EASTHAMPTON — The five candidates pursuing four at-large city seats on Easthampton’s City Council outlined their priorities at a candidate forum Monday night, with the main topics revolving around the municipal budget, visions for the city and what it means to be a councilor.
The candidates are incumbent Koni Denham running against newcomers Kiam Jamrog-McQuaid, Nathan Markee, Jonathan Schmidt and Karl Prahl.
A reshuffle on the council is looming, with Denham being the only incumbent seeking reelection meaning the Nov. 4 election will welcome at least three new at-large councilors. Jason “JT” Tirrell’s decision to run for mayor will leave his seat open, and current members Brad Riley and Peg Conniff will not seek reelection.
The forum, organized by School Committee Chair Laura Scott at Easthampton High School, sought to give voters a chance to hear from candidates before the election. A forum for the precinct council candidates will be held on Oct. 27 and school committee candidates on Oct. 26, both at 6 p.m. in the EHS auditorium.
On Monday, moderators Pat Brough and Kelly Fahey Brown read an introduction for each candidate, followed by candidates answering questions in alternating order, submitted from the public.
Introductions
Denham has served as a city councilor for the past four years. She is currently on the finance and ordinance committees, and has served a stint on the rules and government relations committee. She has been an educator for the last 30 years, having taught English as a foreign language with the Peace Crops, supporting the development of student advocates and preparing them for college. She remains committed to ensuring residents have their needs met, while supporting municipal employees to deliver services to the community.
Jamrog-McQuaid is a lifelong Easthampton resident, an economic and public policy researcher and affordable housing advocate. For the past four years, he has served on the city’s Affordable and Fair Housing Partnership advocating for zoning recommendations to expand housing options across the city, co-authoring the council’s resolution in support of state-level rent stabilization. Professionally, he works at the UMass Donahue Institute conducting mixed-methods, policy research and data analysis related to housing, workforce and economic development. He is running for a seat on the council to expand on his years of local advocacy work, hoping to make Easthampton a resilient and sustainable community.
Markee has lived in Easthampton for more than six years and is the chair of the Easthampton Democratic Committee (EDC), while serving on the board of directors for Easthampton Media, or E-Media. He is a self-employed artist and contractor, having been involved with progressive causes and candidates throughout his past. He is also a single father whose daughter is attending Mount Holyoke College.
Prahl is a small business owner of Underline Farm, using sustainable and regenerative methods after moving to western Massachusetts in 2016. Born in Iowa, he moved to New England to pursue organic agriculture development, after a short career as a teamster and UPS shop steward. Prahl is a fixture of local farmer markets, including Easthampton’s, and if elected, will bring the same sustainable mindset with a blue-collar perspective to the city.
Schmidt works at Easthampton’s Public Library in the youth department. For more than a decade, Schmidt has developed connections with community members through all walks of life. He is committed to public education, having been elected to the School Committee twice, serving from 2018 to 2021, giving him direct experience working in the city government. As a former member of the committee’s finance committee and current treasurer for both E-Media and the Easthampton Democratic Committee (EDC), he offers experience overseeing budgets of all sizes. Schmidt is excited for the opportunity to bring leadership, empathy and reason to the council.
Top priorities
Candidates were asked what their top priorities would be as a councilor.
Denham said within the context as a councilor, her responsibility first and foremost is to be a check on the mayor’s office and hold them accountable for the city. The second priority is making sure the needs of all residents are met, hearing the things that matter to them such as climate resiliency.
“For the last four years, I have served on the Finance Committee and in that time, I have held the mayor accountable by sending the school budget back to city council without recommendation, in order to make sure that our teachers and school programs were funded. I have advocated for city employee hours to be reinstated and I’ve advocated for Flock (security) cameras to be not installed,” she said.
Jamrog-McQuaid said the top priority is housing affordability, referencing that more than four in 10 renting households in Easthampton pay more than a third of their income on housing, and homeowners are struggling. It is also a priority to meet the actions of the city’s Climate Action Plan to create a more sustainable city for the future.
“We are now seeing tenants facing outrageous and sudden rent hikes of 30, 40 or even 50 percent — it’s unacceptable. This is a five-alarm fire and it should be a top priority for the city,” he said.
Markee said the top priority would be to collaborate with city councilors, acting as a pool of ideas for the city. Other priorities include protecting the green spaces of the city, including the aquifer, and making the community more walkable for all residents, especially to help alleviate traffic on Cottage and Union streets.
“I believe that if we work in tandem with the mayor’s office, with the school committee and with the larger community, that we can keep” going in a positive direction, he said.
Prahl said a priority is addressing the ever-increasing cost of living in Easthampton, by expanding municipal services. He said everyone is feeling the pressure of inflation and housing is only part of the picture to solve this, but services like trash disposal and electricity are needed.
“We need to start working towards municipal-owned utilities so that we can keep the lights on and trash picked up. These services will help create new streams of municipal revenue and will help keep those dollars recycled into the local community,” he said.
Schmidt said everything comes back to the changing climate and it is the existential crisis of our times. As a councilor, he would take a closer look at the Climate Action Plan, not just for creating a more sustainable future, but also to create preparedness for extreme weather events. Additionally, as an active school community member, public education must be a focus to help children succeed.
“The city has a Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness plan and I think that’s something that we need to spend a little bit more time with because it’s going to ultimately affect everything that we do,” he said.
Different perspectives
Candidates were asked how they have successfully worked with those who have differing opinions and how will they handle making difficult decisions.
Markee said as the chair of the EDC, while members agree on basic topics, there are still differences and he often takes criticism from other members and the public. He said he is willing to change his opinion if confronted with proper information but will also stay true to his beliefs.
“I’m not going to play the blame game, blame this councilor, blame that councilor, etc. and get into the muck with them … I like to level with folks, be plain and simple about it and stick true to my values with an open mind,” he said.
Prahl said as an elected representative, it is his role and duty to represent all constituents and that includes all of Easthampton, especially as an at-large councilor. He said he knows there will be people who dislike his opinions but he is here to do what is right, not what is popular.
“If elected, I will be making decisions based on my conscience as it regards everyone. We must remember that every voice matters … I will strive to listen to as many views and diverse opinions as I can. Sometimes that will mean siding with the majority. Sometimes that will mean siding with the minority,” he said.
Schmidt said as someone who works everyday at the public library, he meets people of all walks of life — people who are new or have been around, and people of different financial backgrounds. He referenced his time on the School Committee, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, which prepared him “for just about any criticisms I could possibly face.”
“We serve everybody equally,” Schmidt said about working at the library. “And it’s one of the things I really appreciate about my work and it’s a value that I will absolutely be bringing to the city council.”
Denham said it is her responsibility as a councilor to find common ground in a city of 16,000 residents, making sure they all feel heard. She acknowledged that she lives in the majority perspective and that it’s important to recognize when she is in the majority or the minority, referencing her work on the short-term rental ordinance.
“I have to balance my own interests and goals, with those where I recognize that others in the community have different end goals,” she said. “Within the context of that, I have to bring together a variety of different stakeholders.”
Jamrog-McQuaid said beyond voting on various issues, a councilor must be a bridge between the city and its residents. As a housing advocate, he has worked in the community with people coming from many different perspectives who do not always agree with the way he sees the world, and will stand for what he feels is right.
“I think most people involved at the local level though, are there because they want the best for the community. Recognizing that shared goal can be useful in forming a good, working relationship with people you may not agree with and helping not to take criticism personally,” he said.
The budget
When looking at the budget, candidates were asked how they would balance the needs of residents and the city.
Jamrog-McQuaid said while he does not have a lot of direct experience with municipal budgeting, he has studied public finance and nonprofit finance management in graduate school. The budget should reflect current priorities while responsibly stewarding prior investments. He hopes to utilize the professional guidance of the city staff who are “specifically trained and know much more about how our budget works and what the limits are.”
“The city budget should reflect our priorities while responsibly stewarding investments we’ve already made, like our schools,” he said. “When making any reductions or when trying to generate more revenue, we should ensure our priorities are being met to the best of our ability and protect the quality of services we provide.”
Markee said the budget is all encompassing, referencing ways to generate economic growth. He said alleviating road traffic and increasing walkability in the community will help attract more businesses to the city, increasing economic growth.
“I think by generating the economy through strategic planning around a walkable city, (an) environmental oasis … it would in general, generate wealth,” he said.
Prahl said this is a matter of expanding services in the city. Many essentials such as electricity or trash disposal are managed by private companies which pulls dollars out of the community. If these become municipal services, that will generate jobs in the municipal government, with a broader goal to lower the cost of living in the city.
“I think we need to look away from just property taxes and look at services as a way of generating revenue,” he said. “Property taxes continue to go up, if property values continue to go up and salaries do not go up to meet them … we’re going to have a lot of people who simply cannot afford to stay in this community.”
Schmidt agrees there is a lot to be said about pursuing public services and minimizing opportunities for private investments extracting wealth from the city. He said it will take time digging into the budget each year and working with department heads to figure out what is important to them.
“There are costs that we face as a community and the residential tax-base has bore the brunt of that. I’d be curious to see if there are other ways to explore creative sales tax opportunities,” he said.
Denham does not feel there is a dichotomy between the needs of the residents and those of city employees. The needs of residents are met by the services that the employees provide whether that’s through schools, public works, planning or health departments, they are not at odds with the residents.
“I want to stress that Easthampton is a working class community and many of our employees actually live in Easthampton. So if we were to cut their funding or cut salaries or anything like that, that’s an impact on their ability as well to live in this community,” she said.
Video of the forum was posted on the E-Media YouTube channel.