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I'm Mark Sudall. Welcome back to Power and Politics. We continue our conversation with the candidates for mayor of Stanford. Thank you again for being with us, and Mayor, let me start with you, affordable housing. Sure, affordable housing is a core priority for my administration because so many people are struggling to afford to live in our city. So one of the first things I did was sign an executive order on affordable housing with the goal of completing over 1000 affordable new units or upgraded units for our residents over the next several years. We have 637 units in the pipeline, and that includes everything from upgrading units at Stanford Manor, which is a low income senior housing facility for seniors who haven't had their units upgraded in decades, uh, to building new workforce housing near transit hubs so our workforce can afford to live in our city. Uh, but we still have significant work to do to make our city more affordable and to create more pathways for affordable home ownership, and we've included a lot in terms of policy changes. We've required developers to add more below market rate units. Uh, we've also dedicated funding in our city capital budget for the past 4 years to subsidize the cost of more deeply affordable family housing units and. Uh, one of my favorite parts of the job is when I get to visit with residents who live in these units and to see the smiles on their faces that they have a safe, healthy place with a roof over their head to live in our city, so affordable housing. So the the Stanford has the uh below market rate housing program and the Affordable housing Trust fund. So there's a fee and lie process here because when these developers, we need to hold these developers accountable because there's a fee and lie process here. So when they develop a building, say it's uh 100 units in the building, 10 of those are supposed to be going to affordable housing. So what they do sometimes is they pay a fee and lieu and that goes into the Affordable housing Trust fund. So I'd like to see more transparency in that fund and see are we actually getting the right dollar value for this fee and lieu process. So I think that's hurting, uh, some of the affordable housing issues in Stanford, and I'd like to see, as we know, I'm one of the big map chart persons, is how many affordable housing. I think we have 1300 affordable housing units now, but I'd like to see how many are in the pipeline because there's 7,333 units being built in Stanford in the pipeline now that are that are approved by the zoning board and the planning board and how many of those are affordable housing. So how many do we have now? How many are we building, and how many do we need? Talk about traffic and public safety. Traffic and public safety, that's another great subject that I like to talk about is, uh, I drive down Stanford. I'm a contractor in Stanford, so I'm always on the road driving to various towns, and Stanford downtown is very congested, um, so what I like to do is since we have a surplus and hopefully I'm, I'm asking the mayor this if whoever wins is we have a surplus of, uh, I think it was $34 million from 2023. Um, but anyway, well, what I read was 34 million was a few million, but what I like to see is traffic enforcement officers downtown Stanford just in those major hubs on Broad Street, Summer Street, Washington Boulevard, and Bedford Street. So that makes the, the people feel safer, the pedestrians feel safer. It helps traffic flow better. It's just, uh, it's just a good all around for a few $100,000 which is a small amount in our, in our large budget, uh, for a few 100 $000 like she's traffic enforcement officers, and that helps traffic flow better and it's part of public safety along with, uh, you know, sidewalks, better sidewalks in the downtown Mayor, can we alleviate traffic? Sure, uh, well, one of the key things we need to do is invest in alternate modes of transportation because people are so reliant on their cars to get around, not just in Stanford but across our state. So one of the things we've emphasized is investing in more pedestrian friendly infrastructure, uh, building more sidewalks and making our city more connected and walkable. Uh, we worked with the state to secure more funding for the CT Transit bus system. And we're also making a huge investment in the Stanford train station. The new parking garage is up and we're now working with state DOT on the rebuild of the station itself, uh, but I also want to touch on public safety because I'm so proud that Stanford is ranked the safest city in our state, the safest city in New England thanks to the hard work of our dedicated police fire and EMS. Officials and we've made consistent investments in public safety over the past 4 years to earn those rankings whether it was adding additional fire chiefs we have a proposal right now to increase our police force to 300 officers or whether it was improving response times to our 911 call center which is now answering calls within 10 seconds. 95% of our calls are answered before that. How about um economic development and job growth. Sure, well, Stanford really is one of the economic engines of the state. We have a high concentration of Fortune 500 and 1000 companies, uh, ranked one of the top cities in the country for the number of corporate headquarters, and we also have a robust ecosystem of small businesses and startups and a record number of new businesses coming to our city, uh, but we still have work to do. uh, so many are still struggling with the high cost of living right now, so. Uh, my job is to make our city a more business friendly place, and we've worked to do that through initiatives like opening up our first walk-in permitting center to make the permitting process easier. We've launched a small business grant to provide better access to capital for businesses. I've created a major business advisory council and we've created new job training initiatives so that we can create things like a tech talent pipeline to fill unfilled jobs in our city, uh, and to support our economy. Nick, how about economic development? I know the mayor has, uh, uh, her open portal on the, uh, for the building permit process, but I'd like to see the whole town hall open. A lot of the departments are still closed. I'm a, I'm in construction. I'm a builder, so I go to a lot of different towns across Fairfield County, and they're all open except for Stanford, um, and being in construction. Uh, what I like to see is some of these existing buildings without building new buildings, some of these existing buildings trying to, uh, green certify and green update their building which adds which adds jobs for the construction industry, helps the building owners save money, um, creates a higher value building because it goes, uh, raises the taxes will be assessed higher but then give them tax incentives to, to green certify some of these buildings, you know, solar, wind. Uh, whether it's, uh, changing their outdoor HVAC equipment for high efficiency equipment, things like that, and retail, bring back some of the retail. We have some, uh, underutilized buildings in Stanford. We can create retail hubs for small business owners that can that need to 20 seconds. Why are you running for mayor? Why am I running for mayor? Nicole Laarzia has been born and raised in Stanford. It's kind of a culmination of my political career being on the board of that. I've been involved in community service for 30 years. I've been on so many different charities, and I've enhanced and improved, like I said, dollar for scholars. They were raising $10,000 a year when I joined the board, it was $100,000 a year. So I've improved every entity, why are you running again. I love the city of Stanford. My husband Art and I are proud to be raising our 4 kids here, and it's been an incredible honor to serve as mayor in the past 4 years, and I want to continue the momentum that I started in my first term and continue to work hard every day to deliver results for the people of Stanford and improve quality of life. Thank you both. Thank you so much.

