NORTHAMPTON — With two weeks to go before election day, mayoral candidates Marc Warner and Gina-Louise Sciarra participated in two debates on Tuesday, laying out their positions on police department funding, attracting new businesses and shoppers downtown, and how to manage the needs of the city’s homeless population.
The League of Women Voters of the Northampton Area and Daily Hampshire Gazette co-sponsored a 7:30 p.m. virtual debate, and the candidates appeared live on 22News during the noon newscast.
During the evening debate, City Council President Gina-Louise Sciarra, a former Ward 4 councilor and chair of the council’s Finance Committee, compared her municipal government experience to that of Warner, a transportation analyst and founder of Warner Transportation Consulting.
“This is a pivotal time for Northampton. We don’t have time to get your sea legs and build up relationships,” Sciarra said.
Warner has served on Northampton’s parking and passenger rail advisory committees, as well as the charter review and charter drafting committees, which prepared the charter approved by voters in 2012.
“My run takes on an entrenched candidate, anointed by” and funded by the local political establishment, Warner said. “The city does need the professional background and the common sense that I would bring to the mayor’s office. … I have the right skills to do this.”
Warner criticized the City Council, and Sciarra by extension, for cutting the Police Department’s budget by 10% in 2020 amid nationwide unrest over the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.
“The idea of cutting the budget at one City Council meeting was a mistake. It was not progressive. In fact, it kind of gave progressives a bad name,” Warner said.
Sciarra said the decision took longer than one meeting, listing the dates of the Finance Committee and full council meetings that addressed the proposed cut.
“Anyone who was there can tell you it was neither quick nor one meeting,” Sciarra said, and the decision led to the creation of the Policing Review Commission, which recommended the establishment of the new Department of Community Care.
“I may be exaggerating (by saying) a single meeting,” Warner said, but he stood by his criticism that the decision was made in response to “loud voices” rather than careful deliberation about its consequences.
For revitalizing the downtown area, which is facing dual challenges of struggling small businesses and a persistent homelessness problem, Sciarra said she would support restoring the position of economic development director, which was cut from the budget at the start of the pandemic.
Warner said the city should spend some of its pandemic relief money on small business support. He said that, in order to improve quality of life downtown, officials need to enforce existing laws and ordinances against smoking marijuana in public, larceny, theft, blocking the sidewalk and “shouting your head off.”
“We have to be respectful of our shop owners, and the people that want to come to these shops,” Warner said. “This is our quality of life. It’s our retail, our restaurants” and the city’s economic base.
At the same time, Warner said, he supports the establishment of a Community Resilience Hub downtown, which would give the homeless a place to spend their time, store their possessions and connect with social services and affordable housing resources.
Sciarra echoed the importance of the hub, saying it will be “transformative” for many people’s lives. The city is working to identify a location for the hub.
Earlier in the day, Warner and Sciarra participated in a live television debate on 22News, moderated by anchor Rich Tettemer.
Asked about the Department of Community Care, Sciarra said she serves on the committee tasked with hiring the department’s implementation director. Neither she nor Warner committed to a particular funding level, but Sciarra said, “I have vowed that I will fully fund operations for FY2023” and ask the City Council for more money when necessary, while Warner said he would not fund the department by reallocating money from the police budget.
“I don’t think the police have a particularly bad relationship with anybody in the city except for the City Council,” Warner said, criticizing the council for making the decision to cut the Police Department budget by 10% last year. “It’s not just about being progressive in sound bites. It’s also about being responsible as a public official.”
Sciarra said she has spoken to police officers who are looking forward to the new department getting off the ground.
“This has been a very, very trying time, and we’ve had some necessary but tough conversations,” Sciarra said. “There have been some feelings and people are trying to figure out how to bridge that gap, but there is a great desire to come together as a community.”
Asked about the scheduled closure of the Coca-Cola bottling plant in 2023, Warner and Sciarra said they would work to find another bottling company to take over the space and to support the roughly 320 workers who will need to find new jobs.
“I really hope that Coke’s going to do well by them … and give them a decent severance. I’ll do everything in my power to make sure that happens,” Sciarra said. “We can’t lose that water revenue. I will aggressively pursue all options.”
Warner said the city should find out if other businesses are questioning whether to stay in Northampton, and identify possible “tipping points” that can be addressed before a business feels compelled to leave.
The candidates also detailed their ideas for expanding housing access at all economic levels, battling climate change and redesigning Main Street in a way that benefits all residents, business owners and shoppers.
The general election is scheduled for Nov. 2. Voters will see races for mayor, City Council at-large and in several wards, Forbes Library trustee and more. The deadline to register to vote has passed.
Brian Steele can be reached at bsteele@gazettenet.com.