RICK'S REASONABLE RESPONSE

1. Rick StarbardOctober 8, 2014 at 7:50 PM

   I decided to run for council for a couple of reasons. First, there is an open seat. I would probably not have jumped into this race if all of the incumbents were seeking re-election. Secondly, I decided to make the move from SC to council because we as a city find ourselves in a dilemma of balancing Net School Spending along with public safety and public works funding. If we cannot properly fund these three very important segments of city services, how can we expect to afford to continue on with a plan to replace our aging schools? Net School Spending is a mandate, period. For the city to try to maintain mandated funding levels for schools we have to balance it on the backs of other departments unless we grow the pot of available funds. The only way that we are going to be able to grow the pot is to stimulate growth. I think that I have the knowledge, business experience as well as educational experience to help stimulate growth in a manner that is beneficial to residents and businesses alike.
   I have always said that Lynn seems to catch the economic waves near the crest. The economy booms, folks begin to look towards Lynn as property values rise elsewhere for development and once the process and projects begin, the economy crashes and we never reap the benefits as they were planned. I believe that this is what happened to Lynn during the last two economic cycles. I truly feel that Lynn is finally poised to catch the next wave closer to the beginning than at the top. Part of the reason for this is that the city began setting the stage while the economy was in the tank. Regardless of how we may feel about how the chips fell on the casino decision, we can finally move on from that decision. We need to strategically look at how we develop our available space as we are only going to get one bite at the apple. As a commercial property owner in Revere and longtime business owner, I understand how important a strong commercial tax base is to a community and I want to be part of growing the commercial tax base in Lynn. The growth and funding of our city depends on it and the decisions made by our leaders during the next few years will have implications that will follow us for many years to come.
   If I am fortunate enough to be elected to the city council, schools and particularly new school building will always remain a priority of mine. In order to succeed in that effort we need to address our funding issues city wide and we must do it immediately. I have also had lengthy discussions with Mike Heffernan who is the Republican candidate for Treasurer. I asked Mike what his thoughts were if he were elected Treasurer and found himself heading up the MSBA regarding his views on the issues of aging schools in urban districts. I must say that I was pleasantly surprised by how much he knew about the challenges that we face in Lynn. He was very well versed in our NSS problems, the growth in our school populations, our aging buildings and our struggles to fund our portions of new school building if we were granted another even at the highest MSBA rate. He feels that while everyone should have “skin in the game”, the state should be funding urban districts like Lynn at a higher percentage of 90-95 percent for at least a couple of schools to help jump start modernization of school buildings in our cities. I will be bringing him around to a few of our schools, hopefully next week so that he can see firsthand how badly we need new schools. If Mike is not successful, I hope that whoever is in that position feels the same way as Mr. Heffernan.