CAMBRIDGE — Cambridge City Council candidates and the city’s residents flowed in and out of the Chesapeake Grove Intergenerational Center Saturday afternoon for a nearly five-hour candidate forum conducted by the League of Women Voters.
Ten of the 14 commissioner and mayoral candidates running in the Oct. 19 election were at the forum.
The forum was split into three sessions for the different races. Ryan Anthony of the Cambridge Spy, Sharon Smith of the Cambridge Association of Neighborhoods, Jim Johnson of the Dorchester Star and Jim Brady of WHCP moderated the forum.
Ward 2 candidate Jenna LeCompte, Ward 4 candidate Dave Cannon, Ward 3 candidate Frank Stout and Ward 5 candidate Brian Roche — who is running uncontested — were not at the event.
In an email to WHCP on Friday, LeCompte said she is “taking a step back” from her campaign and would not be at the event. She did not respond to requests for clarification from the Star Democrat on what that means.
MAYORAL FORUM
Sandwiched between two commissioner candidate sessions, the mayoral forum gave candidates Lajan Cephas, Andrew Bradshaw and La-Shon Banks-Foster the opportunity to share their perspectives on an array of Cambridge issues, from the waterfront, to revitalizing the city’s downtown, to race relations.
During the session, candidates were asked whether the city should get more involved in Dorchester County Public Schools, which is one of Maryland’s lowest ranked school systems.
Bradshaw said he would like to implement a mentorship program, which would reach across racial and socioeconomic lines, and encourage the Board of Education to implement a charter school program. He said charter schools across the state tend to perform at the state average, which is “significantly better” than Dorchester schools.
“And they are only located in counties and jurisdictions with poor performance,” he said, “so there’s corollaries where they can succeed in places like Cambridge.”
Foster, who attended the forum virtually, said every graduate from Dorchester County high schools is a county resident and could be a Cambridge resident.
“We cannot ignore the fact that whoever graduates from either of the schools that I mentioned can and will impact the City of Cambridge, and we must have an active role,” she said.
Cephas said it is important for the city to be “extremely supportive” of the county, but there is no need to “reinvent the wheel.” She said there are nonprofits already in place to address education concerns.
“So it’s extremely important that we understand what’s already in place, support those nonprofits that are already in place, and each of us just pick up a book and read to someone,” she said.
COMMISSIONER FORUMS
The seven commissioner candidates at the forum were split into two groups. All commissioner candidates were asked the same questions from the moderators.
Kicking off the event were Ward 1 candidates Brett Summers and Laurel Atkiss, as well as Ward 3 candidate Gary Gordy. Ward 2 candidates Jermaine Anderson, Shay Lewis-Sisco and Nancy Jackson, as well as Ward 4 candidate Sputty Cephas, closed out the event.
When asked about code enforcement and overall housing quality in the city, Summers said hiring tenant advocates to promote a tenants bill of rights would be beneficial.
“Because if the tenants feel like they can contact the city inspector and have them come out without fear of getting evicted or some other kind of retribution, then the tenants are empowered to improve our housing stock,” he said.
Atkiss said the city has implemented a software system to make it easier to enforce things like building code violations. She said Cambridge is doing city-wide building inspections and recently hired a new code enforcement officer.
“We’ve invested money, we’ve invested time,” she said, “and now we’re going to invest the manpower, and we’re going to start to see some results that I hope everybody’s going to be really happy with.”
Lewis-Sisco said code enforcement should strategically target houses where renters are living in deplorable conditions. She said community engagement should also be a focus.
“So that when code enforcement officers go out to a homeowner or a property, they are able to offer those additional supports or let them know what additional resources exist,” she said.
The issue of addressing crime in Cambridge was also brought up during the forum.
Gordy said improved lighting, more cameras and more monitoring of those cameras are needed in the city’s “hot spots” in order to lower crime rates. When talking about monitoring cameras, he brought up a shooting that occurred over the weekend.
“Because last night police got there so fast, but they couldn’t see who it was,” he said about the need for 24-hour camera monitoring.
Jackson said addressing the issue of crime in Cambridge might start with more than detaining people. She said she would work to help resolve those problems if elected.
“There is something deep where this person is committing these acts,” she said. “It could be the home life or it could be the environment.”
Cephas said strengthening the police department’s community policing division is important. He talked about programming for youth to attract “local and diverse talent” as another solution.
“Let’s do a cadet program to get some of these young people before they get out into the community and do wrong things or bad things,” he said.
Anderson said these problems have existed for a long time and won’t be a quick fix. He stressed the importance of being proactive and communicating.
When asked about the greatest threat to the city, both Atkiss and Anderson talked about the city standing in it’s own way.
“But the biggest opportunity is imagine if we get out of our own way,” Anderson said. “Think about the opportunity that would pose for this city ... how much of a difference that would make.”
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