The Boston City Council will start off the new year with a new president and a fresh face to replace disgraced former Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson.

Jockeying for the City Council president has continued in recent weeks, despite Councilor Gabriela Coletta Zapata’s Nov. 10 claim that she had secured the necessary seven votes to lead the body.

Councilor Brian Worrell has vowed to stay in the race, telling the Dorchester Reporter earlier this month that “the vote is not until Jan. 5,” and he was confident that he could secure the additional votes needed to win the presidency.

“We are working to secure the additional votes needed to win,” Worrell told the Herald Monday. “For me, being in politics, and … business transactions, you never count your chickens or you never declare victory until it’s the end, until that vote has passed.”

Worrell said he has five votes and needs to secure two more, with just a week remaining until the vote. He had secured the same number of votes two weeks ago, when he spoke with the Reporter, he told the Herald.

“I’m going to continue to talk to my colleagues and give them my vision of the Council and what a Council presidency under my leadership would look like,” Worrell said. “That will entail leaning on their passion, their goals and their interests, and making sure they are part of the policy-making and agenda-setting of the body and being fair and transparent and an independent body.

“I’m going to continue to lean on that vision and share that with my colleagues, and I’m hoping they see that, whether it’s through my vision or the work that I’ve done on the body, that I’m able to secure those two additional votes,” he added.

Worrell, the Council vice president and chair of the Ways and Means Committee this past term, is joined by Councilor Julia Mejia in challenging Coletta Zapata’s claim — though Mejia has positioned her run as being more about disrupting a process that has become predetermined with backroom negotiations and deals.

Coletta Zapata, chair of the powerful Government Operations Committee this past term, has named Councilor Henry Santana as vice president, should she be elected to lead the body by her colleagues next Monday.

Both Coletta Zapata and Santana are allies of Mayor Michelle Wu.

Worrell was initially seen by some political observers as being the favorite to become the council president this term, and while he indicated that he thought he had the support at one point, he said he isn’t surprised by how the process has shaken out.

“For me, it’s not a surprise, because I’m always of the understanding that things can constantly change,” Worrell said, adding of the potential for councilors to change their prior commitments ahead of the vote, “I do think that it’s not over. … I think that once people take a vote, then that will be a declaration of people changing their minds.”

Coletta Zapata has maintained in interviews following her November claim that she still has the Council presidency locked down.

The vote for Council president will take place at the first meeting of the year at noon, which follows the mayoral and City Council inauguration at 10 a.m.

Council President Ruthzee Louijeune was barred from seeking the position again, due to city rules that limit the presidency to a two-year term.

Louijeune won’t hand over the gavel to the new president either. Per the city charter, the oldest member of the City Council, by age, presides over the first meeting of the year, until a new council president is elected.

In this case, that would be Miniard Culpepper, 72, a longtime pastor at the Pleasant Hill Missionary Baptist Church in Dorchester, who also happens to be the Council’s newest member by experience.

Culpepper was elected to the Council’s Roxbury-centric District 7 seat in November, and will fill the position vacated by disgraced former Councilor Fernandes Anderson, who resigned in July after pleading guilty to federal corruption charges.

Fernandes Anderson spent a month in prison after being convicted for a $7,000 City Hall kickback scheme. She was released in November.

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Culpepper is the only new member of the City Council. The remaining 12 members were all reelected last month.

The Council left some legislation on the table at the end of this term, which effectively ended with a final meeting on Dec. 10.

Should councilors be seeking further action on their unfinished legislative priorities, they will have to refile their home rule petitions, ordinances and resolutions in the new year.

Among the outstanding legislation that’s gained attention is Worrell’s home rule petition that would recategorize large apartment buildings as commercial properties, which would lead to those building owners paying a higher tax rate; and a proposed amendment to the city’s zoning code from Councilor Sharon Durkan that would remove parking minimum requirements for new development.

Councilor Gabriela Coletta Zapata says she has enough votes to serve as the next council president. (Staff Photo By Stuart Cahill/Boston Herald, File)