With two years to go, the 2013 mayoral landscape is starting to take shape. Campaign money is being raised by the millions, pols are starting to make clear their intentions and polls are being administered. And the latest one brings some good news for Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, who isn't even running for mayor (yet). If he were, however, according to Quinnipiac University he would be the candidate to beat, with 23 percent of New Yorkers (and 17 percent of Democrats) saying they'd like to see him in Gracie Mansion. That puts him five points ahead of his nearest competitor, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who polled with 18 percent (including 20 percent of Democrats). It appears that the poll did not ask about any of the Baldwin brothers.
"Police Commissioner Ray Kelly has never given the faintest hint that he'd like to move from Police Headquarters across the street to City Hall, but New York seems to like the idea of Kelly for mayor," said Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. However if you take Good Day NY host Greg Kelly's dad out of the running, Quinn quickly rises to top with 23 percent of those polled saying they want to see her become the city's first openly gay mayor. She's followed by Brooklyn Beep Marty Markowitz (15 percent), City Comptroller John Liu (10 percent), 2009 Mayoral candidate William Thompson (8 percent), Public Advocate Bill de Blasio (6 percent) and Manhattan Beep Scott Stringer (4 percent).
Other interesting things in the poll? 54 percent of those talked to say the next mayor should be someone with government rather than business experience. Gasp! Are we nearing the end of the era of the technocrats? We'll believe it when we see it. With years to go before the election there is still lots of time for the entire field to shake up. Remember when Anthony Weiner was a frontrunner?
