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Mathews, Mozzicato Team Up

Mayoral Challenger, Council Candidate Hope To Widen Appeal In Other Neighborhoods

By DANIEL E. GOREN, Courant Staff Writer

October 26, 2007

Mayoral Challenger I. Charles Mathews and Paul Mozzicato, a candidate for city council and co-owner of the popular Mozzicato's Bakery, are working together to further each other's chances for Election Day success.

A deal struck between the two candidates is for Mozzicato to help Mathews win votes in Hartford's South End while Mathews helps Mozzicato in the city's predominantly black North End.

"It is really a very strategic alliance," Mathews said Thursday. "We both bring a lot to the table."

The two have started to hold fundraisers together, join each other on the campaign trail and share their headquarters - Mozzicato's on Franklin Avenue in the South End, and Mathews' in the North and West ends.

During the Democratic primary, Mathews was able to win healthy chunks of Hartford's North End and ran the weakest in the southern part of the city. By joining with Mozzicato, he hopes to bolster those numbers, he said.

Similarly, Mozzicato's base is in the city's South End, where the population knows his Franklin Avenue bakery as an institution.

Mathews is widely considered the main challenger to Mayor Eddie A. Perez. He took second place in the primary, getting 29 percent of the vote to Perez's 49 percent.

Mozzicato had been part of a challenge slate that failed to get on the primary ballot after the city's registrar of voters invalidated hundreds of petition signatures the group gathered. The South End businessman then broke out on his own to run as an independent, forming a party called "Mozzicato for Hartford."

He is one of 23 candidates running for a spot on the council.

As an independent, Mozzicato could take advantage of the state's "minority representation" law, which limits the number of Democrats who can sit on council to six. The three remaining spots are reserved for minority parties.

The city election is Nov. 6.