 On behalf of the League of Young Voters, welcome to So You Think You Can Mayor. Thank you all for coming and participating in this really historic civic forum. My name is Suzanne Murphy. I am from WMPG Southern Maine Community Radio from the University of Southern Maine. Thank you. We are very pleased to have all 15 of Portland's mayoral candidates with us this evening. You will be meeting them shortly in groups of three, but first, let's meet the League of Young Voters Election Committee. Each year, the League members step onto the elections committee to interview all the candidates in Portland and make recommendations to our larger membership on our endorsements for office. Let's meet this year's elections committee. In the red t-shirts, they are Wells Lions, Patrick Banks, Eric Poulin, Steve Berry, Patrick Roche, and this year's chair, Emma Hallis O'Connor. We also have some sponsors to thank for this evening. We're very, very happy to have these sponsors for So You Think You Can Mayor. They are WMPG Community Radio Lucid Stage, Bicycle Coalition of Maine, Maine People's Alliance, East Steering Neighborhood Association, Western Promenade Neighborhood Association, Riverton Neighborhood Association, University Neighborhood Association, Monjoy Hill Neighborhood Association, and Libbytown, Libbytown Neighborhood Association. This event could also not have been complete tonight without the participation of United Way and Portland Trail, so thanks to them. Our goal this evening is to meet these 15 candidates and, for most of you, probably, get a first look at their approach to running our great city. We'll get a glimpse of the entire field, and we look forward to getting to know these candidates even better over the coming weeks. But as you can tell right now, by now, we're doing things a little bit differently this year. The Elections Committee, along with the help of numerous volunteers and league staff, has come up with a forum format that will add some flair and fun to our usual candidate forum. We thank our candidates very much for joining us and taking a creative route to discussing the critical issues in our community. Okay, here are the ground rules. Are you ready? This is how it's all going to work. You may wonder, how are we going to do 15 people? Candidates will come up in groups of three to answer questions within a given topic. These groups have been randomly chosen. Everybody's name went into a hat, and this is how the groups came out. Secondly, topics will be chosen by a spin of the wheel. Is that not the coolest thing over there? The eight categories, just for those who don't want to crane their neck around, and for anyone who may be hearing this later on a radio or television broadcast, the topics are sustainable transportation, education, housing, economy, neighborhood development, leadership and advocacy, justice, and a wildcard category, which contains questions on topics not covered by any of the other seven. Both audience and league member questions will be asked in each topic, and each candidate will answer one question, a different question, each one in the same topic. At the end of that round, candidates will have a chance to play their challenge card and ask any fellow candidate a question of their choosing, and we'll do as many rounds as we can fit in a six-minute period. So we're hoping to mix it up a little bit and be able to get the candidates to talk to each other as well as answering the questions that have been submitted to them. We do want to remind our candidates that they are invited to speak for no more than 90 seconds in their response questions. Lisa McNeil is our timekeeper, who, Lisa is also the designer of this fabulous set, so let's hear it for Lisa. I am the enforcer. As you entered, you should have received a forum ballot at the door. Before you leave tonight, we do ask that you fill out that ballot with your ranked choice vote for mayor, given what you've seen and heard here tonight. The results of this informal poll will be posted on our website, main.thelig.com, at noon tomorrow. And as I mentioned earlier, let's just take a minute and turn off our phones, everybody, please. We really appreciate that. All right. Is everybody ready? Yeah. Everybody ready? All right. So let's meet our first group of three mayoral candidates. Come on up. Group one. Here they come. Okay. What we're going to do is start out by having each one introduce themselves by name, neighborhood, and occupation. You will then have 90 seconds to answer this question. What is the biggest challenge you will face as mayor of Portland and how will you overcome it? We're going to start with Ralph Carmona. Name, neighborhood, occupation, please. My name's Ralph Carmona. I live in Monroe Hill. I'm a retired public affairs executive and educator. And what is the biggest challenge you will face as mayor and how will you overcome it? 90 seconds. The biggest challenge I'm trying to overcome it now as a candidate is that of increasing revenues for the city of Portland and avoiding property tax increases in the process. And in addition to that, maintaining public services all in one process. That's going to involve taking action, immediate action on existing projects and initiatives and ballot measures. This is why I took a public position and the only candidate to do so in support of the Civic Center renovation bond measure. It's why I'm supporting the Thompson's Point project. This is increased revenue, no tax increases. And it's going to increase consumer demand and business confidence in the city. It's also going to involve lobbying at the state and at the federal level in terms of trying to increase some stimulus dollars. As you note, the Adam Street project involved millions of dollars in federal and state stimulus funds. Those are going to go away and we need to increase support for that project. Do we have time left? In addition to that, I think part of the effort is going to involve going out to associations at the national level, developing a counter sort of response on issues involving economic development nationwide. That's going to be very important to do that as the mayor of a national city, be a nation's city mayor. A leader that's going to represent the largest city in the state. Thank you. Next is Marcos Miller. Hi, I'm Marcos Miller. I live on Munger Hill and I teach Spanish at Deering High School. And what is your answer to what is the biggest challenge you will face as mayor of Portland and how will you overcome it? The new position of mayor really calls for somebody with collaborative skills, a consensus builder, somebody that can define a common vision for the city. And I think the biggest challenge is going to be in stating that role in City Hall where that has not always been the case. In fact, that's been sorely lacking in many cases. That is exactly why I am running as mayor. I have the skills as a teacher and as a community organizer to bring people together, find our common vision, and to take productive steps forward to make those visions reality. I've walked the path not of a traditional politician but of a civic leader working to bring people together to facilitate our goals and consensus building. One example of the work that I've done is on Franklin Street where I've worked with business leaders, neighborhood leaders from across the city and state officials at DOT and both the Baldacci administration and the LePage administration to create a common vision that turned its back on widening Franklin Street and instead is now advancing a vision of a multi-use corridor for mixed use development. That's the vision that I can bring as a collaborator. Thank you, Marcos Miller. Ethan Strimling, you're next. Thanks. My name is Ethan Strimling. I'm the CEO at Learning Works and I live in the West End, former state senator for this district. And thank you very much for having this forum tonight. It's great. I've been at many of the forums with the league and they've always been fun, interesting, and very intellectually challenging. So I appreciate this work. The number one issue I think for me in getting to City Hall, the issue we have to deal with is trying to create more jobs. Now there's 10 to 15% vacancy downtown and we are starting to feel it I think in our stores and in our restaurants and in our shops and we have to find ways to get more businesses to come in so that we can have more people so that we can begin to generate the income that we need to keep our property taxes level and perhaps even bring them down. We have a myriad of problems in the city clearly but we have a great city but it seems great in spite of our city government. The culture of City Hall has to change and that's really the hardest part I think of any leader. I run learning works as I mentioned before and we've gone through a transformation in the last two years in which we really changed our culture and found a way to focus on excellence and make customer service first and we now serve twice as many immigrants and refugees and low income kids and kids in after school programs that we served before and they're getting better outcomes than they've ever had. That's crucial to the future of this city and that's the challenge that any of us will have. Thank you, Ethan Strimling. And now we will move on to the wheel. Ralph Carmona, would you do us the honors please and spin the wheel? Just call him Vanna. All right. Sustainable transportation. No, it's in the wild. What's that? It's in the wild. It didn't quite make it. Oh, it's a wild card? It looks like sustainable. All right, wild card, sorry. Great, wild card. May I have the