I’m strongly in favor of option F: Expanding the council to 11 members by making more and smaller districts. That’s as big as the council can be by law and still have an odd number of members, both of which I think are desirable for a city council. The more districts you have, the greater diversity of voices you have, and the smaller the districts are, the more difficult it becomes to engage in gerrymandering.
I wouldn’t add any more at-large seats, though. With the mayor being a voting member of the council, I’m honestly not sure I see the point of having at-large seats in the first place. Obviously nobody’s going to vote to eliminate their own seats, so you’re stuck with the two that we currently have, but I don’t see why you’d want add any additional ones. So I think Option A, adding one more district, would be my second choice.
I’m not yet convinced that a downtown only district would be in DTR’s interest. Right now, in theory, you can get the mayor, 2 at-larges, and district C and D covering downtown. Wouldn’t a DT only district lessen our representation?
It’s still the case that the ratio of OTB citizens to ITB citizens is 2:1. Under one-man-one-vote, the districts will have to be sized about the same in terms of population. If we increase the number of districts, their representation will converge on the 2:1 ratio.
“There’s a whole group of us that whine really loud! Why doesn’t the city council just defer to us like they used to before our candidates lost the election? Well no matter, we will keep at it!”
LMAO. Good luck getting FOURTEEN THOUSAND SIGNATURES when probably barely that many people even voted in the entire mayoral race to begin with. IF they do get 14,000 signatures, what then would be their next step towards a recall?
Aside from Cox, Buffkin is the council member I’d lose the least amount of sleep over if he were to be defeated. Dude has stepped into it one too many times when it comes to racial issues, imo.
His biggest trippin’ through the poop fantastic moment was the whole planning commission kerfluffle in June that he bumbled into around ‘affordable housing and role models’. It was ready-made for the gotcha politics of today and he coughed out quite the hairball. He comes across as little wooden perhaps even Mayberry-esque but he champions what many from the district truly want for their neighborhoods. Seems more of moderate tap dancing around in uncharted waters in his first stint as a Councilor. I don’t think I’d lump him in with Cox but I do think more might be needed for district A based on it being a fast changing landscape and one of the primary frontlines of the ‘increasing urbanity’ versus ‘bucolic status quo’.
I voted for him last go around. Seemed better then the other options during that round. But I’m not married to him, and definitely will take a good look at other candidates in the mix for next election. I have heard things like this here and there, but not much detail.
I’ve been meh on David Knight over in E - it seems that he’s more of just following the other councilors and don’t really know what ideas he’s really taken the mantle on etc…
I agree with his final statement. Based on my research study of affordable housing solutions the best solution is to have mixed income housing developments like the one proposed at the city market. This is because this helps to improve racial equity and the quality of life as a whole, and most importantly allows funds for needed repairs to come from market value units, in theory.
This is his statement that I agree with: “Another benefit of having mixed incomes in these developments is you build a more healthy community,”
To clarify, the buildings that were built solely for affordable housing in a NYC boro I can’t recall are run down and have issues with crime, property damage, and quality of housing due to the lack of city funds. Let’s look at the raggedy glenwood towers as an example of rundown housing, I believe the council member is referring to as “only poor people’s housing” (this statement was insensitive).
I agree with his goal of not wanting to create slums, or ‘projects’ style developments. Or for affordable housing that turns into that. But he did not use the best choice of words while trying to make his point.
…and I think that is what people don’t like, and is what @Kevin et al. were talking about.
Quickly scanning through social media and op-ed chatter, I think the subtext for people who were pissed by Buffkin’s comments is that people are worried that it could be a sign for worse problems in the future. Even if he has the right intentions, I think they’re saying the councilmember is at risk for making ham-fisted policy choices that end up causing unintended consequences that harm current and future AHU residents.
This Indy essay is one example of looking through that lens: