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All candidates were invited. The attendees included: City
Councilman Tyrone Riley, incumbent for District 1; Shaun
Strong , candidate for District 1; Tom Names, candidate for
District 5; Councilwoman Yvonne Harper, incumbent for
District 4, June Boyd, candidate for District 4; Toledo
Clerk of Court Vallie Bowman English; Tom Puffenberger,
candidate for Municipal Court judge; Stephanie Eichenberg,
incumbent for Toledo Public Schools board, and Sheena
Barnes, candidate for Toledo Public Schools board.
Candidate responses are listed in order of their first
response to a submitted question from the facilitator.
Councilwoman Yvonne Harper
“There aren’t too many things I would change about my
district, but let’s talk about the downtown parking. I
listened to the people because, but on November 1 the free
parking between 11:00 a.m. will be replaced with meter
payment. I do enjoy the activities that are held downtown.
When businesses come before Toledo City Council asking for
funding, I have questions. If you are a silent partner with
The City of Toledo, I question that. I’m not willing to sell
out District 4, because building a drug rehab is not
economic development.
Our streets are bad and we’re trying to fix them. However,
streets located in the suburbs are state routes, and the
state takes care of those routes. We must figure out a way
to work with the engineers, because the traffic is so bad
right now. We’re facing several problems, street conditions
are a problem because they are crowded, houses are being
built, there are sewers backups, and more. We are working on
all of that.
You can’t have it both ways. If you call the police to
settle something in your house, you must follow the law.
When the police stop you, the police are the judge and jury
because they run it. I personally got stopped by two white
police officers. One officer had his hand on his gun, and
the other was standing there trying to be rough. He pulled
me over to the side of the road. I don’t know if the officer
knew who I was when he asked for my driver’s license, but I
knew what was going on. I said that my purse was in the back
seat of the car, and asked the officer if he would grab it
for me or could I. We must deal with the police. It’s our
fault that our children aren’t responsive to orders. I know
that the police need more training and our parents need to
work with our kids. It bothers me, because it starts in the
home. There was a law that didn’t pass that would have
required police to live in the city. We lost. They offered
this to the police and sheriff, and they chose not to live
in the city. I think they should live in the city, but they
chose not to live in the city. When I used to work for
Municipal court, I had to live in the city of Toledo.
However, now they got around that requirement. Community
police has always been on the table for discussion. I would
love to see the police walking down the street.
Human Trafficking frightens me because it’s silent but
growing rapid in our community just like suicide. I came
close to human trafficking while working as a bailiff, we
did an eviction and saw four cages. I didn’t know what was
going on. Later we found out the cages were holding youth.
It is close to you. I need to be trained on how to recognize
it. We as city council should be trained on this and
suicide, also working with the police to figure out how to
recognize the signs. We also need those nosy neighbors. I
had an incident that neighbors called me about. There was a
gentleman selling cars on the street, people couldn’t park
on their own street. As a result, 21 cars were towed.
I have cleaned alleys, picked up trash and visited houses.
Once residents see that their city council person will work
with them, they support you. Serving as a councilmember is
not for the weak.
I will continue to work on Community Development Block Grant
and explain how you can get the money. The city receives
$7.2 million-dollars, but only $1.7 million-dollars goes to
the community. We need to work on that. I will continue to
work on absentee landlords. They come here, buy the
property, rent it, and the cycle continues. Third, I will
work on the Special Use Permit ordnance that Tyrone Riley is
working on. It allows us to have some control in our
community.”
Councilman Tyrone
Riley
“Councilwoman Harper was one of four councilmembers that
voted against the new parking policy for downtown. I think
the decision to eliminate the free lunch parking was a bad
decision, it will hurt businesses. Downtown Toledo will be
okay, even though business workers are complaining about the
decision. I say that because there will be an increase of
money coming into downtown, through grants and taxes. We
don’t want downtown Toledo to grow at the expense of the
neighborhoods. Downtown Toledo won’t be this great without
the neighborhoods.
I agree with Councilwoman Harper about the roads and
construction, you can’t have it both ways because we must
take the bitter with the sweet at this time. Residents want
roads paved and repaired, which means we’re going to have to
suffer for a little bit with the congestion. Certainly, the
engineering department must do a better job of routing the
traffic, but we must make sure the streets are repaired. If
roads aren’t repaired, that’s when you blame city council
and the government claiming we’re not doing our job.
Construction in some aspect is good, that means we have the
money to pay for the construction. We must ask the Engineers
and Department of Transportation to design a better way to
handle the traffic flow so people can get to where they want
to go easier.