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At the state Capitol this week, activists participated in an immigration rights march, asking Governor Lamont and state legislators to do more to support immigrants. Protesters want stronger efforts to ensure immigrants are safe from federal enforcement measures. Advocate organizations are asking officials to safeguard personal data, courthouse access, prevent indirect ICE support, and maintain husky coverage for all. If we can do it, if we can save one child from losing their parent, if we can keep kids in school, we should do it. Protesters are also asking lawmakers for a special session to address these issues. The electric vehicle market could take a big hit after the expiration of a Biden era federal tax credit, the $7500 credit applied to new EV purchases. Auto experts say EVs typically cost more because of the expense of making EV batteries. In August, the average transaction price for a new electric vehicle was more than $57,000. Experts say automakers may be forced to lower their sticker prices. What automakers will likely do is offer some vehicles with a reduced battery, meaning that the range isn't as long, but the price isn't as high. In the long run, I think it's going to make electric vehicles better because they now have to compete on an even playing field in terms of value, features, durability and longevity. And if you're looking to buy an EV, experts recommend asking about charging stations for your home. Governor Ned Lamotte was in Stanford this week touring Right Tech. He learned about their exploratory program which encourages freshmen to find new interests and pathways in high demand trades like electrical and plumbing. We have a lot of old buildings and old infrastructure. We need the trades. We're rebuilding the state of Connecticut, and I told the young people here at right, there's a guaranteed job for you at the backside of this education. Now students participated in a round table discussion with the governor talking about the benefits of getting a diploma and a certificate in a trade. But that's all our time. I'm Mark Sudall. Thanks for watching.

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Mayor Caroline Simmons and Republican candidate Nicola Tarzia debated topics important to the voters at News 12 studios. 

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