For the past two years, Lloyd Koedding has been a ubiquitous presence in Hudson. According to his own account, he moved here in 2021, but to Gossips' knowledge he only emerged as a "public figure" in May 2024. Since then, he has attended every public meeting, been a regular fixture at the library, and is frequently spotted walking or sitting someplace on Warren Street. Once calling himself "Your Voice of Reason," Koedding now assigns himself the titles "Bright Light" and "Savior of the Tree of Peace."
Last November, Koedding ran for mayor of Hudson as a Republican. The 68 votes he got may well have influenced that outcome of a race that was decided by just 42 votes. This year, Koedding has changed his party affiliation from Republican to Democrat and is challenging incumbent Third Ward supervisor Sonja Okun in the Democratic primary on June 23. (Early voting for the primary is going on right now.)
But Koedding's zeal for public office doesn't stop there. To ensure that he would be on the ballot in November, Koedding gathered signatures on nominating petitions for two independent parties of his own creation: the Harmony Party and the Prosperity Party. (Last year, in his run for mayor, Koedding was on the ballot on the Republican line and his own Harmony Party line. The Prosperity Party is a new creation.)
For reasons unknown to Gossips, the nominating petitions for the two independent parties were rejected by the Board of Elections. Koedding filed a legal protest to the action, and the case is scheduled to be heard in court on Tuesday, June 16, at 1:00 p.m.
COPYRIGHT 2026 CAROLE OSTERINK
You mean the homeless guy the police allow to sleep in his vehicle that has been parked unmoved in the City Hall parking lot for the past 18 months or more? Yes, that guy. Don't you have to have a physical address to get on a ballot? Or will an unnumbered parking space do? Is all of the City Hall parking lot in the third ward? How many "residents" live in that parking lot that the police may or may not know about?
ReplyDeleteThis raises a question that I believe already came up last year when Lloyd was running for office.
DeleteIs it really such that if you don't have an address, you are de jure excluded from actively and passively participating in elections?
If so, this really rubs me the wrong way. If you're a citizen, I believe you should be allowed to vote and run for office, at least somewhere.
Maybe that's not currently the letter of the law but surely it's the spirit.
Before you get all rubbed the wrong way, Max, let me clarify that being unhoused does not preclude people from voting. I was informed by a former Commissioner of Elections that an unhoused person can register from whatever site s/he frequents. I believe Koedding uses the address of the parking lot.
DeleteGood poinys, all, Bill.
ReplyDeleteWasn't it Sonja Okun, the sitting Supervisor Loyd is running against, who filed the objection to toss his other party line?
ReplyDeleteAnd does anyone know why, residency (him being homeless) or bad signatures (what Matt Murrell did to Sam Hodge last year)?
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This is academically interesting... the progressives in town use the WFP as a back up line when they lose the Democratic primary... (how Kamal ran and lost against Ferris twice).
I have no intention of getting into a back-and-forth on this, but happy to provide a few points of clarification:
ReplyDelete— I did not see the Objections filed, but I did see the petitions themselves and they were rife with errors. (No, not the kind of spurious “errors” claimed by Murell at all - eg not including “street” etc.). Lloyd had people who didn’t actually live in the ward, missing dates, duplicates etc. The petitions did not appear to meet the threshold number of valid signatures.
— Filing Objections to petitions that don’t meet the threshold for valid signatures is not remotely an uncommon practice —it’s part of the process. In fact, another Dem Supervisor candidate in Hudson successfully filed Objections against an opponent’s Dem petitions in this same cycle. The difference is that their opponent accepted the BOE’s decision. Which is almost invariably the case. Not so, Lloyd.
— It is worth noting that *both* BOE Commissioners (Rep & Dem) must review each Objection in conference and both rule that a petition is invalid for it to be so.
Hope that helps.
As much as I love Lloyd for what he is and for what he added to Hudson's political scene, I am not surprised that there's a lot that won't stand up to even a moderate amount of scrutinity.
DeleteIn practice, none of this truly matters. He can never win an election. It has been pointed out that he may have tipped the scale in last year's mayoral election. I have my doubts - there are meme-lovers on both sides of the aisle that see hilarity in voting for him.