The issues between the black community and police can be
bridged by educators and training. Educating must happen on
both sides, the police and the community. Educating on how
to respond when a police officer stops you and educate the
officers on what we as the community are looking for. This
breaks down to respect and not knowing the expectations of
each other. When the police enter a situation, they are
coming in to take command. If they stop my vehicle or an
average citizen’s vehicle, the first thing that a citizen
will say is ‘why did you stop me.’ That one encounter will
determine what happens next. Education must play a role on
how you respond because not every officer has the same
upbringing or experiences or that when you ask why you were
stopped it’s just a question and not meant to be
disrespectful. We must also understand what the law requires
if you don’t have a front license plate on your vehicle than
the officers have probable cause to stop your vehicle. If
it’s one or two o’clock in the morning coming from a crime
infested area or even a party, and don’t have a front plate
that’s probable cause.
We must have discussion like this to address and bring
awareness to human trafficking, inside our homes, churches
and schools. We must act, realizing the problem does exist.
There are so many young ladies that are exposed to human
trafficking and we must have resources available. Law
enforcement officers know where the problem is, like the
I-80 truck stop which operates as a human trafficking hub.
Let’s stop trying to control attitudes and just eliminate
it.
Neighborhood development has been mu mission, and one of the
best ways to increase that mission is through community
engagement. I have established five different block watch
organizations, that are called neighborhood improvement
associations. The residents who attend don’t want to be
perceived as snitching, but they are talking about
neighborhood problem solving. We established one at
Bethlehem Baptist Church, Zion Lutheran church, St. Paul
Church, and Redeemer Church. We must get the people out of
the government center and come into your neighborhood. Let
them travel down the same roads that you travel and see what
you see. That’s why they were established so we can work
together, neighborhoods and city council, to improve
neighborhoods. It’s working there is now an illegal dumping
task force.
I would like to continue to improve our educational system,
by encouraging and supporting it. The system has an impact
on everything that we do. We can’t improve technology
without those students learning those skills. Jobs must be
accessible to men who look like me, we must give jobs to
male so they can support these families and make a decent
living. This will also address crime. There is a correlation
between crime and education, black males are jailed at a
higher rate. A stable community and families are possible if
we address crime.”
Tom Names, candidate District 5
“The Toledo Mudhens announced they were relocating to
downtown Toledo and claimed that parking would be better
than the Lucas County Recreation Center. That promise wasn’t
kept. The new parking policy will cause problems for people
who visit the municipal court and disenfranchise people
visiting family court. I think if you pay a meter for
parking, you should receive a receipt. There are cities like
Ann Arbor and Columbus that will give you a receipt for
meter parking. There has been too much development and focus
on downtown Toledo, it’s too crowded. I would like to see
development move out of downtown, and into the
neighborhoods. Why does Levis Park deserve a $1
million-dollar improvement plan. All they did was tear it
down and rebuild it the same as it was before. I grew up in
New Jersey and have lived in Toledo for 24 years. I say that
because the traffic patterns are not bad here, you can jump
and travel from one side of Toledo to the other in 20
minutes. It’s amazing. It’s beautiful.
There is an issue with construction. One example is Monroe
Street and Secor. I mention those two streets because that’s
my district. It’s taken the entire summer to lay one mile of
pavement, Monroe and Secor is one of the busiest
intersections in the city. There isn’t an excuse for
construction workers to place the orange barrels out and not
complete the work in a quicker amount of time. I recently
attended a Wednesdays with Wade and listened to our mayor as
he spoke the streets, even with his plan and budget we may
not caught up to all the needed repairs. I’m still waiting
to hear back about a new plan.
I attended a meeting at the Frederick Douglas Center a few
months ago and the police’s outreach was wonderful. The
police also have an outreach program called, Explorers,
where students can prepare themselves to become police
officers. I hear the Fire Department is attempting to reach
out more to increase diversity and Interfaith Council of
churches is developing ways for people to break down this
adversarial conversation between citizens and police
officers.
While attending a block watch meeting, I heard a city
council officer claim that human trafficking is not an issue
in Toledo, but an issue on the toll road I-80 and I-90. I
disagree with that statement, in order to deal with human
trafficking, we must connect more with law enforcement to
understand what the signs of human trafficking are in our
neighborhoods. This can happen at block watch meetings. It’s
important that our neighborhoods are a part of the solution
in this problem.
If elected, I would address our water system. The water
system should be interconnected, so the suburbs who don’t
trust us can feed us water and vice versa. I would focus on
neighborhoods, fixing the streets and houses, making
neighborhoods safer, and encouraging kids to become
homeowners and job holders. This will keep people and
commerce in the community. I would also make sure that
special interest doesn’t move our views. City council spends
money and makes laws, but I would make sure that those two
functions don’t always address special interest but the
community at large.”