questions please? Okay, we're starting with the wild card. That's fun, huh? All right, Ralph Carmona. Your question is from the audience. While you've been knocking on doors and meeting voters what is the one issue you've never considered before that you've heard people express concern about and what is your plan to address it? Well, the one thing that I'd never really considered would come out so strongly and vehemently is the issue having to do with immigration. I had that on a number of occasions, but the most critical time came, I'm an American of Mexican descent, and this one guy, he was a staunch Republican and he had a cigarette, and I said, I want to get your support. And he says, you can't solve my problem. Well, let's ask me the question. I'll respond to it because I want to get your support. And he said, well, okay, the problem is those, and he used colorful language, those Mexican immigrants. And I said, what's your solution to the problem? He says, I'd build a wall around the country and I'd have an entry point. And if they come near the wall and not near the entry point, I'd shoot them. And I said, you'd shoot them, huh? He said, yep, I would shoot them. I said, well, you're a straight shooter, no pun intended. I said, but you know, I'm going to tell you what I tell my wife. And that is that I don't agree with you on everything. And the second thing I think that you need to understand is that we live in a country of immigration, a country of folks who come from all parts of the world, and we need to make immigration creative, not destructive. In the end, he heard me out. It was his anger about immigration being chaotic. And in the end, he came across as my supporter. Thank you. Okay. Ralph Carmona, thank you. All right. Our second question in the wild category, wild card is from the League Elections Committee and Marcos Miller, this is for you. What one policy or citywide initiative would you most like to see enacted during your term as mayor? One of my signature issues is getting moving on developing Bayside. We've had a plan for 10 years to create a new mixed-use neighborhood in Bayside. And we have a long way to go on getting moving on that. So I would love to see public works get moved out to Riverside as we planned, have hundreds if not thousands of new home units built there, bringing new home owners into Bayside, creating the kind of density we need to support public transportation. We've got existing infrastructure there. We have great opportunities to be lowering our tax base through development, attracting the kinds of workers that we want who are going to support our schools, build our businesses and contribute to our culture. Bayside is ripe and that is one example of the vision I have for Portland in creating a more sustainable future for ourselves and for our future generations too. Thank you, Marcos Miller. Now, Ethan Strimling, for you, the question is from United Way. Portland has a vibrant and growing multicultural population. To remain globally competitive, Maine and Portland must identify ways to maximize the potential contributions of foreign-born residents. As mayor of Portland, what policies and practices would you promote to help foreign-born residents and what ideas do you have for increasing our collective diversity and cultural competency in Portland? It's a great question and a very important question and certainly related to what it was that Ralph was talking about and I've certainly run into that at a lot of doors and I'm glad you stayed and talked to him and tried to change one heart and one mind. It's very important that we try to bring in, you know, that if we did not have the immigrants into this city, we would have lost thousands of people in terms of population over the last few years, over the last 10 years. At LearningWorks, where I mentioned before, the organization that I run, we work with immigrants and refugees in English language classes and basic literacy. And one of the things that's the most frustrating that we find is that folks who come here from other countries come here with medical degrees and they're superintendents of school districts that are 10 times the size of the city of Portland or they're government officials or, you know, they're dignitaries and they come here and the only job that they can get even though they bring all this intellectual capacity and all this emotional energy and this tremendous community spirit, the only job they can get may be cleaning offices late at night because we don't recognize other credentials because we don't understand, we don't have the cultural competence to see somebody's strengths and make them part of our community and that's really what we need to focus on more than anything and English language classes without question. We've got to teach people to read and speak English as quickly as possible. It's the best way to get people integrated into our community. Thank you, Ethan Strimling. Alright, and now these gentlemen will participate in what is called our challenge round. Each candidate has been given a challenge card. When I ring my bell, the first person to show their card across the bureau there will be able to ask a question of any candidate and as usual the answer will be 90 seconds. So are we ready? Go! Ralph Carmona, what is... Who are you challenging? I challenge Jed Rashband and Jed. It's your lucky night, Jed. The question is this, Jed, at the last forum you mentioned that you were the only candidate who worked for a profit making company and that's fine, but part of that was actually consulting business as I understand it and clarified that involved a passion of this initiative to allow for an elected mayor. Some would view that as a conflict, but that aside, you know, you said that as a small business person that gives you expertise on public policy. Do you really believe being a small business person gives you expertise on broad sweeping public policy? Because I work with large banks, other institutions, and on public policy. I've never been a small business owner. The answer is absolutely, especially the work that I've been doing. My company is Stones Throw Consulting and I've been involved in many, many issues throughout the city including the main state pier where I had a front row seat to the fiasco there. Many of you probably witnessed that as well. I've also ran the campaign to preserve the public library on Monument Square and I have been involved in Augusta on many, many issues including taxes, small business issues and the environment, renewable energies, so on and so forth. So yes, as a small business owner running a business which has been key, earning a profit to make it so that it is viable. And it just so happens that I have the added benefit of working in policy, in politics. And the consulting that I've been doing has been involved in many of the state's biggest issues. Ethan and I had an opportunity to work on Casino's Know. I've worked with many people in this room including Will Everett, the former director of the league and as you said, I did run that campaign last year to create the elected mayor and that in itself was a heck of a policy lesson. Thanks for the question, Ralph. My pleasure. Okay, just one note. You can only play a challenge card once, okay? There you go. All right. I'll play mine. I can't do it anymore, I'm out. Okay, we have a few minutes left in this round. So here we go. I challenge Nick Mavadonis. Okay, Marcos Miller challenges Nick Mavadonis. Come on up. Nick, on Tuesday night you pointed out that you got your start on the school committee and since then you've served on the city council for 11 years, a significant number of them as mayor. You also said that you wanted to champion education. I'm a public school teacher and I'm here to ask you, why is Hall School falling apart? Where has the leadership been in City Hall from the mayor's office and from you on providing funds to reinvest and rebuild our schools? Very good question. Thank you for offering that. As you mentioned, I served on the school board for six years. I have a great deal of experience in moving forward building projects in the city of Portland. We renovated three middle schools under my leadership. I chaired that committee. We built the East End School. I chaired that committee as well. The process, as you know, as a teacher is that the school department submits, does a study and submits all of that to the state. The school department has done that. Unfortunately, our schools in Portland haven't rated high enough for the funding that's available. So we've been going through that state process in order to get state funding. I, and I think the rest of the city council, frankly, has been very supportive of moving that forward. If we get to the point that we very well may, we will have to look backwards. And as we did with the middle schools and our high schools, we funded those renovations, or new, or new, in some cases, new construction on the local dollar. And if the state does not come through, and they have not come through, I will lead that charge to do it on the local dollar. I've done it before, and I'll do it again. Thank you. Okay. Nick Manvedonis responding to Marcos Miller's question. Thank you. That is the end of this challenge round and of this first group of three. So we want to thank Ralph Carmona, Marcos Miller, and Ethan Strimley. Group two. Come on up. Surprise. It's all correct, right? Is that me? Yay. It's been triple-checked. It should be. All right. We will start with Peter Bryant. First, could you please give your name, neighborhood, and your occupation, and then aunts have 90 seconds