PLATFORM FOR MAYORAL CANDIDATES

July 2, 2007

I like John Willingham and by chance I met him recently at Kinko. He gave me a copy of his platform on which he is running for Mayor. What a great list of ideas. I wish all the candidates for Mayor would publish their specific platforms instead of just the normal GOD APPOINTED ME, VOTE FOR CHANGE, HONESTY, INTEGRITY, LEADERSHIP, ETC.

The voters need to know if the candidates have any real ideas for meaningful change. Look at what he proposes.

Immediate Actions
• Audits of City of Memphis and MLG&W
• Recall Our City’s Tax Debt Collection from Linebarger and place same with Bob Patterson and save $5 million a year of tax payers money
• Properly fund Police & Firefighters so they can fight Crime in the streets and gangsters in our schools
• Appoint Bill Crawford as president of MLG&W to restructure operation and reduce utility bills

In addition, he would he would offer resolutions to the City Council to
• Set Term limits as 2 terms for the Mayor and City Council members
• Reduce Mayor’s Unlimited Contract Authority to $75,000
• Increase MLG&W board of directors from 5 to 9 with citizens electing 4 board members
• Citizens would elect the Director of Police, Fire and the City Treasurer
• Limit Mayor’s patronage appointment authority to 80 positions as opposed to 300 at present
• Call for 18 month Pilot Moratorium
• Save Mid-South Fair Grounds
• Make the Empty Pyramid a priority by reissuing an RFP for open proposals
• Convert Sears Tower on Cleveland to a Tech School for Gifted and Creative students
• Public School Architecture to be standardized to save money over the costly schools being built now and in the past which has caused such a huge public debt
• Reinstate Neighborhood schools to reduce cost of busing
• The Pidgeon Properties, 4000 acres should be developed, leased or sold by the City for an Industrial Park to create new jobs
• All Bond Issues would be publicly offered and bids opened publicly as opposed to the special deals now where friend of the Mayor benefit

I would add several more.
• Change the City Charter to state the following. Require voter approval for any property tax rate increases. Tax bills for individual homeowners could still increase as home values rise.
• PENSION REFORM- the January 2001 pension change has cost millions of dollars to date and will go on costing millions more as these elected and appointed officials retire. Since hardly any of the taxpaying public has a defined benefit pension plan anymore, a defined contribution plan should be instituted in the future for all newly hired public employees.
• OPEN RECORDS- Only by putting all important contract bids, purchase orders, personnel salaries and benefits on the internet and by making open records access easier, can we keep the sunshine on government practices which politicians like to conceal. The current no bid purchase orders given under the ACS contract shield is an example of gross abuse and lack of transparency in bidding and awarding contracts.
• Require all local political candidates to publish their required election commission documents concerning contributions and expenditures in electronic spreadsheet format so that a data base could be made to reveal who and how much they contribute to each candidates.
John Willingham may not win, but he has earned my respect as a candidate who is honest and is not afraid to state his platform for positive change. The other candidates should do likewise.