June Boyd, candidate District 4
“District 4 is a part of downtown Toledo, so I am interested
in the development of downtown Toledo. Let’s not forget that
downtown is also a neighborhood because residents live there
too. Even if you think that the elimination of the free
lunch parking is a bad idea, we need the money to improve
the neighborhoods. Take a moment to look at the central
city. There is a lot of crime and is the only neighborhood
that doesn’t have businesses like Little Ceaser’s Pizza, a
sports mall, and so many different things. If there are tax
dollars, we need to share those with every neighborhood but
especially the central city.
Everything that is going on in this country, including
cities and towns are a matter of black and white. Let’s talk
about the white police officer that shot the black man in
his living room, it was on the news. One of the key
witnesses, a young African-American man was murdered. So,
there is a problem. I want to encourage the word respect. I
would like to see more of your young men and women join
these local police force, but you must stay away from drugs
and clean. There isn’t enough of that being done.
Traditionally we used to have Caucasian fathers, sons, and
uncles on the police force. I was around when they used to
write dirty and racist things on the walls. It’s up to us as
parents and grandparents to start teaching these children if
you want to become a cop, you must keep yourself clean.
Stephanie Eichenberg, incumbent Toledo Public School board
“It is important that we are reviewing our own safety forces
that are hired for the schools. We want to make sure that
they have the training and building relationships inside the
school buildings with students. The safety officers that we
have are a diverse workforce, and I think that is a critical
piece because relationship building with teenagers is
important. I will never experience the fear that people have
talked about and can’t pass any judgement on that. I hope
that there are things that we can do to educate our
officers, one training that was conducted covered implicit
biases.
We’re fortunate to have the teacher of the year who still
passionate about the topic of human trafficking, and
teachers’ others in the district. She is focusing on
reaching higher risk students by getting the word out to
lower risk students. We have health centers at two schools
and mental health services also offered, that is an
important piece that allows us to screen signs of human
trafficking. It is about grooming, who’s associating with
our students, and even dealing with bad situations at home.
It’s important for those who interact and care about our
teens to know the signs, it’s important to have those safe
spaces like the health center where a student can ask for
help. They can receive support during the school day and
when they go home.
I agree with Ms. Barnes that we need to offer wrap-around
services to our students. I was at Rogers high school
visiting and saw children in the clinic waiting room. I was
worried about why the children were there, but than I saw
the mother. When mom is sick the entire home is sick, kids
need to get to school. We were able to provide health
services to that family so mom can get better. If our
families aren’t successful and we aren’t offering these
wrap-around services than we might not be able to help our
children. I would like to see health services and mental
health services grow. We have even partners with
OhioMeansJobs to ensure that parents have opportunities to
apply for jobs that are available. We also need to improve
our graduation rate, this is our number one deliverable. We
do have some fledgling initiatives within TPS including the
Student Voice, and Diversity and Inclusion. I would like to
see both become permanent and thrive in our district. We
need to hear and listen to our students and know what’s
going on. We also need to make sure we’re delivering
cultural relevant curriculum for our students and trainings
for our staff.”
Shaun Strong, candidate District 1
“Community policing is one issue that I brought up to the
police union. We should have community policing. Officers
should live in the neighborhoods that they patrol instead of
the suburbs. When they live in the neighborhoods that they
patrol, officers get to know their neighborhoods better,
there is less aspersion on both sides, and property values
may increase. Both sides will say that I don’t have to fear
you because you live down the street. They will begin to
come together, and crime reduction. People won’t try to
break in a property if they knew a cop lived in that
neighborhood. Stereotypes will decrease, and fear barriers
broken down.
Elected representatives should enact the people’s will. I
want to canvass, hold town hall events, and ask what they
think about issues that are presented before city council.
Once I hear back, it is my job to return to city council and
decide based on what the people want.
I would like to make sure that there are functioning block
watch group and neighborhood organizations, because they are
two separate things. A neighborhood organization has the
options to apply for a 501c3 and solicit dollars for
neighborhood improvements in their area and are tax
deductible to individual donors. There are several
neighborhood organizations within District 1 and ask each
neighborhood which they prefer a block watch or neighborhood
organization. When a neighborhood has both organizations
within a District, the neighbors can come together and
realize they have more similarities than differences. They
will become more committed to local government and local
issues with an increase in participation. I would also like
to work on an affordable housing plan, where people with
jobs can own a house instead of renting a house. If you’re
able to afford the house, you’ll have fewer issues with
landlords, dumping, or tenant evictions. Monroe Street has a
great neighborhood plan and I’m excited about it. There are
so many people who want to own their own company but may not
know how to write a business plan or seek grants. I want to
partner with organizations like the library, because we’re
better when we work together. I want to teach them how to
apply for grants or business plans to receive the funds to
start their own business or organization. These businesses
or organizations can than hire the community and decrease
unemployment.”
Vallie Bowman English, current Clerk of Courts
“I plan to increase technology in electronic records, this
will make the court paperless. The supreme court requires
that certain files are kept by the court for up to 50 years.
