Redistricted out of School Board Race, Levin Files for City Council
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Dennis "Mitch" Maley
BRADENTON – After the Manatee School Board's redistricting put his home outside of the district he had filed to run in, David Levin has announced he'll instead run for Bradenton City Council in 2022, as the local election landscape begins to take shape.
Levin had filed to run for the school board's District 2 seat. However, the school board must redraw the district boundaries every 10 years following the U.S. Census and the new maps had Levin's home in District 3, which is currently represented by Mary Foreman and not up for election until 2024.
Former Bradenton City Council member Harold Byrd recently filed to run for the District 2 school board seat and is presently unopposed. Each of the other two school board seats on the 2022 ballot also has only one candidate thus far: Garin Hoover in District 4 and incumbent James Golden in district 5.
Levin says he'll run for the Bradenton City Council's Ward 2 seat, which means he'll have his work cut out for him. Ward 2 is currently held by Marianne Barnebey. Barnebey came out of retirement after she was appointed to her old seat when Mayor Gene Brown vacated it to run for the mayor's office. While Barnebey has yet to file for 2022, she said yesterday that she is putting a campaign team together and plans to run, which would put Levin's chances at high betting odds, to say the least.
The only other city council candidate to file at this time is Josh Cramer who will run for Ward 3 to which longtime incumbent Patrick Roff has said repeatedly he will not seek reelection.
Levin, 36, made news in 2016 when he was arrested for hacking into Lee County's Supervisor of Elections website in a "white hat" hack meant to show vulnerabilities to the site (Levin resided in Estero at the time). He has since earned a law degree from Western Michigan's Cooley School of Law.
"The obstacle is the way," Levin said of the decision in a press release. "Hopefully some of my sweat equity transfers," he added, referring to improvements he'd made to school grounds while campaigning.
Levin said he wanted to help make Bradenton a positive example for other U.S. cities.
"New York City, Chicago, and Los Angeles are in shambles," said Levin. "A lot of the world sees it. Those are our major media markets, the window into the United States, and there are sections of those cities you'd think were in third-world countries. Now is the time for a show of strength from Main Street–Manatee Avenue, USA."
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