Harrisburg City Council candidates address a crowd at Open Stage.
On Thursday, seven local candidates for public office shared their stances on issues like safety, housing and infrastructure.
Harrisburg City Council candidates addressed a crowd at Open Stage theater for a debate-style forum, hosted by Friends of Midtown, Midtown Action Council and Who’s Running for Office? Harrisburg, PA.
Seven of the eight Democratic candidates were present, each attempting to persuade voters that they deserve one of the three seats up for grabs on city council. Candidates Brad Barkdoll, Danielle Bowers, Crystal Davis, Leslie Franklin, Cole Goodman, Lamont Jones and Rob Lawson attended.
Affordable housing was the most discussed issue of the night, with all candidates agreeing that Harrisburg has a shortage of homes, especially for the city’s low- and moderate-income renters and homeowners.
“The issue with affordable housing is because there’s a lack of housing stock, and we can’t solve that unless we create more stock,” said Lawson, who was appointed to council in January and now is seeking election.
Goodman said he would hold developers accountable to build affordable units, and Barkdoll suggested using American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds to build and renovate housing.
Another question dealt with safety in the city and improving infrastructure to support multimodal transportation.
Harrisburg City Council candidates
Bowers, currently the president of city council seeking re-election, said that she would like to see better signage to alert drivers to the presence of cyclists and pedestrians on the roads. Jones said he would like to see infrastructure improvements and outreach to gather residents’ input. Davis suggested better street lighting.
Goodman took the time to specifically point out the construction project on State Street in Harrisburg, which has been on hold for about a year after the city decided to halt and re-work the proposal.
“I think that it is criminal that the improvements on State Street were halted, and we need to deal with that,” Goodman said.
To address a question about reducing gun violence in the city, Franklin, who works in the Harrisburg School District, advocated for violence prevention education for youth and for a strengthened relationship between residents and police.
Jones, who runs a re-entry program for residents returning home from prison, said that he wants to build up workforce development in the city, which could help target the root of the violence issue.
“We have to get jobs into these communities; we have to get trades back into our schools,” he said. “A lot of the time crimes exist because there is a lack of resources in those communities.”
Harrisburg resident Leeland Nelson attended the debate and said that, as a business owner himself, he was happy to hear of candidates’ plans to prioritize workforce development.
“We need to upscale our workforce,” he said.
Another resident, Tim Ward, attended the debate with an idea of who he was planning to vote for come election day. However, after hearing from candidates, he said he changed his mind.
“From my perspective, it was very helpful,” he said. “Two of the three that I was going to vote for changed. I guess it’s good news for the two people that got the switch and not for the people that walked in with my vote and are not walking out with it.”
To watch the Harrisburg City Council candidate debate, click here.
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