to answer what is the biggest challenge you will face as mayor of Portland and how will you overcome it? Peter Bryant. My name is Peter Bryant. I live on back coal estates. It's off Ocean Avenue. I'm a retired merchant seaman. I started in Portland on the fireboat and I got off a ship in December of 2010. I think the biggest challenge is going to be for me, is working with the city council. Yeah. I've watched them on TV and if one person doesn't understand it, it gets tabled to the next meeting and it gets tabled. That's not going to happen. That's not going to happen when I'm there. If there's one person that you explain it to three times and they still don't get it, you're taking the vote anyway and don't vote. If you don't understand it, get out of the way. So, hey, thank you, thank you, thank you. Here's another one, a little one of the challenge. If you want to build a shed in your backyard, that takes two months to get a building permit. It's not going to happen. It's going to be one week and by sitting up there, standing up there, watching how it works, when you submit your application, you've got to wait a week for the fire department to come in and you've got to wait a week for that building inspector to come in and my time is up. Thank you very much. Thank you. Peter Bryant, our next candidate, Jill Dueson. I'm Jill Dueson. I live in North Deering. I am an attorney by training. I'm former director of the Bureau of Rehab Services for the state of Maine and I'm currently a part-time seasonal employee with LL Bean. And what is your answer to what is the biggest challenge you will face as mayor of Portland and how will you overcome it? Well, Portland is a successful city and to build on that success, the mayor will have to have a full toolbox of leadership skills. The first challenge I will take on is to get buy-in from my concept of the mayor as ombudsman and advocate for residents and businesses. As chief ombudsman and advocate, I will personally engage, follow-up and see to the resolution of concerns and complaints about city services. I know that government can work and offer a value proposition for the tax dollars that support it. I know this because I've done it. I've taken on a public agency and I've been in trouble and worked with the employees of that agency to turn around a 10% budget deficit and eliminate an 11 month wait list for services. No employee of this city gets up in the morning thinking how can I frustrate the residents and businesses of Portland today. I will improve city services by taking on problems from the perspective of a customer and together we will resolve issues faster, better and for the long term. I know we can make government work because I've done it. I want to do it for Portland. Thank you. Jill Doosan. Our third in group two is Jed Rathband. I'm Jed Rathband and I live over in East Bayside and I'm the owner of Stone's Throw Consulting as I mentioned before. And what is the biggest challenge you think you will face as mayor of Portland and how will you overcome it? Sure. Hands down, our budget is going to continue to be our most challenging issue in the foreseeable future. We have a budget of roughly 300 million dollars, 100 of which goes to our schools alone and last year we lost a million dollars in state funding. That is going to continue for the foreseeable future. Now we cannot afford to lose a dime in our schools but yet we cannot afford to raise taxes. We've got to hold the line on that. Therefore, we've got to get smart with how we spend and we've got to get innovative. As mayor, I will work hard every day to retain the businesses that we have in the city and work to attract the ones that we are actually capable of getting, putting our money into targeting the business that we can get. I'll fight in Augusta and I believe I'm in the best position to do that. I'm trusted on both sides of the aisle and most importantly, I don't have the political baggage that stymied efforts in the past to get our share. Our schools depend on it, our seniors depend on it, fire and safety depends on it and we must continue to make the investments in our community that will attract human capital and businesses to our area. This challenge is an opportunity to create something sustainable for Portland that will diversify our tax base for years to come. But we need new leadership to make this happen and I believe I am that new leadership. I hope to earn your support and please check out my website www.JedFromMair.com. Thank you. That was Jed Rathband, everyone. And now on to the wheel. Peter Bryant, will you do us the honors this time around? Maybe I'll get it right this time. Your timekeeper has a question. Was I under that time? I'm really impressed with how cooperative all our candidates have been with the time. Isn't this really good? Apparently it's housing. Could I have the questions please? Okay. Peter Bryant, first question and housing for you is from the audience. Question. With the loss of federal LIHEAP funding, the program that offers subsidies for heating... I'm sorry. What was that again? With the loss of federal LIHEAP funding, LIHEAP being the program that offers subsidies for heating fuel, do you have a citywide plan to keep the heat on this winter when many low income people lose that safety net? If yes, please describe. Yeah, listen to this one. We got a gold mine here in Portland and we don't even know it. And why they're not advertising, I mean the gas company, natural gas. Bethel Main is paying a million dollars to run a five mile line of the Bethel. They just ran it down Washington Avenue. They ran it up Exchange Street and they're going to go up Congress Street. And natural gas is 40% cheaper than oil and we got it here. We got to get the word out to guys that have people that have apartments change your furnaces over from oil cost like 100 bucks from oil to natural gas and you're going to save around 40%. If you are going to make an investment in oil, you have about a 15% risk factor. If you are going to invest in natural gas, there's a 90% risk factor because they're predicting natural gas is going down even more. Natural gas is not a good investment for a person investing but it's a good thing to invest in if you're going to use natural gas, if you need heat. And we got it right here. Why the gas company isn't having an ad in the paper, they predict they have 28,000 customers in the Portland area and they expect 14,000 more. Mr. Bryant, your time is up. I'm sorry. So sweet. Thank you. Thank you very much. Jill Doosan, this question is from the audience. How do you propose to keep property taxes down? I'm worried about property taxes making our arts and culture suffer. I have served on the finance committee twice for the city. The way that the city has kept property tax increases relatively moderate in a tough economic environment is that we go through that budget line by line, department by department and in the past three years we have cut the budget and done the work around the table of trying to minimize tax impact in order to but part of the process is figuring out what we can stop doing and what we must keep on doing and I think that if you look at the results of the budget over the past three years you'll see that we had a 1% increase a 2% increase and a flat tax impact within the past three years and that's a pretty, I think a pretty astounding set of results to survive through along with the city for the past three years. Thank you, that was Jill Dueson. Jed Rathband, your question is also from the audience. Describe one policy you would implement to make it easier for young professionals to find affordable housing in Portland. Great question. If you look what's being built in the city today it's not condominiums. Condominiums can't get funded anymore because the economy is in such bad shape builders and developers can't afford apartments. Therefore, what is actually able to happen is that we can build apartment buildings and we're seeing it a lot. Little pocket spots all over the city where they're actually commanding good rents and they can get them financed and it's crucial. There's a spot over on Hanover street that I know, not Hanover but Hammond Street near my place that's going to be done pretty soon as well. We have got to make it a real disappointment in how we did the Adams School up on Monjoy Hill. That was a huge missed opportunity that does not produce affordable housing. Two acres of the most valuable land almost in the state of Maine, the most densely populated piece of land in the state, and all we're getting out of that is 16 units. That should be 60 and then we'll start talking about affordable housing. You cannot build affordably when all you do is build 16 units on a piece that big. As mayor what I would do is I would oversee how that is happening. I would work with the stakeholder groups, I would work with the developers and I would make sure that the city is on track to really see what is our long-term goal and how are we going to meet that. Thank you. Thank you. That was Jed Rathben. Thanks to Group 2 for answering those questions in the category of housing. We're going into the challenge round for Group 2. So, here we go. I'm afraid Peter Brian, you were first. Who was your question for? Chris Vale. Chris Vale, could you please step forward? Chris Vale, North Deering. Chris you're a firefighter and talking to the chief and going around the town doing my homework. When I see a fire engine, fire truck heading down the road 60 miles an hour blasting away and the kids all run to the curb. Does that driver have a license? Do they have a license