He's a court jester and yet, most of the time he is actually a voice of reason. Doesn't change the fact that the board of elections is rightfully applying the same standards to him as it is to any other candidate running for office.
Helpful, thanks Verity. The GOP said the same (but pointed the other direction) last year.
DeleteIt seems that more than half of Supervisor races are unopposed, even at the Primary level. Same might be true for other elected positions in the City.
Broadly, maybe it would be wise to let elections be elections... not de facto appointments by the Party... and to decrease the number of elected positions.
Does Lloyd pay for parking? When I park in that lot, I pay $1.35 for 1/2 hour. So, 18 months is approximately 25,920 half hours or $34,992.00. Unless he has a parking subscription. Either way, I am wondering does he pay for paking or did the City of Hudson give him property? And, if he has received free property...I would like some too!
ReplyDeleteI believe he purchased an annual parking permit, at least that's what I've been told.
DeleteI hope the annual parking permit is available to all Hudson residents. It seems to me that the annual permit would be very beneficial to shop owners as well as city residents. If I lived on Warren Street or any adjacent side street, I would pursue it.
ReplyDeleteThe annual parking permit is available to anyone, resident or otherwise. It is specifically for municipal lots (except the Amtrak lot).
Deletehttps://cms3.revize.com/revize/hudsonnynew/document_center/Clerk/Parking%20Permit%20Applications.pdf?t=202512081202220&t=202512081202220
Even while everyone in City Hall and at HPD was aware that a homeless person had been sleeping in his permitted vehicle in the City Hall lot for much of the latter part of last year (and doing nothing about it), the Clerk's Office still issued him another $250 Municipal Lot Parking Permit, allowing him to live in and not move his vehicle from the same space under a tree for another 12 months. That's about $21/month rent.
ReplyDeleteThis simply doesn't happen anywhere else in this country in the year 2026. If it does, it's a municipality that is probably going nowhere but to the bottom. And sinking fast.
Lloyd helps keep face-to-face dialogue alive in this town. He befuddles many because he takes vigorous action without institutional support. He raked the algae from our children's swimming pond, rescued our desecrated 'tree of peace' from the cliff's edge, and taught a master class to mayoral candidates by playfully embracing the insults directed at him. He listens patiently in nearly all the public meetings and smiles in the face of rudeness. He sees himself as having a deep purpose as the town prophet. Is it any wonder he grates on the nerves of modern secular society? I wish him success as he raises the caliber of discussion above divisive trends and helps usher in Hudson's brighter future.
ReplyDeleteChristopher's right. Great point on the secular society grate.
DeleteAnd let's be honest, the Board of Elections would very likely have struck those petitions on its own, lawfully. They were flawed on technical grounds.
Lloyd's real mistake was splitting his signatures across two party lines when one would have doubled his count and cleared the bar easily.
An error by a homeless man who uses the public library to navigate the world, not fraud, as Okun conceded in open court today.
But here we are, very likely with no contested supervisor race left.
So the message to Hudson residents is clear. Run without the Blue Party's blessing, and we challenge you on every technicality we can find.
We like our poor and homeless compliant, voting our way. Vote against us, and last week's folk hero is this week's problem.
Here's the odd thing.... Okun has every insider endorsement in town and still wouldn't risk the race. Clearing the ballot was easier than earning the seat.
If she'd rather not share a stage with Lloyd, she can decline the debate, and let the voters decide.
p.s. We don't endorse Lloyd or his platform, or his social manner, whatever it may be on any given day.
It's simply a very Hudson moment, and it says a lot about how Hudson works; the town that claims to protect the marginalized (and celebrates and lionizes the protectors) has no use for a marginalized man who won't vote its way.
Hugo/HCS, this comment betrays a misunderstanding of how the Board of Elections petition review process operates and is thus incredibly misleading. No, they wouldn’t have “very likely struck the petitions on their own, lawfully”. Yes, they were “flawed on technical grounds” (as I pointed out, above), but a BOE review at that level of specificity is ONLY triggered by Objections from someone with standing (in this case, a registered Dem in the 3rd ward). In fact, upon prima facie review, when they accept filings, they are prohibited by state law from searching around for invalid signatures themselves and refusing the petition on those grounds. Once a voter calls their attention to the potentially invalid signatures, via the formal Objections process, they conduct a bipartisan review of each Objection — limited exclusively to the Objections made by the filer, guided by state case law and the state BOE as needed. It is almost always the opposing candidate who files the Objections that start this review process, but it could be any interested party with standing.
