in the coming weeks.

Since graduating in 2017 from Columbia College Chicago with a degree in broadcast journalism, he has worked as a reporter in central Wisconsin and in communications. He currently works for the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin.

He has knocked on doors for other campaigns and has interned with elected officials including former Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett.

Ballard said in talking with students and young people he came to believe that now was the time to run.

What he heard: economic development, jobs and reckless driving seem to be issues year after year.

He said crime and reckless driving would be his top two issues, followed by job creation.

Ballard said he'd work with other council members and the mayor to combat reckless driving and crime and said it's also important to restore trust between residents and law enforcement.

"We really have to make our neighborhoods safe before we can start talking about bringing in business and economic development into the communities because if people don’t feel safe, they’re not going to bring their businesses to the area," he said.

Mark Chambers Jr.

Chambers said he is a lifelong resident of District 2 and grew up in Westlawn Gardens.

The father of two children said he graduated in 2004 from Bay View High School and is working on his business management degree from Concordia University.

Chambers, 35, said he has worked at banks in various positions and is a business consultant for Milwaukee-based Community Related Training, which he said aims to help small businesses and non-profits with technical support, computer training and more.

If elected, he said he would want to focus on gun violence and reckless driving, having lost his father and a close friend, respectively, to those causes.

He had been considering a run but the loss of his friend, Jamaul J. Jones, in September prompted him to get in the race when the seat opened up.

Jones was helping his brother, whose vehicle had been disabled in traffic, when he was struck by a vehicle whose driver had a "serious" gunshot wound, the Milwaukee County Medical Examiner's Office said at the time.

Chambers said instead of only talking about the issue he wanted to be the one to make change happen.

"I want to enact change," he said. "Growing up in the district, I have seen the good parts of the district and I've seen the bad parts of the district."

Chambers said addressing gun violence and reckless driving would require bringing in church leaders and other stakeholders to keep families together. Some of the people committing the worst crimes come from broken homes, he said.

And, he said, it will be necessary to help today's children and youth, including by teaching them financial literacy. He serves as an adviser to the Governor's Council on Financial Literacy and Capability.

On the Common Council, he said he would want to create a city-sponsored youth financial literacy council so young people can inform their peers about how to balance a checkbook and more.

Chambers, too, addressed a 2019 harassment restraining order that was in place for two years, saying it was a verbal argument with a woman. He said they have since made amends.

Keyellia Morries

Morries has worn many hats, including a Milwaukee police detective and landlord.

She said she retired in February from the Milwaukee Police Department as a detective after 28 years with the department. She joined the city in 1989.

After retirement, she said she wanted to continue working with the community but needed another outlet.

She entered the race at the urging of some people who felt her background in law enforcement would help bridge the gap between the community and police. Morries said as a council member she could explain police procedures to residents.

"Even though I'm retired, I still want to remain in the community. I'm not done," she said.

Being on the council would be a way to help more people whereas working in policing was more focused on helping individuals, she said.

Addressing reckless driving and violence in Milwaukee will take police and the community coming together and communicating what they need from each other, she said.

And, she added, community policing and residents' willingness to share information with police, even if it's a relative they believe is responsible for a crime, will be necessary to drop the city's homicide rate.

She said she has lived in District 7, which borders District 2, for 22 years but she has investment properties in Districts 2, 6 and 7.

She would move to District 2 if she were elected.

The reason she became a landlord, she said, was to help single moms or other people who could not afford housing in the way that someone helped her when she was a mother at 18 years old.

She estimated she bought her first property in 1995 or 1996 and said the current tenants have been there 15 or 16 years.

Contact Alison Dirr at 414-224-2383 or adirr@jrn.com. Follow her on Twitter @AlisonDirr. 

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Three vie for Milwaukee council seat vacated by Mayor Cavalier Johnson