to drive that thing? What's the answer to that? You're going to grill me over a yes and no question? Yeah. Yes, it's a license driver. No, they're not. Stay to main license. To drive a truck? You didn't ask me if it was a truck driving license. They're driving a fire truck down the road. It's a state of main driver's license. Just a main driver's license. No truck license. Correct. I have a state of main driver's license as well. But you don't have a truck driver's license. You can't drive a truck. I have a state of main driver's license. Okay, thank you. Peter Bryant, Chris Vale. Are there remaining two candidates? Okay. Jed Rathpan, who do you challenge a question to? I've got a question for Nick. Nick Mavadonis. Nick, as you know, I ran the campaign to create the elected mayor. And you helped lead the opposition against it. You repeatedly characterized the position as overpriced and worthless. How will you create the changes necessary to address the challenges in our city when you hold the position in such low esteem? Fair question and good question. I'm not sure those were my exact words. As many in the room know, I did not vote for the proposal. I supported the work of the Charter Commission. In fact, appointed as the city councilor some members of the Charter Commission. However, I didn't agree with the recommendations. I felt if we were going to have an elected mayor and frankly I should tell you I thought there should be two questions. One should have been do we have elected mayor? The second should have been do we elect that mayor by rank choice voting? But that was not the recommendation of the Charter Commission. I felt if we're going to have an elected mayor it should probably be a stronger position of stronger CEO type position. The rank choice voting is something that we will see how it works out. In many large cities they have a runoff. So I think the voter spoke, although it was by a close vote, the voter spoke and said that they wanted an elected mayor, the position as described in the Charter and recommended by the Charter Commission. I would work very hard. I think I bring a set of skills that brings vision and leadership and experience in a lot of areas. So I think I would be one that fits that profile very well. I would use that experience and that vision and that leadership to move things forward. I think we have a lot of good things going in Portland but we've got to do more to try to build a better future and I see the signs are up. Thank you for the question. My name is Charles Bragdon. I live in Manjoy Hill and many of you know me as a cab driver but I'm also a publisher of the Portland Maine Gazette. And what do you think is the biggest challenge that you will face as mayor of Portland and how would you overcome it? I think my biggest challenge for us elected mayor of Portland is number one to get more people on board with the population of Portland. I think the biggest challenge for us elected mayor of Portland is number one to get more people on board with the position because there's a lot of people that opposed it and there's a lot of people that still don't have a lot of support for it. So that's going to be the first hurdle to overcome but that isn't the biggest one. The biggest one is to get the economic development of this city really restarted again because right now it's stagnant and we've stalled our economy to the point where we don't have a lot of local businesses starting up. A lot of small businesses and that's what we're going to have to do. We're going to have to overcome that barrier and really focus on and anchor back on our economy and really build on that and try to focus our energies to make sure we have viable business plans being developed by these people that want to start businesses here. And I'm not talking about big businesses from away or small businesses from away. I'm talking about people like us creating our own businesses in this economy and making sure we make that happen. We have grant money available that's never been used at the city level to help mom and pop businesses that are creating new jobs and I want to kick that into overdrive. I want people to know as a people who want to support our people and help our economy really kick in where it needs to be and I want to be the guy that markets to our people that we want your business here we want you to be local people living here vested in this community and really know the cities behind you 180 percent because that's the only thing we're going to do to really get our economy back on track and really get our economy recession proof. You can bring big businesses from away but they don't bring jobs that put money in the local economy and they don't bring money away from it. I want to put that money back in your pocket so you can spend it in our local economy and we can make sure that our economy is viable and relevant and not something that is going to be stagnant for the next 20 years. That's what my biggest challenge is to overcome that. Thank you. That was Charles Bragdon. Our next candidate is Jodi Lapchick please. Your name, neighborhood and occupation. Jodi Lapchick is this on? Jodi Lapchick, my neighborhood and my occupation I'm an independent marketing strategist. And what is your answer to what is the biggest challenge you will face as mayor of Portland and how would you overcome it? Well most of us agree the candidates and I agree that our challenge is to grow the economy. I however have a vision and a plan to do this by reinforcing years of investment already made in building and promoting our creative economy. Achieving sustainable growth through our creative economy will help generate additional funds needed to improve our schools, our transportation system including making our streets friendly to bicyclists and pedestrians and the funds we need to provide necessary social services. I will embrace the challenge of finding sustainable solutions that protect our environment and our social and cultural resources. The solutions are out there many people have already done some great work and are doing some great work on solving some of our city's most critical issues. I plan to increase support and sharing of the many successful efforts already happening. I will engage nonprofit corporate and the public sectors while empowering our great neighborhoods to band together to preserve, improve and promote our unique way of life. Thank you. That was Jody Lapchick. Our third candidate in this group is Dave Marshall. Hey everybody. I'm Dave Marshall and I am from the West End. I am a fine artist, a gallery owner, a property manager, a historic house restorationist and a city counselor. And what do you think will be the biggest challenge you would face as mayor and how would you overcome it? There's an ancient philosophy that says that it's very, very hard to abolish an old form of government but it's much, much harder to establish a new form of government. This is going to be the challenge that the new mayor is going to have. We'll no longer select our mayor or our chair through a process of counselors having a caucus. Instead we're going through this process, a people-oriented process. Instead of picking up the phone and making four phone calls, you're going to have to take and go out and knock on 10,000 doors. And that's a lot of doors to knock on. And so as the elected mayor, my biggest challenge is going to be how we gain the public's confidence into this new form of government so we can move forward as one step, one community at the same time. In order to do this, I'm going to work extremely hard to bring the public into the process right off the bat. We're going to have a public dialogue about where we're going as a city. We're going to make sure that the values and the goals I have as a mayor or candidate are aligned with your goals as well. These goals include investing in our school buildings to make them state-of-the-art learning facilities, growing our population near the downtown and in our business corridors in getting the majority of our buildings off of oil. These are my goals as your mayor. That was Dave Marshall. Thank you to the three candidates for their opening statements. And now Charles Bragdon, would you please spin the wheel for us? Well, this is great. We're getting different categories. Leadership and advocacy is the category. And here are the questions. We'll start with you, Charles Bragdon. This is a question from the League Elections Committee. How do you plan to use the bully-pulpit aspect of the office of elected mayor to represent the constituents of Portland? I'd probably stop by flogging the councils, no, I'm kidding. What I would do, number one, is I would start by meeting with all of the directors and the city manager, because I think the first thing a mayor should do is understand the people he's trying to lead and the people that are leading with him. The first step is to meet with the city councilors, the directors of different departments and the city manager, and get everybody on the same page of where the people's vision is for where Portland needs to go. And really try to bring that all into one ball that we can roll around for a while and really start the development process and get things moving where they need to go, because this is a George Washington position for Portland and we need to recognize it as that, that this is our pioneer stage for our new local government and we need to really take that leadership position and know that maybe the strength that this position carries isn't strong, but the direction they're going to take it is going to be strong and we need to