Mark Sloane - Candidate for 6th Ward - Position Paper

Mark Sloane

Candidate for Sixth Ward Alderman

Why I’m running:

·        I have the financial skills, managerial experience, community involvement and passion necessary to help move Evanston from good to great. 

My financial and managerial experience:

·        Chief Financial Officer  – 15 years

·        Certified Public Accountant – 22 years

·        President, Evanston Playground and Recreation Board, 2005 – 2006

 

My community involvement:

It’s time to:

·        At least 80 percent of the decisions made by the City Council have financial implications.  

·        The city’s Blue Ribbon Pension Committee specifically stated “Hindsight tells us that had more questions been asked, and more information been sought, city officials might have chosen to increase funding at an earlier time to mitigate the depth of the current crisis.” We need an alderman who can ask smarter, better questions – the right questions. I will be that alderman.

We need to:

1)      Prioritize our limited spending dollars.   

·        We need to adopt a zero-based budgeting approach to the city’s budget. In a 612-page budget document, it’s hard to distinguish which programs provide the most positive impact on the quality of life in Evanston.

·        The city appears to duplicate what our federal, state and county governments provide in order to be even more giving. Today, the city just cannot afford it.

2)      Have an advocate for recreation on the City Council. Increased investment in recreation is a must.

·        We have an ice rink in the community whereby the demand for its use far exceeds its ability to serve. We are losing revenue to other communities because of a lack of facilities. This facility also needs substantial repair and must be replaced.  

·        The city has just begun discussions with District 202 to jointly build a new field house at Evanston Township High School. This will provide badly needed indoor space for many sports. Its availability in the evenings and weekends will greatly increase year-round recreation facilities within the city.    

·        It is a proven fact that if you can keep kids busy in the evenings, weekends and over the summer, certain crime can be reduced.

3)      Manage and control development/redevelopment.   

·        New office space, which would substantially assist the retail establishments in downtown Evanston, hasn’t been built in years. It’s happening in other downtowns, why not here? We need to balance our downtown development and not just allow a few developers to mold us.    

·        We must require Performance Bonds, with the city as beneficiary, on all new developments. We need assurances as a community that once a project starts it will be completed in a timely manner. If it is not completed in a timely fashion, the city should have the right to step in and complete it. This should also be required on substantial residential rehabs. Neighbors should not have to put up with houses that appear to be in constant repair.    

·        All developments over a certain size should be required to perform a traffic study prior to issuance of a permit. If the development will result in substantial deterioration of traffic flow, dollars should be required to mitigate the deterioration.

4)      Create a citizens’ focused government moving from a “good” to “great” municipality.

·        I suggest we reduce the length of the resident no-parking ban for street cleaning. Street cleaning occurs by the same person in the same machine using the same route every other week. The city should know within a two-hour window when my street will be cleaned. Why inconvenience us all day when only a two-hour window is really all that is needed.    

·        Moving from good to great requires top level leadership. If we want to become a great municipality, the city cannot accept an Interim City Manager for as long as we have. We’ve had eight of thirteen senior managers leave within the last year or so. Have we filled them with good … or great replacements?

I urge you to join my campaign, help bring fiscal responsibility to our city, and help move Evanston from good to great.  Visit my web site at www.sloaneforalderman.com.

Please also join me for my campaign kick-off wine tasting on Sunday, February 15 at WineStyles 1741 Sherman Ave., Downtown Evanston at 4:00pm – 6:00pm.