Council Member Mathieu Eugene has campaigned non-stop on the streets of Brooklyn’s 40th Council District in order to secure his seat against the Republican opposition.  He raised over $24,000 and spent $19,000 for his campaign, the third this year after winning two special elections. Now the time has come for the final vote, which will make him a councilman until at least 2011.

Yet, even with a solid campaign and success expected, there still is the other candidate to think of, Clarence John.

“He is my opponent and I have to give him respect as the opposition,” said Eugene. “I don’t want to underestimate anyone.”

The threat of losing appeared minimal, as 81-year-old John doesn’t have a campaign office and nor has he raised campaign funds. Phone messages to his home go to a machine that sites the phone number in an old, scratchy man’s voice and are not returned. And, the public hardly knows anything about him.

“My guess is he does it for a hobby,” said Jeff Merritt, president of Grassroots Initiative.

Tuesday’s election will be the eighth time John has run in a political race, which included State Senate, City Council and the Assembly. He has never won.

“There is always going to be a token Republican running,” said Michael Harris, a Democratic political strategist. “By the sixth or seventh time running, people might want a change.”

The change Harris spoke of deals with a switch in political party, a move that isn’t likely to happen in Brooklyn, which has the largest population of Democrats in the country.

“One way they could win is if they get on the ticket for another category like liberal or independent,” said Merritt. But, he said of John’s case, “It’s odd he wouldn’t do anything to campaign.”

To run as a Republican in Brooklyn it takes far less effort than to run as a Democrat. The 40th Council District requires 155 signatures for a Republican compared to the Democrat’s 900.  John has voted in every election, no matter how small and if patterns remain the same, he will vote next week.

“We are trying to revitalize the Republican Party,” said Craig Eaton, the newly elected Kings County Chairman.

Eaton said the Republican Party would start to raise funds for their candidates and in the future, people like John will have more support in their campaigns. Meaning, they will actually have a campaign.  John, who had finally been reached dialed in on a conference call, spoke quietly and with an undistinguishable heavy accent.
“They always elect a Democrat,” said John, “but there is nothing done in the neighborhood.”

Almost as quickly as he got on the phone John left to go to a doctor’s appointment, not much said and no new knowledge of this man gained.

Eaton doesn’t expect him to win, but deemed the action of a Republican on the ballot important.

Right before he got off the phone John said, “I am always motivated to run, to show them what the opposite is like.”

So far, there has not been a Republican City Council member in Brooklyn’s 40th District, and this year, Eugene has no doubt that this will not change.