make sure we find where that is with the people, not just with the politicians and the directors and the bureaucrats that are running things, but the people out there that put us in that position and make sure we're all on the same page and developing what the city feels is a plan we all want to be a part of, not just what some of us think we should be a part of. So I think that's where I would go with it. I would meet with the people involved. I would meet with the people out here. I would have very large groups come to neighborhood meetings, I would hope to really help shape this vision. I know there's a vision already being shaped of where this may position is going to be, but I think my time is up. Okay, that was Charles Bragdon. The category is leadership and advocacy and this question is from the League Elections Committee and this is for Jody Lapchick. What is the number one outside obligation and commitment that you have which you would need to balance with your role as a full-time mayor? This is so easy for me because I have no life. I guess I would have to say my husband is the only outside obligation. I have actually, and I have a daughter who's just recently engaged. I plan on devoting my entire waking hours and you can ask anyone who knows me. I'm a bit of a workaholic and so this is sort of going to be my passion day and night for four years. Okay, that was Jody Lapchick. All right, in the third candidate here, in the category of leadership and advocacy, the question for Dave Marshall is besides promoting Portland as a quote, foodie town, what ideas do you have to bring this city to wider national prominence? The city of Portland has a very, very special thing. What we have here is a great group of people in this city. Together we collectively have an amazing creative talent. We need to reinvest our creative talents back into the economy. We need to use it by growing our arts and culture, by creating new inventions. This is the way of the future. Right now we're seeing jobs being shipped overseas for pennies on the dollar. Right now there are more jobs in arts and culture in the Maine than there are the wood products industry. And the creative economy is growing by leaps and bounds. 20% of our economy is now in this creative economy sector. And we have a huge amount of opportunity here to all work together in order to harness this creative talent and to market it on an international scale. We shouldn't be the place that you're just going to come and eat a lobster. We should be the place where you're going to get that rich cultural experience that you've always wanted. And we should be developing new products here and we should be selling those products overseas and around the country. To be a net exporter of creative products, that's where our future is. As a city councillor I've championed this issue. And as your mayor I will as well. That was Dave Marshall on the question of leadership and advocacy. And now we go into our challenge round. Each candidate has been given a challenge card. So when I ring my bell the first person to show the card will be able to challenge. So here we go. I think it was Jody. I think it was Jody Lapchick. Who do you challenge? My challenge is for Mike Brennan. Mike Brennan, can you come forward please? It may be a softball. Well I can give a hardball answer. I'm Michael Brennan. I live in Back Cove in Portland. My question for you is you're going to do a lot for the city of Portland in Augusta. You can stop right there. That's an endorsement. You're going to represent our city in Augusta and in D.C. And I'm wondering what your plan is for engaging in the neighborhood issues and all of the sort of down in the trenches issues that the city council tends to deal with. Great. Well, thank you. And thank you for acknowledge that I am going to do good work in Augusta and represent us well in Washington D.C. I appreciate that. But I'm going to do the same things that I've been doing for the last 35 years that I've lived in Portland. And that is to work in neighborhoods, work in the communities and address the nitty gritty issues that are so important to residents of Portland. And I've been a commissioner on the Portland Housing Authority where we've dealt with all kinds of housing issues, had to pave roads, had to deal with snow removal, and had to deal with actually being the biggest landlord in the city of Portland. I've also worked for United Way to Barrier Portland where we address the issues that had to do with elderly housing. Okay, I'm still green. Sorry, I keep looking at you and I'm looking at the other thing. But I've had a long a lot of experience in dealing with those very nitty gritty issues and clearly as a state senator or state representative on a regular basis I had people call me and ask me can you help me with your social security? Can you help me with child support and can you help me with a number of state programs? I still got a couple more seconds. Well, thank you. Thanks, Mike. Thank you for challenging Mike Brennan. All right, we have time for one more challenge. Let's go. I think it was Dave. Dave Marshall, who are you challenging? I'm going to challenge Councillor Nick Mavidonis. Thank you for keeping my streak up, Dave. So I read in the Portland Press Herald recently that you're advocating for bringing tar sands to the city of Portland by reversing the flow of the Portland pipeline from Montreal to the port of Portland. Now, this tar sands is a highly volatile form of oil. This is the dirtiest oil in the world. It has a carbon footprint where its emissions are 30% greater than common crude oil. Now, Councillor, how are we going to do that when we're looking at our comprehensive plan and we know that we just adopted the Environmental Sustainability Report? How are we going to bring tar sands to the city of Portland and keep that consistent? Good question, Councillor, and thank you for asking it. Claire asked me that the other night and just to put it into context, I was called by a reporter and asked about economic activity in the waterfront and the question was about the Portland pipeline which, frankly, I've dealt with over the years and is a very fine organization and said, how would you feel about more ships coming to the harbor? There's an opportunity to bring oil product back from Canada which I knew very little about at the time and thank you, I don't have to recite some of the things that I've learned since it was suggested the other night that I look up tar sands. That gives me the same concern that you do. The issue I was asked about was economic activity in the harbor when you can bring more ships to the harbor it's like bringing more good jobs to Portland. You bring more ships you have more jobs along the waterfront Portland, South Portland and that is for a variety of purposes could be tugboats, pilots other things that are brought to ships, ship chandlers. I have concern about the tar sands I thank you for raising it and giving me a chance to talk about it. Claire brought it to me the other night and I have looked it up and I still want to see more ships coming into the harbor but the tar sands would give me concern so thank you. Thank you, that was Dave Marshall challenging Nick Mabadonis and I'm told we have time for a third challenge so Charles Bragdon. If I knew that I would have told Nick not to sit down. So my challenge is for Nick Mabadonis. Like your time. As one of the longest seated counselors in the city of Portland, Nick and Cheryl Lehmann probably the only one running for mayor that has the term value that you have over 11 years I want to know what you're going to do different than the status quo to move us forward over the next four years because in 11 years you've had an opportunity to bring forward a vision that we can't bring forward in four years so you've had an 11 year opportunity to make Portland better than what it is and we're stagnant right now so I'm wondering what you're going to do different than the status quo that you're going to bring us out of this stagnation of our economy it's feeling. Thank you Charles another good question. I've been on the city council for actually 14 years and served as I said for a couple of years on the school board. The city council works as a team there are nine of us decisions are made by majority I am very proud of a lot of decisions that I have helped either vote on or bring people together to make over the years this is a different position mayors currently serve for one year Jill has been a mayor there are others who have been mayors my great-grandfather used to tell me when I was a kid it's tough to juggle two watermelons and Greeks eat a lot of watermelon you think of that trying to juggle your full-time job and being a city councilor or your full-time job and being a mayor so you have to work as a team. I'm running because as I said before I think I bring that experience the leadership and the vision that I would work on are certainly we've talked about it tonight jobs we need to create jobs if we're going to have more people living here we're going to have more housing we need to create jobs and bring people here I would work hard on education I've done that in the past I'm proud of many of the things that I would have done but that would be a focus for me another big focus is we have to have a healthy city. If you look around we have one in three children in Cumberland County are obese or overweight we're wrong that is phenomenal and we need to do something about it some of the things I would be working on and I'm out of time. Okay thank you that was Charles Braggen challenging Nick