As with nearly every other issue our community faces, short-sighted leadership has contributed to crumbling infrastructure—and there is no true plan to address the crisis. We currently fix 4 roads in each district a year that each alderman identifies. That’s not a sustainable or efficient plan. As alderman, I fought to safeguard new revenue streams into a protected fund that would solely fund road and infrastructure improvements. With these allocated resources, we will evaluate each road in the city and establish a comprehensive plan for annual street maintenance of our roadways.

As mayor, I’ll continue to fight for infrastructure improvements that make our roads, bridges, and pathways safer, and I’ll work with our Public Works Department and other local stakeholders to do more with less.

We also need to explore new partnerships and revenue streams. It’s time to redouble our efforts to apply for state and federal grants like the Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity funding, so we can make improvements that don’t create an extra financial burden for local residents. As mayor, I’ll be proactive and work with private stakeholders and neighboring communities to partner on ways that we can coordinate resources to improve efficiency and save taxpayer dollars.

Our city government needs to operate with one guiding principle: “We must do more with less.” A guiding principle neither David Goins nor Brant Walker know how to follow. Alton residents can’t afford to pay more in taxes, so it’s time to stop raising taxes and start looking for ways to improve efficiency. As alderman, I led the opposition to David Goins’ latest property tax increase attempt and we blocked it from happening. As mayor, I’ll task every department head with compiling a list of ways we can improve community services without increasing costs. And I’ll restore financial oversight as the lack of it from past administrations has allowed our government to carelessly spend without having a budget or knowing where the money is going.

While Alton faces the same challenges as many Illinois cities such as pension obligations and a burdensome tax environment, some of our problems are self-inflicted. Our city’s finance committee—the committee tasked with overseeing the fiscal health of our city’s government—hasn’t held a meeting since 1998! David Goins attempted hiking department head salaries to unprecedented levels, 33% in one instance that I opposed. It’s time to get serious about improving our city’s budgetary situation, and that starts with bringing back committee meetings that focus on long-term solutions.

When we need to “restore fiscal responsibility” to our community, this isn’t to say that we haven’t taken positive steps, but I believe that more transparency and visibility into city finances is a necessary first step to improving our financial situation. You shouldn’t need an accounting degree to know how your tax dollars are being spent, and as mayor I’ll make sure every resident has easy access to our city’s finances.

I still remember a time when everyone I knew was proud to be from Alton. We need to reignite this spirit by strengthening our neighborhoods. We know that close knit neighborhoods are safer, happier, and enjoy increased property values—yet recent administrations have done little to improve “neighborhoodization.” As mayor, one of my top priorities will be to deploy a comprehensive plan to foster “neighborhoodization” and increase our community’s desirability for middle-class families.

A strong community is filled with small, family-owned businesses. When I was growing up, my mom worked at a local family-owned restaurant, and that family-owned business was literally what put food on our table. I would drive down the street and see business after business of local small businesses. That’s not the case anymore. As alderman, I worked within the confinement of one of our existing TIF districts to execute a loan agreement for a business development which created over 100 temporary construction jobs, and upon completion, will create nearly 250 permanent full-time positions and 62 part-time positions. This type of creativity adds value to our town. As mayor, I’ll work tirelessly to promote and protect the family-owned businesses that are the backbone of our city. It’s time to send a message to the entire region that Alton is open for business, and this is the place where you want to set up shop.

When it comes to public safety, our first responders are doing an incredible job protecting our community, but our police department is currently being hamstrung by short-sighted leadership coming from city hall. Because the current administration isn’t enforcing existing city ordinances that would undoubtedly reduce crime, their inaction has led to certain areas of town requiring more police attention than ever before. As our police are forced to watch over certain areas, other parts of town are completely unsupervised and residents can’t get police service. Because city hall fails to be proactive and remove business and liquor licenses from places that regularly require police presence—our police department is forced to be reactive. As mayor, I’ll use every tool at our disposal to reduce crime hot spots and free up police assets to patrol the entire city.