In an effort to help voters prepare for the Nov. 7 elections, Atlanta Loop sent questions to candidates running for Atlanta City Council, Atlanta Mayor and Atlanta School Board. Early voting begins Oct. 16. To see district maps, click here.

1) Why are you running for office in the city of Atlanta? 

I am running because I believe public service is a noble enterprise, and I have dedicated my life to public service in Atlanta—as an elected official and community leader/advocate. During my service on the Atlanta City Council, I have been a prolific legislator—authoring, coauthoring and passing record numbers of meaningful legislation for the citizens of Atlanta—more than any other official, per term, in the city’s history.  I have demonstrated the ability to bring groups of opposing viewpoints together and led on solutions for some of the city’s most serious problems.  I am a proven leader who has not only held office, but who has been effective in office.

2) What makes you a better candidate than your opponents? 

My progressive vision, dedication to public service, legislative experience and accomplishments make me a greater candidate.  My opponent and I entered our current, respective roles in the same year, 2010.  While I have dealt with and resolved tough issues facing the city, my opponent, by contrast has failed to address basic yet critical issues in APS.

Pension Reform: I have served as a leader on the Atlanta City Council who has led on issues such as pension reform that has saved Atlanta citizens more than $25 million per year for the past eight years.

My opponent, as chair of the Atlanta Public School Board, has allowed the APS pension plan to remain stagnant at 18 percent for eight years—hovering only three points above insolvency, according to State law—threatening tax payers with the need for potential bailout.

Reserves: When we were both elected in 2009 the reserves of the COA and APS were in very different circumstances. In 2o10 the COA reserves were only $7million, APS had almost $100 million. Today I am proud to report that the COA reserves are $175ml and climbing, set at the level that the Wall Street rating agencies have recommended. APS reserves have fallen to a $60ml, well below what is recommended accounting practices for an organization with a budget their size.

Taxes, size of government: The smallest portion of your tax dollar comes to the COA less than 22%. Over the past 71/2 years the COA has ‘right sized’ its bureaucracy, reducing its size while still taking care of every employee group with better pay and benefits. By 2018 the lowest wage-earning employees will be paid a ‘living wage’ of $15 per hour with no negative budgetary impacts or tax increases. I am proud to have supported the financial policies that made this possible.

In contrast under my opponent’s ‘leadership’ as Chair of the Board, APS receives the largest portion of your tax dollar, around 52% has the largest bureaucracy per capita than any education system in Georgia. For example: APS’ bureaucracy is four times the size of the largest education system in Georgia, Gwinnet County School System, which has approximately four times as many students (GCS -178,00 to APS – 49000 respectively). APS student population has been shrinking for more than a decade, yet under the ‘leadership’ of my opponent the cost to educate continue to go up and the quality goes down.

Failed to balance their budget: Under the ‘leadership’ of my opponent in his role as the Chair of the Board, APS is extremely poorly fiscally managed. APS has run deficits for two years in a row 2016 and present year 2017. In 2016 APS created an unnecessary Police Department at the cost of $12 million dollars despite receiving Police Services from APD at 1/12 the cost for many years and ignored overtures from APD to provide expanded services. This new department was embroiled in scandal when it was revealed this year that they had hired many individuals that would qualify to be police officers in most metro departments, but in some cases, should not work around children. This $12ml expense drove the APS budget into deficit and they had to borrow 420ML in tax anticipation bonds to balance budget. APS should be focus on buying books, not bullets.

APS was the only government entity to not embrace the rollback of the Fulton County Tax Assessment. Instead of doing what every other government in the County did  – ask the Boar of Commissions to reject the 2017 valuations and use previous year 2016 – APS, under the leadership of my opponent, the Chair of the Board, quickly anticipated the increased revenue and set their budget. Once the County did the right thing and moved to use the previous year assessment, APS found it had backed itself into a potential $24million dollar defect. My opponent is on record speaking before the Fulton Board of Assessors to maintain the large increase. Instead of looking for savings within his own bloated bureaucracy threatened a tax increase for Atlanta Tax payers.