Mabadonis we want to thank Group 3 Charles Braggen, Jody Lapchick and Dave Marshall Group 4 come on up flip your signs over please we're going to start with Mike Brennan we need you to introduce yourself we have 90 seconds to answer what is the biggest challenge you would face as mayor and how would you overcome it thank you my name is Michael Brennan I live in Back Cove and I'm a policy associate at the Muskie School of Public Service at the University of Southern Maine and similar to some of the other candidates I just want to thank the league for having this event it's really a terrific opportunity for us to all talk about things that we think are important and secondly I'd like to thank Lucid Stage for also hosting this and having this event here it's really been terrific I don't know if the challenge is so much for me as mayor moving forward it's a challenge for us as a community how we move forward and I want to just tell a quick story I was born in Portland I didn't have the opportunity to grow up in Portland my father lost his job when I was young and he had to move the whole family out of the city and out of state in order to find another job I was fortunate as an adult to come back to Portland and I've lived here for the last 35 years raised two children and had the opportunity to work here so I think one of the greatest challenges that we face is to make sure that every person in the city has the opportunity to live in the city to prosper in the city and be part of the city and it doesn't matter whether you're a homeless person whether you're an artist whether you're a business person whether you're an educator you should be able to raise a family to have a place in this community Portland has a reputation for a city that embraces diversity, that's compassionate and that has a big heart and I want to make sure that going forward we continue to have those values and that we develop a budget that reflects those values thank you very much that was Michael Brennan thank you for your opening statement our next candidate is Hamza Haddo your name, your neighborhood and your occupation please thank you so much my name is Hamza Haddo I live east of Deering I work for a goodwill assistant, sustainability and recycling operation the biggest challenge that we do have as a city is the economic which includes jobs and also education system which is great but we can make it better so how should I fix it as a mayor we want to think about not today only but for the future next 20 years, next 30 years the generation of Portland will change the world is getting more diverse how we will accommodate and also the world is flattening the American dream every country is picking up American dream how we will face that challenge should we fight or should we think about today and accommodate our future generations the work that they need to do today so as a mayor I will emphasize the education system yearly education system going and visiting our schools I haven't seen any mayor or city leader who will go and talk to the children and also our homelessness our unfortunate people our low income people if we educate them I came to this country with only high school education and right now I do have a decent job thank you so much very good, thank you that was Hamza Haddo thank you Chris Vale is our third candidate my name is Chris Vale I live in the North Deering area and it's already been established I work for the Portland Fire Department and you have a main license right? evidently it comes along with the job so what is your answer to the question what is the biggest challenge you will face as mayor of Portland and how will you overcome it? I have tons of goals but I think at the very core everybody is a little foolish to think if a challenge isn't going to be the city council as we've already realized and recognized it's been brought up a few times tonight the city council has met this position of resistance and I think first of all working with that resistance as a full-time mayor I'm going to be working against the resistance that City Hall has already established and the city councilors have established one thing I'm sick of is just a citizen of this country is the notion of reaching across the aisle a term born of politicians born of government and born of politics and I'm frustrated by this notion because it's them who built it and they built it to a point now that they're forced to look at it and recognize that we're all sick of it so I think people who reach across the aisle are adults I look at everybody in this room I've heard a few young cries but we're all adults and we should act like it what I search for is streamlining City Hall I search for accountability in City Hall I want to be the name of four years on City Hall that says it's my right, it's my wrong tell me what I'm doing at the end of four years if you don't like me pass me on but I'm done with the shell game of City Hall and City Council nobody having accountability or a name on an idea I'll be the face and I'll be the leader of the City of Portland as your mayor thank you that was Chris Vale okay and now Mike Brennan could you spin the wheel oh well I don't think we've had that yet justice justice is the category I may have the questions I think our wheel needs some WD-40 or something I'm not alright Michael Brennan the category is justice the question is from the United Way and the question is the City of Portland has been a leader and partner with other organizations to address the needs of homeless people in greater Portland housing is a major contributing factor to homelessness what is your commitment to helping people in need in their community and what ideas do you have for addressing the critical issue of homelessness well I'm glad that that's a question that came from United Way I worked for the United Way for seven years and while I would work for the United Way we created the Cumberland County affordable housing venture I was a founding member for a specific purpose of creating affordable housing for people who had been homeless I also started the emergency shelter assessment committee that has played a monitoring role within the community to make sure that there's enough affordable housing I mean there's enough homelessness not enough homelessness there's enough housing for homeless persons and I'm proud to say that a number of years ago the City of Portland made a commitment to the community and what they said is no person on any given night in Portland and we've stuck to that commitment for the last 20 years and basically said on any given night in Portland there will be enough opportunities for people who are homeless to at least have a shelter but we have to do better and doing better means that just providing a shelter bed is not enough we need to create affordable housing opportunities throughout the city and probably the best example is what Preble Street Resource Center is doing now with their housing first program with Logan Place and with Florence House and those have been extraordinarily successful programs and helping people who have been homeless find permanent living situations I'm sorry thank you for helping me answer the question anybody else in the audience must contribute to okay that was Michael Brennan alright the category is justice this question is from the audience for Hemsahado what would you do to meet the needs of the racial, transsexual and queer youth in Portland thank you for asking me that question the first thing is everyone deserve to live the life he or she Jews so to emphasize that everyone has a lifestyle that one to adopt and I will encourage everyone to adopt the lifestyle that you know that person in Jews saying of that what we need is there is a different culture belief is also need is to be respected and as a mayor I will support every group to celebrate their differences to bring together and to be united for the common goal for the future that we need a one community whether we come yesterday or whether we had a Janus to be born and raised in here and we want to be an equal whether it become an employment education every aspect of life we are human we have to live the dream that we have Jews to live in American dream that no one will bother anyone else just everyone needs to be successful and adopt the life that he wants thank you that was Hamza Haddo alright our last question in the category of justice for Chris Vale is also from the audience what are the challenges that people of color in Portland face and what programs or initiatives would you propose to address them I think it goes back to just our general sense of equality I think still what we need in the city of Portland is education education on everybody's behalf education in city hall I think we need to realize besides the diversity in our city just the diversity in our country it's not restricted just to the city of Portland our country is diverse in a million different ways and I think half of our problem is the diversity the crowds the different sect doesn't know how to embrace the other they don't know how to engage with the other and it doesn't matter if it's color race, religions whatever it is I don't even know if from within we educate ourselves enough I say within I'm not in city hall yet but I think even in city hall we need to educate and by education I think starting with the children is great I like some of the ideas and the notions of we need to really work on language it's one of our first primal how we get in touch with each other I think these ideas of education have to grow from our children I see it working in the fire department we go to