Six applicants for an open delegate seat representing District 39 in the Maryland General Assembly made their case for why they should head to Annapolis during a public forum hosted by the Montgomery County Democratic Central Committee (MCDCC) Wednesday.
The candidates–including a current member of the central committee–answered questions submitted by members of their district. There are three delegate seats in the district representing parts of Germantown and Montgomery Village.
The seat was vacated in March by Kirill Reznik, who left to join Gov. Wes Moore’s (D) administration as the new assistant secretary for inter-departmental data integration for the state Department of Human Services.
In accordance with state law, the county’s Central Committee members–who are elected at-large or in legislative districts–vote on who will fill the legislative vacancies. Those recommendations are sent to the governor to approve as a formality.
Two applicants–Esam Al-Shareffi and Eric Bernard–have withdrawn from consideration, committee leaders announced prior to the forum.
Charles Barkley, a former District 39 delegate who sat in the House from 1999 to 2019, moderated, asking the candidates what they would pursue as their top legislative priorities, if appointed.
W. Gregory Wims, founder of Victims’ Rights Foundation and local business leader, said he is very concerned with a rise in teenagers abusing fentanyl and would work with colleagues in Annapolis to create more addiction treatment centers in the county and across the state. He said he also wants to work to end hunger and to ensure more affordable housing in District 39 and across the county.
“We need housing that’s affordable for our teachers, for low-income families like myself when I grew up,” Wims said.
Clint Sobratti, a bus driver and union activist, said he sees education as the top priority for the General Assembly, and wants to see more resources for vocational training.
“I think we did a wonderful job with the Blueprint [for Maryland’s Future] in pushing it forward and funding it, but I think we need to expand and go a little further, where we start to introduce vocational life skill trades back into the school,” he said. “We should be teaching kids that they not only have the opportunity to go to college, but they can actually learn a trade and become successful.”
Sobratti also said he thinks the county has a housing crisis that needs to be addressed, and that public transportation needs to be bolstered. Sobratti was a two-time primary candidate for the District 39 delegate seat.
Marc Anthony Robles, a current MCDCC board member, said his main priority is improving quality of life for constituents, and he sees this as a three-pronged approach to address – affordable housing, education and transportation.
“It’s an umbrella of priorities for me … affordable housing feeds into having livable wages so that our constituents can afford affordable housing. We need to create more affordable housing here in the district,” he said. “The other thing that leads into the quality of life is education. Specifically, what I’m talking about is having more investment opportunities in our wellness centers in our schools.”
Robles has represented District 39 on the central committee since 2022.
George Lluberes, a corporate qualitative research director at Hanover Research, said his top priorities are education, affordable housing and public safety. He spoke specifically to his experience as a member of the Montgomery County Police Accountability Board. He said it’s important to work as a team with law enforcement.
“Trying to reduce disparities and traffic stops is one of the top issues that I work on day in and day out. I think that that is certainly data behind that and addressing that in terms of instilling trust in our law enforcement agencies and addressing public safety more often … in terms of how it affects our minority and most vulnerable populations,” Lluberes said.
Adam Cunningham, a 2022 primary candidate for District 39 state senator, said his priorities are single-payer healthcare, housing reform and rent stabilization, and expanding public transit.
“There isn’t a lot of public transit infrastructure where I live. There’s maybe one bus that comes down every hour or so, and they’re not available on the weekends. So as delegate, I would push to increase funding so that there can be a more robust transit system in the district and beyond,” Cunningham said. “I would push for … expansion of Metro infrastructure so we can have Metro lines leading out to Germantown and beyond, which would definitely help with business, will definitely help with climate change, because less people will be using cars as a result.”
Robert Bartlett, a 2018 primary candidate for District 39 delegate and Montgomery County Public Schools teacher, said he would prioritize public transportation, 100% renewable energy, and most importantly, the literacy crisis in schools.
“We encountered a situation where during the pandemic, so many kids from lower income families went two years without reading anything that wasn’t on their phones. A lot of kids have already shaky skills that atrophied horribly, and so there’s a problem. It’s bad,” Bartlett said. “We need to increase the ESOL support and paraeducators in schools … we need to pay them more.”
This is the fourth time the committee has undergone the process this year, and it is about to undergo it a fifth time to fill an additional vacancy. Del. Kumar P. Barve (D-Dist. 17) is leaving his seat in the Maryland House of Delegates to join Gov. Wes Moore’s administration as a member of the Maryland Public Service Commission.
The committee encourages District 39 residents to submit letters in support of their preferred candidate by emailing d39vacancy@mcdcc.org by 5 p.m. on Friday.
The MCDCC will hold a special meeting at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday to interview the applicants and vote to recommend a candidate to the governor to fill the vacancy. The meeting, which will be open to the public, will be held in-person at MCDCC Headquarters, 12320 Parklawn Drive, Rockville and will be live-streamed via Zoom webinar. All attendees must register in advance at bit.ly/mcdcc-04-18.
This type of selection process has not been without controversy, Good-government advocates, some central committee members and several state legislators have criticized the process as less democratic than special elections. Thirteen of the 34 Montgomery County delegates and senators were appointed by the committee, not elected by voters.
For years, legislative reforms calling for a special elections model have failed to pass in Annapolis, preserving a system where Democratic and Republican central committees across Maryland have tremendous power in who gets to fill delegate and state senate seats. Democratic central committees pick whenever the seat was vacated by a Democrat, and Republican committees do the same for Republicans.
Del. Julie Palakovich Carr (D-Dist. 17) sponsored a bill this General Assembly session that would require central committee members who apply for state legislative vacancies to recuse themselves from voting for the vacancy. However, the bill didn’t make it far in the legislative process.
MCDCC’s Rules Committee advanced a proposal that would not allow current MCDCC members to participate in a vote to fill a vacancy if they have applied for the vacancy, and the committee was initially slated to vote on the proposal this past Tuesday. However, the committee decided to delay the vote to May, according to Liza Smith, an MCDCC member representing District 14. Even if the proposal had passed this week, it would not have impacted the District 39 vacancy or committee member Robles’ participation.
Committee member Liza Smith told MoCo360 that Robles said he’d recuse himself from voting in an email to committee members, but Robles did not respond to a request for comment to confirm.