APS under the ‘leadership’ of my opponent ‘fixed’ their $24ml deficit by borrowing $100 million dollars! Exceeding the actual deficit by $76ml to make up the tremendous loss in philanthropic giving – by some estimates philanthropic giving is down almost 40% – since my opponent began his term as Chair of the Board.

My opponent has not acquitted himself well enough in his current position to demonstrate that he should be trusted or rewarded with a higher position or greater public responsibility.

In stark contrast to my opponent I have lead on the issues that have brought the City of Atlanta to its bright financial position and present stability. By working closely with our Mayor, my colleagues on Council, and listening to our financial experts we have passed eight balanced budgets, reduced the size of our government, grew our police department to an authorized strength of 2000 officers, all without raising your taxes.

3) What do you think is Atlanta’s greatest strength? 

Atlanta’s greatest strength is our ability to come together and work on problems for the good of all citizens. The intentionality of this approach and philosophy are part of Atlanta’s cultural richness. It is the Atlanta Way!

4) What do you think is Atlanta’s biggest challenge?

Affordable housing is one of Atlanta’s biggest problems.

5) How would you address what you feel is Atlanta’s biggest challenge?

To address the growing deficit of affordable housing stock, I recently introduced an ordinance to amend the City of Atlanta’s policies governing the sale of surplus real estate, to allow, in areas where feasible, surplus City-owned properties be used to develop affordable housing units.  The legislation would enable the City to sell real estate to pre-qualified (targeting non-profit developers) developers for a $1 to eliminate the key barrier to the development of affordable housing—cost of land.  By helping developers to avoid high costs of land acquisition, the legislation will make such development more feasible and help families at zero to 30 percent AMI, the income bracket of Atlanta families with the greatest unmet housing needs.  In the other areas, the City can also create housing enterprise zones that would support the purchasing of housing stock in select neighborhoods and for first-time homebuyers.

I was also proud to author the legislation behind the City of Atlanta’s recent major step toward eradicating homelessness. In July 2017, the Atlanta City Council authorized Invest Atlanta to issue its revenue bonds to fund the new Homeless Opportunity Project, a massive three-year effort to reduce underemployment, unemployment and resulting homelessness in Atlanta. The $26 million bond from Invest Atlanta will be added to a $25 million donation from the United Way of Greater Atlanta. Over the next three years, the $50 million in funds will be used to create 364 new homeless shelter beds, provide 254 homeless youths with housing interventions, and provide permanent homes for 500 homeless individuals and 300 homeless families.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development reports that in recent years, Atlanta has decreased the number of homeless individuals by 52 percent. However, according to anti-homelessness nonprofit Partners for Home, over 3,500 men, women and children in Atlanta are still in need of shelter.  We must continue to work to eradicate homelessness in our community until all residents have permanent housing.

6) What are the top two or three things you plan to focus on during your term as an elected official? 

Public Safety – Public safety remains one of the most critical concerns for the city of Atlanta.    Crimes committed by youth and gang activity continue to plague residents of the city. While the number of violent crimes has dropped, thefts and related property crimes have remained high. These property crimes and some high-profile violent crimes have created a perception of rampant and escalating crime in city neighborhoods, thereby producing anxiety and fear that leaders must address.  Maintaining a fully staffed police force that is well compensated is one key to addressing the city’s public safety challenges.   Atlanta’s public safety personnel (Fire, Police and Correction officers) should be the highest paid in the state of Georgia, if not the region.  To address salary concerns and attrition, I introduced legislation to create a Public Safety Compensation Commission to define equitable salary numbers, perform annual or biannual salary analysis and make regular recommendations to the City Council and Mayor to ensure that public safety personnel salary data is always current. Salary and benefits remain among the top reasons that attribution is high for these departments. We must ensure that public safety personnel can afford to make a full career with the City of Atlanta, and protect the City’s investment in these personnel by paying competitive, equitable and living wages.

Affordable Housing – I recently introduced an ordinance to amend the City of Atlanta’s policies governing the sale of surplus real estate, to allow, in areas where feasible, surplus City-owned properties be used to develop affordable housing units.  The legislation would enable the City to sell real estate to pre-qualified (targeting non-profit developers) developers for a $1 to eliminate the key barrier to the development of affordable housing—cost of land.  By helping developers to avoid high costs of land acquisition, the legislation will make such development more feasible and help families at zero to 30 percent AMI, the income bracket of Atlanta families with the greatest unmet housing needs.  In the other areas, the City can also create housing enterprise zones that would support the purchasing of housing stock in select neighborhoods and for first-time homebuyers.