DeleteOne correction: *any* registered voter in ward 3 (regardless of Party) has standing to make Objections and thus start the review process that allows the BOE to lawfully invalidate petitions with insufficient valid signatures.
DeleteThe following comment was submitted by a reader whose identity is known to me.
ReplyDeleteI usually prefer to fight my own battles but I continue to be dismayed at the public pandering of the ubiquitous Lloyd. HCS and Max, you are just giving him the attention that he seems to crave. I notice it’s only men who seem to think he is charming and a fun addition to the City. I can assure you that being stalked by Lloyd is not fun or enjoyable. There are reasons why he is banned from certain public groups and not really welcome at the library. Bill Huston has it right when he calls him a ‘phony.’ He is homeless by choice and is certainly intelligent enough to know the difference between error and fraud. As he has now run in several elections he knows the drill and chooses not to follow it. I know of several other women who have also received his unwanted attention and I assure you it’s not ‘charming’ or ‘fun.'
Not Me!
Heard, and respected.
DeleteThat's real, and separate from ballot access issue and principles. You're not alone in it, by a long shot.
The judge will likely strike Lloyd from the general election ballot, and rightly so this time, but only because both Election Commissioners, Rep and Dem, found the petitions had errors.
[Duplicate signatures, bad dates, clerical errors. The law, applied to him like anyone.]
Only the law should strike a candidate though. Not that he grates, not that the controlling political party would rather he weren't on the ballot.
And if any man or woman harasses you, tell them to stop, and if they don't, call our very well trained police. That line is bright.
As Chomsky said, "If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all."
You funny there, HCS, with your comment "And if any man or woman harasses you, tell them to stop, and if they don't, call our well trained police."
DeleteAnd he's not at the library all day reading books or the newspaper or helping children with their homework. He is there stuck to a computer to keep an eye on his stocks and/or mutual fund prices. Between bouts of sleeping in his chair, of course. He is as phony as they come! Even our mayor loves the fact that Lloyd is sleeping behind City Hall every night.
DeleteI took my eyes off this thread for a little bit and thus missed most of what transpired since. A rather amusing email sent to me by HCS retrained them back onto it.
DeleteI want to make this abundantly clear in response to the reader whose identity is known to Carole: I'm not Lloyd's biggest fan. I have a pretty good understanding of who he is, I think, and I am under no illusion that the guy is an angel. I have heard all of the things the anonymous poster mentioned already.
Not too long ago I commented here that we may have humored him a little too much and that that may not have been healthy. That was specifically in reference to him losing it in front of the council when Henry Haddad rightly tried to remind him of the three-minute limit of public comments. It told me that he is volatile and not the embodiment of harmony that he likes to portrait.
That was an incident I experienced first hand. The other ones I didn't. I am very aware that I am not a woman and therefore my experiences will always be different. The comments that I make about anyone can only be based on experiences I've made myself.
If I had any advice for Carole it would be to give less attention to Lloyd. His strength is grabbing that attention but there's never been any substance behind it. On the occasions when he appears to be the voice of reason, it's always been just the simulacrum of reason.
That said, I still maintain that someone without a fixed address should be allowed to vote and be electable for office. Carole confirmed that that is in fact the case and so I am happy.
Final thought, after getting several reader questions on this... most issues in Hudson, at their core go back to the Charter problem.
ReplyDeleteA city under 6k elects ~18 paid officials, and many of those races run uncontested, like the supervisor seats this cycle.
That's a charter problem, that becomes a candidate issue.
Some (all?) of those seats carry taxpayer-funded health coverage too, which in a country that ties insurance to a job is its own quiet incentive.
Cut Hudson's 5 supervisors to 1, give seats longer terms, contest every race, and much of this fixes itself.
Spare a thought for a candidate like Okun who has now had to run twice in basically 12 months, and may yet spend more time on campaign and election issues than actual lawmaking.
In low-turnout elections, curious things and curious candidates find a way.
If there was a credible opposition party in town the competition would straighten all this out.