|
“The political difference
is in how we spend the tax dollars,” says Hicks-Hudson. “Our
community is strapped and we need state help.” She notes
that the post-recession trend towards low-paying jobs, the
reduction of federal funds and the state funding cuts
brought about in an effort to balance the Columbus budget
have placed an increasing strain on the ability of local
officials to bring about significant change.
Local politicians, she
says, now have to prioritize how tax dollars are allocated
and, when dollars simply aren’t available, create innovative
approaches to dealing with issues.
“We have to be fiscally
responsible and good stewards of taxpayers’ dollars,” says
the city’s first female African-American mayor. “We have to
decide how we are going to fund this city. No one likes
taxes – that’s a dirty word; no one likes lay-offs – that’s
a dirty word.”
For Hicks-Hudson,
therefore, a range of administration-generated initiatives
make sense in the current economically-challenged
atmosphere.
It’s critically important
to attract to Toledo companies and developments that can
provide living wage jobs, she says. “That’s what I want to
go after.”
Clearly such jobs will
help with a range of problems, she notes, such as
neighborhood safety. Her predecessor, Mayor D. Michael
Collins, a former police officer, viewed the issue of
neighborhood safety primarily as a function of increasing
police and fire department presence. Hicks-Hudson sees that
issue more as a matter of “getting people to work and
earning a living wage.” Jobs create financial security and
limits the idleness that can cause or exacerbate
neighborhood problems.
A government can provide a
platform for development insists the long-time Democrat, but
there are impediments that exist in this day and age. Those
impediments, for example, include the funding problem and
state restrictions on the ability of municipalities to
effectively deal with abandoned properties.
“That’s more than a local
problem,” she says of the blight of abandoned properties
that plagues Toledo. “There are so many outside property
owners who have walked away from properties. We are
advocating for a change in state law to be able to place
such properties in forfeiture.”
If the city could seize
such properties and then provide no or low interest loans to
help people fix them, that would go a long way, Hicks-Hudson
believes, to solving one of Toledo’s most pressing problems.
For the new mayor,
ascension into the chief executive’s seat has been a
life-altering experience. Her private moments have been
abruptly curtailed to be sure. “The town is always open, the
phone is always beeping.”
On the other hand, she
clearly relishes the opportunity to make a much bigger
difference than she ever could have had as a city
councilperson.
“There are projects and
ideas that we in this city of Toledo need to do and I’m more
in a position to help do those things,” she says. “I’m
learning a lot about government that I think I can help
fix.”
One of the things that
Hicks-Hudson found herself in a position to help,
immediately upon assuming office, was the negotiations with
Fiat Chrysler to keep Jeep in Toledo. “They are reviewing
the proposal and we are waiting to hear,” she says. “We gave
it our best shot and it’s a great partnership between city,
county and state. We’ve done all we can do at this point.”
In view of that greater
opportunity to help her adopted hometown, Hicks-Hudson
recently announced her decision to run for election to
complete the mayor’s four-year term. Should she win in the
November election, she will be in office until early January
2018
She announced her decision
at the site of a neighborhood swimming pool – a site that
has been the source of contention between the former mayor
and City Council. Hicks-Hudson agrees with the former
mayor’s desire to see the structural neighborhood issues
solved - such as filling pot holes. On the other hand, she
believes that areas such as pools can be a huge benefit to a
neighborhood.
“I see healthy
neighborhoods when people can recreate – that is also a
necessity,” she says. “Places where one can take a breath.”
Taking a breath is clearly
something the mayor will not be doing anytime soon. Between
adjusting to her new position and the need to conduct a
city-wide political campaign, Hicks-Hudson own ability to
take a breath and a grab little recreation will have to be
put on hold for a while.
|