Transportation – The Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) stated in 2010 that Households in the Atlanta region spend more on transportation each year than any other metropolitan area. After 50 years of lost opportunities to solidify transit in the region, solutions to the region’s transportation problems are limited and costly due to land use and acquisition in already developed areas. As the economic engine of the region and the state of Georgia, Atlanta bears the brunt of this burden. I support an integrated system of transportation both inside and outside the city of Atlanta, working in partnership with other governments around the region.  In order to manage current needs and future projected growth (1 million more cars), the Atlanta region must create coordinated transportation linkages that get people out of their cars. The General Assembly’s 2015 Transportation Funding Act and recently passed T-SPLOST bills in 2012 and 2016 around the state are great starts but more aggressive support of transit (not just transportation projects) are desperately needed.

7) What is your opinion of the Atlanta Beltline? Is there anything about the project that you think should be handled differently? 

We must guide future planning of the Atlanta Beltline by the inspiration of its original priority of transporting people, which would require slight re-tweaking from an economic development priority only.  Along with parks and trails, the Beltline loop needs to create greater connectivity to ensure that people can get to all of parts of the city utilizing diverse modes of transportation whether walking, biking, linking to transit sources including other “first and last mile” means as envisioned by the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA). We should consider a light rail system that will serve as “spokes in the Beltline’s wheel,” thereby providing more passenger routes inside the city limits.  To aid balanced development of the Atlanta Beltline, I introduced legislation currently held in committee to create housing and commercial enterprise zones to help existing property owners from being priced out of their communities.

8) What is your opinion of the Atlanta Streetcar?  Is there anything about the project that you think should be handled differently? 

I am in full support of the Atlanta Streetcar, especially since MARTA has assumed governance and operations. I look forward to when the Streetcar connects to the Atlanta Beltline. Retrospectively, many things about the project should have been changed, but I have confidence that those issues are ameliorated by MARTA’s oversight, since they are an experienced transit operator.

9) What should the city of Atlanta do to reduce traffic congestion in the city? 

As mentioned above, in order to manage current needs and future projected growth (one million more cars), the Atlanta region must create coordinated transportation linkages that get people out of their cars, utilized managed lanes for bus rapid transit to outlying areas and light-rail in other landlocked areas.

10) What should the city do to increase affordable housing options for its residents?

In April 2017, the Council passed my ordinance to establish a trust fund to benefit the communities around Turner Field. The trust fund will collect a portion of the proceeds from the sale or lease of city properties in Mechanicsville, Peoplestown, Pittsburgh, Summerhill, and a portion of Grant Park. The funds will then be used to finance affordable housing, job training, and community development projects in these neighborhoods.

To further address the development of new affordable housing stock, I recently introduced an ordinance to amend the City of Atlanta’s policies governing the sale of surplus real estate, to allow, in areas where feasible, surplus City-owned properties be used to develop affordable housing units.  The legislation would enable the City to sell real estate to pre-qualified (targeting non-profit developers) developers for a $1 to eliminate the key barrier to the development of affordable housing—cost of land.  By helping developers to avoid high costs of land acquisition, the legislation will make such development more feasible and help families at zero to 30 percent AMI, the income bracket of Atlanta families with the greatest unmet housing needs. Working with Councilmembers Ivory Young and Cleta Winslow, we passed 20-year tax abatement for Westside homeowners to help offsite growth in areas impacted by rising costs along the Atlanta Beltline. In the other areas, the City can also create housing enterprise zones that would support the purchasing of housing stock in select neighborhoods and for first-time homebuyers.

11) If elected, do you promise to conduct yourself in an ethical and transparent manner?

Yes. Further, I am a strong believer of ethics and transparency and have been a long-time supporter of the Ethics Office. I recently approved legislation for a request-for-proposals to secure a company to place all financial transactions online for real-time viewing by the public.