many houses we talk to the kids first they learn education in schools and they communicate with their parents I think the more diverse we are the more educated we become through the process and I think we engage and embrace each other as citizens in this country all right that was Chris Vail thank you very much and now are we ready for the challenge round here we go I'm a quick one Chris Vail who are you challenging I guess Michael since you're here I'll deal with you first I have a driver's license it's a vain driver's license I think some of the candidates are starting to understand my frustration I hope I voice some of the frustration of American citizens we're frustrated with government we're frustrated with politicians we're frustrated with politics so I ask you maybe to represent a large crowd over to my left what is career politicians is going to change to help the city of Portland and get us off the treadmill and get us to progress and not fight with each other and look to the future instead of arguing and staying right where we are today well I agree with you well I agree with you and I think if you know anything about me and what I've done in the community for the last 35 years that you've seen that I've been a very progressive force within the community and to help address a lot of the issues that we've faced in the city of Portland I also did have the opportunity to represent Portland in Augusta as both a state legislator and as a state senator I'm happy to say and I wanted to clarify something that Mayor Mabadonis didn't quite get right but the city just had two schools funded fully with state money and it's because I helped rewrite the school funding formula to allow for Portland to get money for school construction when I was chair of the education committee it was the first time in the history of the state and the city that we received funding for English language learners also got the most money that we've ever received from the state in school funding when I was chair of the education committee so if you think that's the type of politician that you don't want then maybe there's some other people that you might point to but I have a record I think that has been extraordinarily beneficial for the city of Portland and I would be a type of mayor that has that would help the city of Portland move forward in ways that I have for the last 35 years okay that was Chris Vale challenging Michael Brennan we have time for another challenge round I don't know what's going to happen he can only get one challenge sorry can I get a rebuttal rebuttal no one yeah we're going to what do you have a challenge well I'll ask Jody Lapchick okay we have a challenge Michael Brennan challenges Jody Lapchick Jody come on up Jody what do you think is the greatest attribute that you would bring to this position well you gave me an easy question trying to think where to start I think that the attributes that I bring the greatest attribute I bring would be the experience that I gained in running a small business with 10 employees and having clients with many stakeholders involved and trying to get people to work together and buy into an idea and get behind an idea and if it was my idea and people didn't get behind it then we would go back and forth until I was sure that they had a better idea and then we would work with their idea so it was an idea driven company and I think that the city needs an idea driven mayor to bring people together and figure out how to get ideas sold so that everybody can get excited and nobody is doing something that they don't want to be doing okay that was Michael Brennan with challenging Jody Lapchick alright thank you to Group 4 Michael Brennan, Hamza Haddo and Chris Vale alright so we are ready are we ready for our final round Group 5 welcome to the stage well you haven't been patient you've been talking I'm just teasing alright so let's start with Richard Dodge please introduce yourself by name, neighborhood occupation I'm Richard Dodge and I live out of Forest Avenue by Warren Avenue and I own Sam's Great Northern Lobster Bakes and catering and I'm also a commercial broker and what do you think is the biggest challenge you will face as mayor of Portland and how will you overcome it well I think my biggest challenge is many will see the attitude of the current and the past administrations in the planning boards they have created a culture in the city that is how can we stop this project as opposed to how can we help this project go through as many of you has witnessed the many businesses that have moved out of town or haven't come here because of the roadblocks put in their way to recap it will be how to change the attitude at City Hall I think is our biggest challenge we need to streamline the whole process and we need to change some department heads if it's necessary so we have more positive people that are thinking positive ideas my goal is to seek common sense regulations that don't tie up the process of building new businesses we need to elect the planning board we've been appointing them way too long and they are appointed by the city council it's not working we all see that we need jobs here that's our biggest thing going on right now and we need to stop running the city like a charity and start running it like a business thank you okay that was Richard Dodge speaking next candidate is John Eater could you give us your name, neighborhood occupation and answer the question about the biggest challenge and how you overcome it I'm John Eater I'm from the west end of Portland I am a community organizer I work with the homeless the drug addicted and mentally ill I'm a student and I have several other jobs like everybody else in Portland the most challenging thing for us is going to be for us collectively is going to be changing the culture at city hall so that we can make it reflect our collective imagination of the city of our highest values and our highest ideals thanks to what we've all accomplished the league, us everybody in this room we have a full-throated collective voice in the elected mayor so that we can make ourselves heard I don't know about you but I'm hearing a lot of the same old same old up here I'm not sure the old guard gets it I think they need to hear from us about the Portland the Portland that we're experiencing the Portland we're experiencing people have multiple jobs and they're living stacked up like cordwood and substandard apartments to meet their basic needs our Portland is the Portland of working people who make this city go who make it vital, who give it style who make and enjoy art who pour your coffee, who bag your groceries by day I'm all for the creative economy but I want to make it work for regular working people Portland is in danger of becoming the coolest scene that never was because working people who make it cool you can hardly get a foothold in real economic development I'm promoting is getting a thousand of affordable housing underway in the first term for people who aren't eligible for subsidies right here on the peninsula so we can live sustainably downtown and support local businesses we can get behind that by creating a tax break for its creation and when we give that tax break we're required that those companies pay livable wage jobs to their employees most people in Portland I know don't have I'm so sorry you're out of time that was John Eater third candidate Nick Mavidonis your name your neighborhood and your occupation please thank you Nick Mavidonis I live on Chennery Street in the back cove neighborhood I'm the operations manager at Casco Baylines and what do you think will be your greatest challenge as mayor and how will you overcome it well I also want to thank all of you for putting this together this evening this has gone quite well not that I was skeptical but it has gone very well and to lucid stage as others have mentioned this is very good for the community and I really appreciate the ability to participate there have been a lot of good comments made tonight I think answering this question and as I've thought about it for me I'm thinking a little more outside of the city in terms of biggest challenge I've had the opportunity and probably there are only a few of you in the room to meet with the governor and the governor's policies have been interesting to say the least for the city of Portland and that is true of the legislature so I think one of the biggest challenges is going to be working outside of the city there will be challenges inside and many of them have been mentioned this evening but the mayor needs to strategically work in Augusta and you could spend a lot of time in Augusta and you could waste a lot of time in Augusta but I think I would be a mayor and I've shown this in my past experience not only as a city council and school board member I've been a union negotiator I've been the president of the main municipal association I've worked to bring people from different parts of the state together and I would do that as the mayor I would work on my time is up I have 10 seconds I would work to work with legislators in Augusta in a strategic way and the governor Thank you for your opening statements now Mr. Dodge could you do the honors please give it a good whack oh you're the last one if you break it it doesn't matter neighborhood development may I have the questions please alrighty neighborhood development is the category this question is from the audience this is for Richard Dodge what has your involvement been in your own neighborhood community my involvement in my particular neighborhood I've been there 22 years I've worked with a lot