Rochester has been in dire economic shape for decades.  As our history has shown, when times get tough, the ruling political party in our town can pull their leaders together to do absolutely nothing for us.  They continue to allow outside corporations and rich individuals to enrich themselves at our expense while they spend time cutting ribbons in exchange for a few crumbs doled out to select small business owners.

I will not vote for any project that involves corporate welfare for companies that do not need it.  We have enough office and retail space as well as luxury and falsely labelled “affordable” apartments. 

When elected, I will:

• Advocate for claw backs of previous corporate welfare deals.
• Propose the City's Neighborhood and Business Department focus on worker-owned and run businesses.
• Advocate for the development of a program that helps business owners who want to close their businesses to transition them to worker-owned co-ops.
• Adjust regulations to make owning a business easier including reducing permit costs for capital improvements.

I will also focus on specific cooperative economic development projects that include:

Changing the City’s Compost Program to one that picks up food waste at people’s houses, like we do with recycling.  We would then use economic development resources to help local citizens start an industrial composting plant that would be cooperatively owned and run.  This would be similar to the Evergreen Cooperative in Cleveland, Ohio.

Using vacant plots of land around the City to be developed into cooperative urban farms which would include infrastructure for year-round growing.  Once these are running, we can then use economic development dollars to help create cooperative grocery stores in our food apartheid areas. 

NOTE:  These ideas tackle multiple issues that we face, including employment, poverty, food security, climate change and more.  They will have long-term effects on our schools and public safety as well.