As Baltimore voters prepare to elect the city?s next mayor, the candidates have much to say. Crime, taxes, schools and jobs all rank high as priorities, and each candidate has his or her own take on how to make the city a better place to live.
To give voters a sense of how the 2007 contenders for the city?s top job would tackle the challenges of running Charm City, Examiner Staff Writer Stephen Janis sat down with the candidates and let them make their case. Candidate Elbert Henderson did not return phone calls for comment.
Mike Schaefer
» Age: 69
» Current job: Real estate investor
» Best known for: Being the perennial candidate
» What he brings to the table: A good relationship with former Mayor William Donald Schaefer
» Quotable: “I have serious ideas.”
Accuse Mike Schaefer of running on the name of one of state?s most famous political last names, former Baltimore Mayor and Gov. William Donald Schaefer, and you will get a sharp response.
“That?s just to get my foot in the door,” he said. “I?ve been a city councilman in San Diego and a prosecutor,” he said. “But I have serious ideas.
Indeed, Schaefer is the only candidate promoting a commuter tax.
“Every non-city resident who comes into the city to work will pay either a half a percent of their salary or a minimum of $100,” he said. “We could raise $50 million dollars.”
The 10-year Baltimore resident also thinks the city should raise police officers? salaries and would use the commuter tax to pay for it.
“We should have a minimum first-year salary of $50,000,” he said. “We?re losing too many officers to the county.”
As for the man whose name netted a fifth-place finish in the state?s Senate race in 2006, Schaefer said the former mayor has given him his blessing.
“I asked him if he minded if I got into politics and he said no.”
Keiffer Mitchell Jr.
» Age: 39
» Current job: City councilman
» Best known for: Trying to block the convention center hotel
» What he brings to the table: City Council experience
» Quotable: “We need to end cronyism in the city.”
Despite carrying the name of one of Maryland?s most famous families, City Councilman Keiffer Mitchell said the family legacy is not the reason he?s campaigning for the city?s top job.
“I?m not running solely on my last name, I?m running based on my record,” he said. Fighting corruption will be one of his top priorities.
“We?ve got to end cronyism in the city, the idea of pay for play,” Mitchell said. “It?s costing the city millions of dollars. The process is being abused.”
Mitchell said he would eliminate two positions from the Board of Estimates ? the body that governs city spending ? limiting it to independently elected officials: mayor,
comptroller and council president.
“It diminishes the power of the mayor,” he said, “but it needs to be done.”
Mitchell said he would conduct a full independent audit of all city agencies. “I know we?ll find we?re wasting a lot of money in ways we don?t know.”
Improving the city, Mitchell said, requires improving schools.
“Mayoral control of the schools is the only way to fix the agency,” he said. “Someone needs to be held accountable.”
Critics say Mitchell?s campaign is short of funds and passion, a characterization he disputes.
“Wait until August when we have to report [campaign finances], then people will see I?m doing fine,” he said.
Andrey Bundley
» Age: 47
» Current job: Administrator at Baltimore City Public Schools
» Best known for: A strong finish against Martin O?Malley in 2003
» What he brings to the table: Experience as an educator
» Quotable: “That?s where the problem is, in the neighborhoods, and that?s where I?ll be.”
A mayor should be in the streets ? literally, Andrey Bundley said. The reason?
Too many city residents are “disengaged,” he said.
“We need to re-engage the people,” Bundley said.
“[Nearly] 50 percent of the city?s population is unemployed,” he said. “If we don?t fix that problem and get people working, policing plans won?t matter.”
To realize his vision for the city, Bundley has developed a neighborhood-centric plan that emphasizes Baltimore?s network of 256 community associations. Bundley said he would put City Hall on wheels.
“There will be a mobile mayor?s office,” he said. “The mayor should be mobile and in the neighborhoods, and I will be.”
Bundley said he would equip a Winnebago with all the accoutrements of a mayor?s office.
As mayor, Bundley would use the same philosophy to extricate the city from what he believes is a crisis.
“That?s where the problem is, in the neighborhoods, and that?s where I?ll be,” he said.
Critics say Bundley?s chances are hurt by the same lack of financing that plagues Del. Jill Carter. But Bundley, who in 2003 garnered roughly 33 percent of the vote against former Mayor Martin O?Malley, said Dixon?s financial advantage is not insurmountable.
“If a candidate is dependent on money from a few businesses, then he won?t do the people?s business,” he said. “I will depend on the people for my vote, and I will serve their interest.”
Jill Carter
» Age: 43
» Current job: State delegate
» Best known for: Fighting the city?s mass arrest policy
» What she brings to the table: Experience as a state legislator
» Quotable: “You can?t leave the rest of the city behind.”
