New London, CT resident considering running for mayor as a Green

From The Day:

[Lori] Hopkins-Cavanagh is a member of the New London Republican Town Committee but says she would not run for mayor as either a Democrat or Republican. She said she has had conversations with members of the Green Party in the city about running as a Green candidate for mayor.

If she announces, she said, it will be on July 1.

At that time, she said, she will be ready to unveil a 10-part plan for the city, one that she suggested might upset the status quo and reinvent the way things traditionally have been done in New London.

She was willing to talk about a few of the things that are on her agenda, such as moving the police department to a new venue and remodeling the current police station into a visitors center.

The building is perfectly sited to welcome tourists and woefully inadequate for police, who don’t even have a place to park cruisers outside, she said.

Other issues Hopkins-Cavanagh suggested she would put on the front burner for discussion are safety and reducing crime and city zoning, which she said now encourages too many out-of-town investors to buy multifamily houses in city neighborhoods.

As a real estate agent, she said she regularly visits parts of the city, “the trenches,” that other mayoral candidates never see.

“I just introduce myself to the drug dealers,” she said about her visits as a Realtor to some neighborhoods.

Hopkins-Cavanagh has a long history of being involved and volunteering in the city. She says she was a founding board member of New London Main Street and has served on numerous other boards and for agencies, including the New London Maritime Society, the YWCA, the New London Historical Society, Better Business Bureau and the Children’s Museum of Southeastern Connecticut.