Jack Kelly Holds City Council Campaign Fundraiser

[UPDATED Wednesday, June 5, 9:45 a.m. To change "campaign kickoff" to fundraiser—a kickoff event will be held later]

Jack Kelly held the first official event for his campaign for at-large Boston city councilor Friday night, with a combination graduation party and fundraiser at Old Sully’s.

Kelly, a Charlestown resident, graduated Friday from University of Massachusetts Boston with a bachelor’s in political science.

The day before, he officially announced his candidacy, seeking one of four at-large seats on the Boston City Council.

“I’m excited,” Kelly said Friday of launching his campaign. “It’s going to be a grassroots effort. I’m very passionate about the issues that have been raised.”

Kelly said he thinks he will particularly resonate with Boston’s middle class families.

He grew up in Charlestown, graduating from Mattignon High School where he played hockey, and worked as the neighborhood liaison in the mayor’s office before taking a job as a community health liaison at Massachusetts General Hospital.

“The fact that I was a neighborhood liaison already for five years—there’s nobody, in my opinion, that knows how to work the city like I can. I can take a bold vision, because I had to do that with the mayor, and I can also practically help implement it on a one-to-one level,” he said.

Kelly said he felt Charlestown and other neighborhoods from “this side of the city” should be better represented on the City Council.

“There’s a lot of issues over here,” he said. “Charlestown, from a development standpoint, puts a lot of money into the city coffers. It’s an attractive place to live, as we all know, and the North End is the same away, and East Boston is up and coming. So it’s going to be very important from a citywide level that someone from over here is represented and heard.”

Kelly has set up a campaign website at jackkellyforboston.com.