TROY — Less than a month after announcing he would not seek re-election to his seat on the City Council, Peter Ryan has decided to throw his name into a crowded field for the Rensselaer County Legislature.
He will seek a seat representing the six-member District 1, which consists of the entirety of the City of Troy. Five incumbents and more than a half-dozen challengers will be vying for those seats in November, when the entire 19-member body will be on the ballot.
Ryan announced last month that he would not seek re-election to the City Council, where he is serving his second term representing District 3, due to conflicts with his job at Superior Business Products in Schenectady. He said the dealings of being a politician and also a salesman would sometimes conflict.
“It puts you in a very uncomfortable position,” he said Monday. “But we worked some things out at work. We had some changes here.”
He said he now has a different assignment at the company covering a different area, and the potential for conflict is no more. So he’s ready to continue holding a public office.
“An opening came up over the weekend and they asked me,” he said, “and I thought it’d be a good time for me.”
The Democrats didn’t officially announce their slate of District 1 candidates until the conclusion of last night’s committee meeting but one, Lisa Graham, backed out creating an opening for Ryan to run.
The others are expected to include incumbent Legislator Peter Grimm and newcomers Mark Flemming, Lou Rosamilla, Charlene Cassidy and Ed Manning.
There will likely be a primary though because the city committee met earlier this month and nominated the candidates while Chairman Frank LaPosta was in Baltimore watching a baseball game.
The move infuriated LaPosta, a former Troy councilman, so he and another former councilman, Dan Doran, are also collecting petitions to run for Legislature so it is gearing up as an eight-way primary for six seats.
LaPosta was upset that Ryan did not have to go through an interview process before being selected.
In District 1, the Republicans are running incumbents Chairman Neil Kelleher, Robert Mirch, James Brearton, Michael Picarillo, who was recently appointed to fill a vacancy, Legislative newcomer and former Troy Councilman John Mahoney and political newcomer Kay Vandenburgh.