There can be 100,000 cases that come through the courts
every year, we don’t have a building capacity to keep those
records on site. We must pay for offsite storage and would
like to make those records completely electronic. That would
allow me to decrease the cost of storage, so I can increase
the pay of the workers at municipal court. It is hard for me
to compete for a workforce, when people can make more money
per hour working at Five Guys or Sam’s Club. The records
that we deal with are so important to our community, but we
don’t value our workers enough to pay them a competitive
salary. I would also like to increase access to the courts.
There are people in the community who believe the court is
inaccessible, like the attorneys or advice. I would like to
continue to encourage people by encouraging them to take
care of these things on their own. There is rent escrow, and
even small claims court. I have placed that information on
our website, so people have great accessibility. “
Tom Puffenberger, candidate Municipal Court judge
“Judicial candidates cannot talk about issues. There are
three things I would like to do with the court. I would like
to save the court money by cutting down on court
appearances. People may have to come to court six times
before their case is resolved, but I would like to change
that with just offering a pre-trial and a trial. It will cut
down on the number of court resources. I would have to check
with our current Clerk of Court, but I would like to see our
courts offer digital notices on cases instead of sending
people mail. Why not send a text message or email? That
alone will cut down on court costs and missed court
appearances. I would like to put that money towards
resources to help curve the opioid crisis going on right
now. It’s one of our biggest issues going on right now in
our city and extends to every area of the city right now. I
am not an expert in the opioid crisis, but I know that
people are. I would like to divert those resources that
we’re saving at the court to hiring more experts and
providing more programs for people who know what they are
doing in that area. The third thing I want to provide is a
domestic violence docket, it may not be feasible in common
pleas court. One problem we can help through a specialized
docket is a domestic violence docket, it’s done in Cleveland
where there are expects trained on how to deal with domestic
violence.”
Sheena Barnes, candidate Toledo Public Schools board
“The reopening and renovation of the new Mott Library and
Main Branch Library are beautiful because I work with
economically disadvantaged youth who don’t have computers at
home and may not understand how to research. Providing
accessibility to that demographic is amazing. We have events
going on in downtown Toledo that we are overlooking because
we want free lunchtime parking. Even though it is important
to some folks but look at all the development that we are
gaining that is benefiting our young people.
When we’re talking about harassment from the police, we also
need to talk about trauma that effects the youth. An
organization had a forum with police officers and youth. One
of the officers that looked like us that if you don’t dress
like this or behavior like this than you won’t get harassed.
That statement bothered me, as a community member who
advocates for youth and a parent. I have an eleven-year-old
who was riding his bike in the new neighborhood that we
moved into by the police. Let’s be honest when we’re talking
about police. It may even be uncomfortable for some folks.
Let’s be honest about the tone that Officer Amber’s trial
has set for African-Americans. I agree that we need classes
and education for the police officers. Officers should not
have demands from our youth when they are addressing them in
community forums. These officers should learn how to listen
to our youth. I work with some amazing young people, and
they still achieve.
I volunteer as a sexual assault victim outreach worker. We
need to start having honest classes, education about sexual
health, healthy relationships, and body respect. Human
trafficking continues because people think it’s a white man
in a van who is kidnapping kids. However, statics say, it’s
really girlfriends, boyfriends, and friends of students that
are recruiters. The youngest person that I have seen
personally was fifteen years old and conditioned because she
was human trafficked. Human trafficking victims are male and
females, sexual workers and migrant workers. It’s not just
the white girl in the shorts, but the African-American male
who’s cleaning kitchens.
I was shocked when I attended my last few school board
members, because I was only one of a few parents in
attendance. The school board meeting where the Lady Rams
received their award was standing room only, but afterwards
everyone cleared out. We are involved when we want to be
involved. School board meetings are at 5:30pm, when most
parents get off work at 5:00pm. The question is are we
providing that opportunity for parent involvement when that
occurs. Let’s use technology and smart phones, incorporating
live streams. Why not video record teachers during their
lunch break for ten minutes if they have a matter or topic
to discuss for the school board meeting, instead of asking
them to work all day and then attend the school board
meeting. We could look at holding meetings on the weekends
because I see parents at City League games, and Smith Park.
There is parent involvement.
As a proud TPS mom and advocate I am willing to work on
communication, equity and wrap-around services in TPS
schools. I should know more than four days in advance, which
school my child will attend in the fall. There should be
equity, so every child feels welcomed in our schools. These
students should feel restricted because of their zip code,
race or gender identify. There should also be wrapped around
services and connections with community resources. These
things are needed to move us further along and higher
education for all. Increase teachers, para-professional, and
minority para-professionals.”
The general election is November 5 at assigned polling
locations, and early voting is currently at 1301 Monroe
Street until November 4, 2019.
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