He’s put the time in. He’s earned it. Those are early, behind-the-scenes remarks sizing up the incipient CD-11 candidacy of Brendan Gill, who’s ready to lurch out of the gate in pursuit of the Congressional seat Governor-elect Mikie Sherrill will leave behind when she departs for Trenton.

Influential chair of the Montclair Democratic Committee, Gill cut his teeth in politics with Bill Pascrell, the ultimate retail politicians, and later worked for Steve Rothman. He would move up the ladder to serve as the state director of the late U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg, and subsequently run the successful U.S. Senate campaign of Cory Booker. Gill jumped at the head of the Phil Murphy parade, when there was no one else in attendance at that parade, or very few, anyway. Murphy won, of course. He serves in elected office as an Essex County Commissioner. His wife, Alixon Collazos Gill, serves as an assemblywoman from the 27^th District.

They’re friends with Mikie Sherill. It was at the Gills’ home that former U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords made a late-game campaign appearance in support of Sherrill’s gubernatorial candidacy.

Helming an impressive No King’s Rally in his hometown two weeks until Election Day, Gill – never a ham with the mic in his hand - reflected on running over a bicycle owned by a child of neighbor Sherrill. A stricken Gill plodded over to the congresswoman’s house to confess. Sherrill surprised him when she asked the commissioner if the bike was where it should have been, demonstrating what Gill described as Sherrill’s strong sense of accountability for herself and for her family.

So, Gill looks like the favorite for the congressional seat.

But there will be others in pursuit.

The relentlessly turf-pawing, come-backing Hunterdon County Democratic Committee Chairman Tom Malinowski, former CD-7 congressman, who thought he was unfairly redistricted out of service, is running. Others may have a go, too.