Eli Sabin Wins Ward 26 Endorsement Over Patricia Dillon

Eli Sabin beat 44-year incumbent Patricia Dillon 21-9 at a Ward 26 straw poll held Sunday at Kehler Liddell Gallery in Upper Westville. Justin Farmer, an activist and former Hamden Legislative Council Member, collected one vote. All three are chasing the Democratic nomination for Connecticut’s 92nd House District.

Sabin’s been in Westville roughly four months. That’s it. And he still walked out with more than double Dillon’s count. The former East Rock and Downtown Alder, who coordinates legislative work for CT Voices for Children and is finishing a degree at Yale Law, didn’t let a thin residency record slow his organizing.

But don’t treat Sunday’s result as a done deal.

Ward 26 is one of seven wards feeding non-binding straw polls into the formal endorsement process. The vote that actually matters happens May 21 at the Betsy Ross Parish House, where the New Haven Democratic Town Committee meets to decide whether to back Dillon, Sabin, or Farmer. Co-chairs from wards 2, 3, 23, 24, 25, 26, and 27 cast the deciding votes. A majority of those co-chairs determines who gets the formal party endorsement and, with it, an automatic berth on the August 11 Democratic Primary ballot.

The two candidates who don’t secure majority support aren’t automatically out, but they’ll face a grinding obstacle: collecting petition signatures from at least 5 percent of registered Democrats in the district just to qualify for the primary. That’s a real burden, mid-campaign, when organizing resources are already stretched.

What Ward 26 co-chairs Sharon Jones and Laura Cahn do on May 21 isn’t locked in by Sunday’s count. According to the New Haven Independent, co-chairs have historically handled advisory polls in a few different ways: casting a double vote for the straw poll winner, splitting votes to reflect internal disagreement, or simply following their own judgment. Jones and Cahn can go any direction they choose.

Dillon’s case is institutional. She’s in her 22nd two-year term. She serves as the House’s deputy majority leader and holds seats on the Judiciary, Environment, and Appropriations Committees at the Connecticut General Assembly. Nine committee members found that record persuasive enough to stick with her on Sunday. Her campaign’s central argument, deep institutional experience, isn’t a weak one in a district that spans Amity, Westville, Edgewood, Dwight, West River, and the Hill.

Sabin’s case is different. His policy work at CT Voices for Children, a nonprofit focused on child poverty and state fiscal policy, gives him substantive credentials that go beyond generic challenger energy. “The work I’ve been doing on fiscal equity and children’s issues directly shapes what I’d fight for in Hartford,” Sabin said, framing his candidacy around the organization’s research priorities. He’s also put in the street-level hours in Edgewood, canvassing and building connections with small businesses in the Hill.

The math heading into May 21 isn’t simple for any of the three candidates. Dillon controls name recognition and legislative relationships that took decades to build. Sabin won Sunday’s most consequential straw poll by a wide margin but still needs Jones, Cahn, and co-chairs from six other wards to translate that into a formal endorsement. Farmer, who didn’t register significant support in Ward 26, faces the steepest climb, but his background on the Hamden Legislative Council and local activist networks give him a base that can’t be dismissed entirely.

The 92nd District is competitive Democratic turf, not a safe-seat sleepwalk. Whoever survives the endorsement fight in May still has an August primary ahead.