A Conversation with Ben Wetzler on the 5 Phases of a New York City Council Campaign

Ben and the other 2025 candidates are currently in Phase 1

In today’s post, I have a conversation with my friend Ben who’s running for New York City Council in 2025. His general election is over a year away. But as we all know, because Democrats dominate here, the primary is what really matters, and that’s next June. What’s Ben going to be doing between now and June? What are the phases of the campaign? What are the milestones? We sat down and discussed the 5 phases of a New York City Council campaign.

Phase 1 of a New York City Council Campaign: Fundraising

Sachi: When did you launch your campaign and what have you been working on since then?

Ben: I launched at the end of March 2024, so about 15 months from the June 2025 primary. February 2024 was the earliest that a city council candidate could start raising money, so the sooner you declare, the more time you have to fundraise. 

So the first phase of a city council campaign is fundraising. The City has such a generous match program that most candidates take advantage of it, and it has a very structured timeline. That makes City campaigns much more structured than State or Federal ones because of the public financing system.

Sachi: The goal of New York City's small-dollar public matching funds program is for candidates to rely on local residents to fund their campaigns. That way, candidates aren’t relying on a small number of big-pocketed individuals or groups. The match is really generous– donations from NYC residents can be matched up to 8x. And while the program caps the campaign’s election-year spending at $207,000, the maximum match from the City is $184,000. So under this program, the vast majority of a candidate’s spending comes from public funds. 

Ben: There are deadlines you need to hit fundraising milestones by in order to qualify for the very generous public matching funds system. I successfully met the milestone for the most recent deadline in July. And I’m on track to meet the goal for the October one as well. 

October 2024 is roughly the “end” of the fundraising phase. That doesn’t mean you can’t raise any more money after that, but it’s the last filing before the spending cap kicks in. So to really get every matching dollar, you want to be more or less done by then. The October deadline is also the first one where you can qualify for an actual payment. You don't get the whole $184K at once, but you can get a chunk of it if you've met all the criteria by October. That's my goal for now.

Phase 2 of a New York City Council Campaign: Staffing Up

Sachi: Who are the people that you need in order to run a campaign?

Ben: The first person I needed was a treasurer– I’ve had a consultant for that from day one. The first thing you do to formally declare your campaign is to open a bank account and send the Campaign Finance Board a bunch of forms. 

I also already have a campaign consultant for media (e.g. direct mail and digital). And an election lawyer who’s also a consultant to the campaign.

I won't begin looking for a full-time campaign manager until December. They will be the first full-time employee of the campaign. The campaign manager will oversee all parts of the campaign: solidifying outreach strategy, managing volunteers and consultants, etc. December is great timing because people who were working on Federal campaigns will now be looking for new jobs. 

I will eventually want to bring on someone to be in charge of field operations. That person will be on the ground talking to voters, and coordinating volunteers that are talking to voters. The field person will make sure the campaign has a presence in all parts of the district. But that hire isn’t needed until March.

Phase 3 of a New York City Council Campaign: Endorsements

Sachi: Once you’ve got your campaign manager on board, what’s next?

Ben: From December through February, advocacy organizations and democratic clubs run their endorsement processes. For most of them, the process is to send out questionnaires to candidates. The questionnaires ask about the issues most important to that group.

For example: one Democratic Club Questionnaire for State Assembly candidates had 37 questions ranging from:

• Should we condition further aid to Israel? 

• Do you support allowing legal Immigrants to vote in local elections?

So I’ll complete about a ton of endorsement questionnaires. Sometimes groups do an interview in addition to the questionnaire. 

Sachi: I recently wrote about the role of democratic clubs. In my experience, their endorsement not only adds to your positive name recognition, but also the clubs do work for you. Democratic clubs will send mailers advertising their endorsed candidates, and also turn out volunteers to gather signatures to put your name on the ballot. An endorsement from a democratic club is a huge win since it comes with marketing and labor.

Ben: Yep, exactly. So the reason endorsements happen around February is because the next phase is coordinating volunteers from those groups to gather signatures to get their candidates on the ballot. 

Phase 4 of a New York City Council Campaign: Getting on the Ballot

Ben: In mid April, I’ll have to show that I gathered 900 signatures to qualify for the ballot. Each signature needs to satisfy all 3 of these criteria:

1. The person is registered to vote

2. The person is a registered Democrat (since I’m running in the Democratic primary)

3. The person lives in the district I’m running in

Since sometimes peoples’ handwriting is unclear or maybe they don’t fit all of the above, candidates aim to gather 2.5-3x what’s actually required. So my goal is to get around 3,000 signatures. 

Sachi: That would be a huge amount of work to do by yourself, so it’s definitely helpful to have the endorsements of volunteer groups that will help out.

Phase 5 of a New York City Council Campaign: “Real” Campaigning

Sachi: Studies have shown that one of the most critical factors in voter behavior is positive name recognition. This is why incumbents have such a huge advantage – their name is familiar to voters and they have a track record in the job. In your race, there isn’t an incumbent, so you and your opponents will have to work harder to get your message out. When does that start?

Ben: Real campaigning starts in March and goes up til the day of the primary: June 24, 2025. Field is critical in this phase. These are the months when we’ll set up tables on corners with campaign buttons and mobilize volunteers to hand out brochures at bus stops. We’ll be using all channels: digital, in person, mail, etc. 

Sachi: All those touchpoints are super critical not just for convincing people to vote for you, but reminding them to vote period. New Yorkers are notorious for not showing up to vote in the primaries, even though that’s where the winner of the election is decided. 

How, but more importantly WHY, you can help

Sachi: In order to run a successful campaign, you need a wide network of people you can call on for support. Which folks in your network have been most useful so far?

Ben: I’ve especially been tapping my friends, family, and connections who live in the district, since they’re able to share my campaign with neighbors. The people in my district are the most important audience for my messaging: their donations are an integral part of the funding formula, they’re the signatures I need to get on the ballot, and they’re ultimately the votes I need in order to win.

I’ve also been leaning on my network of civically and politically engaged folks. They’re helpful for questions like: “do you know any consultants with X expertise?” “can you help me practice for X media interview?” “do you have a contact at X local news outlet?”

For friends and connections who live outside the district, I’m super grateful for their help with things like offering a couple of hours to knock on doors in the spring.

My connections and experience from working on others’ campaigns have also been invaluable. One early example: when I launched my campaign, I already had a full endorsement page on my website. The people endorsing me are Democratic Party District Leaders and issue advocates that I’ve worked with in the past and who know me. And when I’m making calls to raise funds, donors want to know that I have experience campaigning– that they can trust me with their money because not only do I have a thoughtful policy platform, but also that I know what I’m doing.

Sachi: That’s been my experience as well– I worked on a few local campaigns in San Francisco and those really taught me a lot about what a campaign needs to succeed. I was mostly supporting the endorsement questionnaire processes, so that meant coordinating with folks with different areas of expertise: education policy wonks, education activists, leaders of different cultural groups. Then I had to be in lockstep with the comms side of the campaign to share about our endorsements. And with the field side of the campaign to coordinate which endorsing groups were turning out volunteers and when. 

I hope that readers might get inspired to help out on your campaign, since that’s an easy way to learn about the process without quitting their day job.

And of course, I hope that NYC readers consider donating since their donation gets 8x matched by the city!