Mayoral Candidates Rachel Barnhart and James Sheppard are both critical of Mayor Lovely Warren for being too hand-in-glove with the ridesharing service Uber, and Barnhart says she’s filing a complaint with the New York State Joint Commission on Public Ethics and Rochester’s Board of Ethics.
Both candidates jumped on Wednesday’s combined public forum on ridesharing services and Uber job fair at City Hall. Both are questioning why the city was promoting Uber over the competing service, Lyft.
Barnhart claims it’s because Uber has ties to Mayor Warren’s former chief of staff, lobbyist Jerry Cooney. Cooney works for a PR firm that now represents Uber and helped organize the the forum.
Mayor Warren says she won’t get “down in the mud” by responding to Barnhart’s charges. She says the City Hall event was about finding jobs for city residents and is the sort of thing the city does routinely.
City Attorney Brian Curran told 13 WHAM no lobbying was involved at all, since Uber has already been approved by the state. The firm that employs Jerry Cooney issued a statement rejecting Barnhart’s charges and calling her a “flailing candidate.”
Lyft has also held promotional events in Rochester, but chose to work through Monroe County and invite County Exec Cheryl Dinolfo.
Both Barnhart and Sheppard are running primaries against Mayor Warren, seeking the Democratic nomination.