State Del. Jill Cater takes exception to people who say Baltimore has improved. To her, opponents Keiffer Mitchell Jr. and Mayor Sheila Dixon are responsible for the decline of a city she has called home all her life.
“I look at Mitchell and the mayor as one and the same ? they have no vision and are invested in failure.”
That?s why Carter, the daughter of famed civil rights activist Walter P. Carter, says the city needs radical surgery.
“The leaders of this city do not have any integrity,” she said.
Carter believes both mayoral control and an independently elected school board will improve city schools
“I?ve sponsored legislation to accomplish both and received no support from anyone in the city, including Keiffer Mitchell,” she said.
She advocates assembling an advisory board of former police commissioners to construct an effective crime-fighting strategy.
“These people understand the community and understand policing,” Carter said.
Spreading the wealth from downtown to midtown will be another priority. “Politicians have focused too much energy on downtown and benignly neglected the rest of the city,” she said. “You can?t leave the rest of the city behind.”
Sheila Dixon
» Age: 53
» Current job: Mayor
» Best known for: Becoming the city?s first female mayor
» What she brings to the table: Served in the City Council from 1987
» Quotable: “I?m not a person who is going to run away.”
Being the mayor is not an easy job, Sheila Dixon says ? especially when you have to run a campaign at the same time.
But while the former city school teacher and City Council president has faced several crises in her six months in the top job, she is still thinking long-term.
“You need to change the mindset to change policy,” she said. “That can take 10 or 15 years.”
Fighting a bureaucracy that is often unresponsive, Dixon said, is one her biggest frustrations.
“The Department of Public Works has seven layers” of supervisors, she said.
Dixon also thinks racial discrimination has hampered many city agencies, including the police and fire departments. “That is something that has to be dealt with.”
Dixon says she thinks the city?s violence is a complex problem that needs long-term solutions.
“It?s very frustrating,” she said.
And she said change in police personnel might not be limited to the top.
“Sometimes you need a change in the middle, too,” she said.
A. Robert Kaufman
» Age: 76
» Current job: Retired
» Best known for: Socialism
» What he brings to the table: A lengthy career as an activist
» Quotable: “It?s not a war on drugs, it?s a war on drug addicts.”
Bob Kaufman makes no apologies for running as a socialist. Since 1947 he has protested against discrimination and for workers rights.
“It?s the job of a socialist to unite the 95 percent of the people that do not share in the wealth,” he said.
Kaufman, who suffered debilitating injuries after he was robbed and beaten by a drug addict in 2006, says he believes the war on drugs has to end. “It?s not a war on drugs, it?s a war on drug addicts,” he said. “It?s because of the war on drugs I lost my kidneys.”
A drug-selling zone, where people could buy drugs under the supervision of the city, would be one of his priorities as mayor.
“It would be a red-light district for drugs,” he said. “You run it like a flea market, dealers would pay $20 for your table space.”
Focusing the drug trade in one part of Baltimore also would allow the city to provide services to addicts.
“The health department could come in make sure they?re not selling talcum powder instead of heroin and the dealers won?t have anybody to kill,” he said. “The department of sanitation could be there, and there could be recruitment for various treatment programs.”
Seeking help from the federal government would be another priority for Kaufman. “We need a job program much like we had the in ?30s,” he said. “We need to give people opportunity.”
Frank M. Conaway Sr.
» Age: 74
» Current job: Baltimore Circuit Court Clerk
» Best know for: His tenure as clerk
» What he brings to the table: Perspective
» Quotable: “The shoe has a bullet hole in it.”
At 74 years old, Baltimore City Clerk of the Court Frank M. Conaway Sr. says he “will be an old-school style mayor.”
“There will be police walking the beat in uniform and there will be no door policy at City Hall ? people can just stop by,” he said.
The former state delegate said he would give the Police Department an overhaul.
“If homicides are going up, then why should you keep the same management?” he asked.
This is not the first time Conaway campaigned for mayor. In 2003, collecting 924 votes as a write-in candidate in the primary won by Gov. Martin O?Malley. But Conaway points to his success in two citywide elections for clerk of the court as proof he has the ability to win big.
“I received the second-highest total of votes ? 15,000 ? in the city in 2006,” he said.
Conaway said he is running to bring common sense back to City Hall.
“How can you spend $37 million on overtime when you say you?re short police officers? Think of all the people we could have hired with that money,” he said.
Quick with incendiary quips, Conaway kicked off his campaign holding a woman?s red shoe, a not-so-thinly veiled reference to Mayor Sheila Dixon?s infamous 1991 City Council speech where she brandished a shoe to symbolize a change of leadership in the council. But Conaway?s shoe had a different look.
“The shoe has a bullet hole in it,” Conaway said. “It needs to be fixed.” “I don?t tell people what they want to hear. I tell them what they need to know.”
