Tuesday is Somerville’s primary election. This year, we are voting for Mayor. Joe Curtatone is looking to win his seat again in this election, but my vote is going to a different candidate.
Suzanne Bremer, a long-time Somerville resident, is taking a chance at it. A true progressive and someone with some ideas for positive change.
If you’re a Somerville resident, I am urging you to take a look at her (www.SuzanneforSomerville.org) and get out to vote on Tuesday.
Please share widely!
So how does Curtatone fall short of being a true progressive? For example, he was an early endorser of Patrick and back when I lived in Somerville, I seem to remember voting for him for Alderman at Large more than once.
and I was rather unimpressed.
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To her credit she does say, “Suzanne is opposed to improving the city’s financial situation through the sale of city property… The city’s long term needs must not be sacrificed for a short term cash infusion.” But she has no suggestions of how to solve Somerville’s financial difficulties other than “improve efficiencies and reduce redundancies”, which won’t make much of a difference.
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Furthermore, requiring that, “all future residential developments in Somerville at least 15% of the units should be set aside for affordable, family housing” isn’t going to do much about rising housing cost, since Somerville is fairly built up already. (It’s the densest city in New England, folks) In that same vain, how does she plan to get more open space? Tearing down houses? While Open Space an building more affordable housing are both good ideas, neither is particularly practical for Somerville.
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As the previous poster noted, Joe Curtatone is fairly progressive already and has done a good job the past four years he’s been there. At this juncture, with the State threatening to renege on it’s promises to Somerville, we need strong experienced leadership, not someone with good intentions but little grasp of how to actually get anything accomplished. I’m sticking with Joe.