With today’s 5 p.m. deadline fast approaching, Alison O’Connell is working to submit 125 signatures needed to file an independent candidacy to run for Alexandria City Council.
O’Connell, a founding member of Alexandria for Palestinian Human Rights, is hoping to run for City Council with platform issues that include affordable housing, ethical investment and anti-immigration enforcement measures. She and her team have been collecting signatures and turning them in throughout the day to the city’s registrar’s office, she told ALXnow this afternoon (Friday).
As of 4:36 p.m., O’Connell has turned in completed paperwork to file for candidacy, according to the Office of Voter Registration & Elections. She is slated to face former Republican City Councilman and now-independent candidate Frank Fannon and Democratic candidate Sandy Marks in the upcoming special election.
“I know it’s a long shot in the city, frankly, as an independent and also as a person with less mainstream values,” O’Connell said. “Even if I don’t win this election, I think it’s meaningful to be able to talk to people about the values that we have in the city, about human rights, and to give them a more-left option.”
An administrator at a pet care company in the city, O’Connell has lived off-and-on in Alexandria’s West End for nearly a decade, serving on the city’s Commission on Persons with Disabilities and the Alexandria Housing Affordability Advisory Committee.
In 2023, she co-founded Alexandria for Palestinian Human Rights, a group that has protested at dozens of events outside City Hall, at City Council meetings and events with the Alexandria Democratic Committee and Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine.
Initially, the group — which has since grown to hundreds of participants — advocated that local elected officials sign a resolution calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, but since a ceasefire went into effect last October, the group has demanded that Alexandria divest itself from Israel.
On her campaign website, she said Alexandria needs “Trump-proofing,” and lists banning all city involvement with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in her platform. She supports decriminalizing sex work for independent contractors and businesses, and she said she would like to see a human rights screening process for city funds.
“There are screening methods that already exist for human rights violations connected to businesses that Alexandria does business with,” O’Connell said.
Additionally, her platform includes a city-led effort to remove school resource officers and reappropriate associated funds for student mental health support.
O’Connell thinks that Palestinian issues and ICE weren’t discussed enough in the candidate forums during the Democratic primary for the council seat.
“I have been working on a community-led effort towards ethical investment for several years now, and it rarely get discussed at all,” she said. “It’s not an uncontentious issue, but at City Council public comment periods, we are a regular fixture and we bring it up a lot, so that was a real issue for me.”
O’Connell said she has considered running for office ever since former State Sen. Adam Ebbin resigned to joined Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s administration in January, kickstarting a cascading series of firehouse primaries and special elections.
She said she has spent a lot of time on the outside of city government advocating for causes. When officials are responsive, it can be powerful, she said.
The special election is April 21.