of the elderly and I was on the Portland housing authority commission with Mike as a matter of fact during that time across the way from us we have a affordable housing for people that have mental disabilities and such and we advocated for that back when they were building that and helping people get around the neighborhood I do think that we need to do something about the transportation system in our neighborhood especially we're not meeting those needs and I think that would be one of the things that I would address because there are a lot of low-income people that live out near us and the big metro buses are not cutting it so we would like to work on that okay that was Richard Dodge thank you very much and John Eater this question is also from the audience so much attention is placed on the peninsula how would you represent our other neighborhoods well I would focus the affordable housing on the peninsula so that we can support local businesses here in town and live sustainably but what I've been hearing from people who live off the peninsula they have a couple of issues that are important to them that are really important to me I've heard two things people would like a bus system that was more vital so that they could also live sustainably even though they live off of the peninsula one thing that I have been proposing for many years and have been working on is getting it and I would like to work with the schools so that we can make it so that kids in Portland who are in high school take the public transportation to school this is one simple way that we can build good habits that we can get more people riding the bus and that we build the future of public transportation in our city we know that it's not used very well and very effectively and this is one simple way I've never lived in a big city where the kids are bussed to school in high school they should be learning how to take the bus and this way we can make living off peninsula as well as it is to live on peninsula thank you that was John Eder and our third question in the category of neighborhood development is from Portland Trails this is for Nick Mavadonis as you know Portland Trails is a private non-profit organization that works closely with the city on many projects but it is not funded by the city with the city's elimination of a separate parks and recreation department a few years ago as to the remaining staff in the public services and public facilities departments how do you think the city can best support parks and trails in our community in both the short and long term good question from our friends at Portland Trails first of all I should tell you that I was not a big supporter of eliminating our parks and recreation department it had been done as I'm told 25 or so years ago it didn't work well at that time a council before me brought that back as a separate department and I think eventually in the long term that's what I would like to see happen we've talked about budget issues but our budget is where we set our priorities so the decision that we make as elected officials and I and other elected officials here have a record and you can look back and see what those decisions were but I would look in the long term to try to bring back a separation of parks and recreation as its own division in the short term we need to do things as we did last night at the city council meeting where we're renovating and actually there was a press conference today about it rehabilitating is the right word the Kochmar organ at the Merrill auditorium and that is being partially funded actually half of the funding is done through a fundraising campaign by the friends of the Kochmar the city is paying for half of that through a bond but we need to have partnerships and those partnerships are how we have to move forward with Xiaoming Oaks or it's a new park or a new trail out at Thompson's Point okay, thank you. That was Nick Navadonis speaking. And now, are we ready? Ready for the challenge? Okay, all right I think JohnOrder who are you challenging? cancel the plane, Nick who would you like to challenge? I'd like to speak with Councilor Ducen please Jill Ducen, please come up Jill, thank you for your service service. You're welcome. My pleasure. The question I have for you is the league and I supported an initiative for non-immigrant voting status because we believe there's no better way to welcome the new immigrant community into Portland than to give them voting rights in local elections because they pay taxes and they should be able to have representation in the schools and so forth in local elections. I understand my understanding at the time is that you are not supportive of that and I'd like you to tell us why that you don't support inviting immigrants into our conversation as a community. I fully support inviting immigrants into our conversation as a community and I go out to immigrant communities and engage in those conversations myself. I don't wait for people to come to me. I believe that voting it's okay for voting to be a privilege of citizenship so on that single issue I disagree with the position taken by the League of Young Voters and I didn't mince words or pander or pretend like I believed it or you know I was straight up about it. Thank you. Welcome. Okay that was John Eater challenging Jill Doosan thank you both. It's half a loaf. Okay for the remaining two candidates if you want to challenge here we go. Okay Nick Mavadonis who would you like to challenge? I can't believe I got to challenge someone. I'd like to challenge John Eater and I'll try to see if I get this right. More troubling than some of the things that the governor has said are some of the policies that have been towards Portland and on your website you say something to the effect that having a mayor with a long tenure in the legislature would seriously hobble the city. Could you elaborate on that thought and talk about how having a non-partisan elected official who would serve the city might better benefit? Well I think that me being a green, highest elected green thanks to the League in the nation twice thank you. I think the point that I was trying to make there that I wonder being a partisan Democrat how partisan Democrats are gonna go in the short run deal with a very staunch conservative Republican and how that might hurt our representation in Portland. I think that I'd be a much better person to represent Portland because we won't will just be two people relating as people not as oppositional party people and that's the point I was trying to make. Thank you. Okay that was Nick Mavadonis challenging John Eater. I've been told we do have time for a third challenge Richard Dodge. Did I break the plane? Who would you like to challenge please? Oh I'm gonna have to do Nick everybody else has. What's your question? My question is having been in City Hall 14 years and nothing has changed in fact it's got worse since I moved down here as far as businesses that have left town and the surrounding communities but you're telling us now that you've seen the light and now you're saying I want to bring businesses here I want to do this but after 14 years you haven't accomplished that and you your reasoning was well I was working with the City Council well I don't think the City Council is working at all so how are you gonna change that now? Well I would say that I think we live in a great city and I'm proud of the businesses that we have brought all you have to do is look I think in that direction to Thomson's point and you'll see something that I and I brought people together to talk about that our Councils unanimously supported that over the years I look around the city and I'm very proud of the businesses that have come here and all we really have to do I think is look in the last few months Portland has been ranked by the AARP as one of the 10 best cities in the United States for people to retire very impressive you also will take note that and I think it was Forbes but this is one of the 10 best cities in all of the United States for young people to come now there are a whole host of other indices one that I'm particularly proud of is that we on the sedentary list we are number seven where from the top we are one of the top 10 best cities in terms of people who get out and get active as I mentioned earlier we have a long way to go because we have one in every three children or child is is obese or overweight so I haven't seen the light in any way I have been living this doing this in my time on the City Council and we've brought a lot of good business here Portland is a wonderful city we've got all kinds of good things going and we have to keep that happening okay thank you those Richard Dodge challenging Nick Mabadonis we want to thank group five Richard Dodge John Eater Nick Mabadonis wow we did it we made it and want to thank all of the candidates very much all 15 candidates are here tonight to talk to you also before you go I just want to thanks again to all of our sponsors don't forget how great these institutions are in our community WMPG community radio Bicycle Coalition of Maine Maine People's Alliance and all of the fabulous neighborhood associations East Deering Western Promenade Riverton University neighborhood and Munjoy Hill and Libby town all those great neighbors and also a special thanks of course to Lucid Stage for hosting us tonight again I'm Suzanne Murphy from WMPG on behalf of the League of Young Voters thank you all very much for coming and for please remember to fill out and return your ballots to the people in the red t-shirts Portland is making history be a part of it goodnight