LYNN — Over the course of Thursday’s three-plus-hour candidates forum at the Community Brotherhood, sponsored by the Community Minority Cultural Center, issues of public safety and housing came up repeatedly.
Candidates for all elected Lynn positions got a chance to discuss issues pertinent both to their own domains and citywide. All nine School Committee hopefuls attended, and all but Elizabeth Figueroa (Ward 2, who had a death in her family) and George Meimeteas (Ward 3) were there as well. Of the councilor-at-large candidates, only Buzzy Barton was not in attendance. Both Darren Cyr and Jared Nicholson, who are running for mayor, took part.
Darrell Murkison from the CMCC asked the candidates to be respectful of one another, and while they all complied, the most fiery exchange of the night belonged to Ward 4 candidates Richard Colucci, the incumbent, and Natasha Megie-Maddrey.
“I go through my ward and nobody knows who you are,” said Megie-Maddrey to Colucci, hitting upon another theme that ran through the forum — access and transparency.
“People know how to get in touch with me, and I hold regular meetings,” Colucci said, in response to charges that he lacks accessibility to his constituents.
There was humor as well. Councilor-at-Large Brian Field and challenger Nicole McClain were paired together for their portion of the forum. Field asked McClain who she admired most of the 11 incumbents.
With Field sitting next to her, she said, “the Brians (Field and LaPierre),” which got a laugh from the audience.
Mostly, though, there were a series of discussions, moderated by Murkison. Due to the lateness of the forum, much of the mayoral portion of the night could not be covered by The Item because of the print deadline. However, both Cyr and Nicholson were asked their opinions on an unarmed crisis-response team (UCRT) that would assist law enforcement where appropriate.
“I can’t say yes or no on that,” said Cyr. “I don’t know enough about how it works in other parts of the country.
“It seems to me that whenever we’ve had problems of this nature, they have been taken care of,” he added. “Police officers have resigned. I do think there needs to be more training.”
Nicholson was unequivocally for the UCRT.
“Obviously,” he said, “we have to study the way it’s run in other parts of the country to see what we can take from them. But they’re being used, and they are helping.”
Housing continued to be a hot topic. What, Murkison asked Ward 3 candidate Coco Alinsug, could be done to better tackle what is growing into a crisis in the city?
“The time for talking is over,” Alinsug said. “The city has passed the housing production plan. We just have to work to implement it.”
All of the at-large candidates are on record as supporting the plan (it was passed overwhelmingly by the City Council earlier this year), but LaPierre cautioned that when it comes to inclusionary zoning (tying developers to a percentage of affordable units per project), it didn’t work that simply.
“If it’s private development, you have to wait until they come to the city looking for incentives. Then, you can be aggressive in trying to get affordable units,” he said.
Whatever the city does, it had better be soon, several of them said. The issue is becoming critical.
“There are people who live here who are afraid they are going to have to leave, because they cannot afford to live here,” said at-large challenger Marven Hyppolite.
Hyppolite also reiterated his stance that the councilors are spread too thin, and that all of them need support staff, even if it’s voluntary. And when his and Councilor at Large Hong Net’s session ended, he asked Net point blank whether he’d support such a move. Net replied that he would, with the caveat that they may have to be volunteers.
In the School Committee portion of the forum, diversity within faculty and staff at the schools was a big topic.
“Representation matters,” said Lennin Pena, who reiterated a story from two nights ago at a Zoom forum of how important it was to him as a sixth-grader to have Jeff Byrd as a teacher.
“He knew our lingo,” he said. “He looked like me. It made a difference.”
Sandra Lopez said that while diversity is important, it’s just as important to create conditions that will keep qualified minority teachers and staff in the city.
“They are going to go where the money is,” she said.
Challenger Tiffany Magnolia devoted much of her time giving an impassioned defense of mandatory vaccinations and wearing of masks for both students and teachers.
“This is a public-safety issue,” she said. “Teachers have to set the example. There are going to be people who cannot get vaccinated because of another health issue, but everyone else must be vaccinated for their protection. I am 100 percent in favor of this.”