Maitland Council candidates make final pitches

Campaign signs clutter street corners and City Council candidates pound the pavement as election day looms less than a week away in Maitland on March 12.

With two candidates competing for each available Council seat and 29 proposed city charter amendment issues on the ballot, there’s a lot at stake – and for residents to keep straight – when they enter the polls on Tuesday.

To learn more about each of the candidates visit their websites at: Seat 3 – Renee Stein Charlan, renewmaitland.com ; Joy Goff-Marcil, joyformaitland.com. Seat 4 – Charlie Adkins, cgadkins.com; John Lowndes, johnformaitland.com

To keep you on track, The Observer spoke with each of the candidates about what they feel the city’s top priorities should be, and what makes each of them the right man or woman for the job.

Seat 3 – Charlan vs. Goff-Marcil

It’s ladies first in the race to fill termed-out Councilwoman Bev Reponen’s seat on City Council, with retired developer Renee Stein Charlan facing off against attorney Joy Goff-Marcil for Seat 3. The winner earns a three-year term.

Careful redevelopment, improved resident communication and maintenance of the Maitland community are top topics touched on by both candidates with varying ideas of how to accomplish each.

Life-long Maitland resident Goff-Marcil has built her candidacy around offering to be a voice of the people, “I will listen to you” labeling her campaign signs throughout the city. She said her top priority if elected will be to listen and consider what Maitland residents have to say – this, she said, will serve to influence how she’ll weigh decisions when it comes to community development and funding.

“I don’t know what’s going to be in front of me, but when I do I want to be able to make a reasonable decision based on listening to the residents and listening to people who are experts, who know the impacts and how it will help the city financially,” she said.

This, she said, will ring true in weighing redevelopment decisions against always maintaining the established residential character of the city.

The Maitland municipal election will be held on Tuesday, March 12.

The polls – located at Maitland City Hall, 1776 Independence Lane, and the First Baptist Church of Maitland, 1950 Mohican Trial – will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. For more information about the election, and for a list of all 29 charter amendments up for vote, visit itsmymaitland.com

A fulltime city volunteer for the past seven years, Renee Stein Charlan says her experience in serving on boards for the Maitland Civic Center and Performing Arts of Maitland during that time, and with her prior 35-year career in private development, will help her be the best advocate for Maitland residents on the Council.

“The idea of being able to work and negotiate with developers, I think I am strongly suited for that because I know who they are and where they’re coming from,” Charlan said. “So I can actually be a better advocate for citizens of the community than someone who really doesn’t have that background.”

Charlan said to get more residents actively involved in government and growing the community, the city should look into live-streaming its Council and Board meetings either on TV or online for those too busy too attended, and create more Maitland-centric events to bring neighbors together.

“There out are out-of-the-box kinds of thinking about how to have a fun time of building community, and then that starts to heal some of the divisiveness that has started to happen in our town where people want to take sides,” she said. “I want to help break through that and I want to help heal that.”

Goff-Marcil said she isn’t convinced that a live-stream would be worth its cost, or if residents would really use it. To get neighbors more connected, she suggested forming channels through homeowners associations and watch groups to filter information to residents.

“The residents need to reach out to each other and tell each other what’s going on,” she said.

City Charter Amendment 10 – Drafting following the scandal surround the resignation of former Councilmember Phil Bonus, this amendment, if approved, adds convictions of driving under the influence, public intoxication, theft or prostitution to offenses that require forfeiture of office.

City Charter Amendment 11 – This amendment, if passed, would establish a code of conduct and listing of penalties if violated that City Council members must abide by during their time in office.

Charlan said whoever wins each of the seats will be assuming a critical role in a time of major importance in Maitland’s history between weighing the pros and cons of each development and its impact on the city’s infrastructure and residents.

“This is going to take a lot of real commitment from whoever is up there,” Charlan said. “This is not a single issue type of situation in Maitland. It isn’t just the redevelopment of our downtown, it isn’t just rebuilding and creating a community in Maitland Center.”

Seat 4 – Adkins vs. Lowndes

It’s a battle between former city board members in the race for Seat 4 between real estate maintenance manager Charlie Adkins and attorney John Lowndes. The winner of this race will serve out the remaining term of former Councilman Phil Bonus, ending in April 2014.

Both men have their sights set on improving business and development in Maitland, each with plans to use their individual skills to get there in different ways.

Adkins, who previously served on the city’s Board of Adjustment and Appeals, said his biggest concern is that of the financial health of the city. From addressing CRA debt, frozen city staff positions to pension fund reform, he said the city’s solution will come through generating more income.

“Income solves a lot of problems,” Adkins said. “… We need to decide as a community, where that income is going to come from.”

The primary options, he said, would be either from taxes or new business. And with his eyes always on the top-line, he said, as a member of the Council he would do his best to prioritize cutting spending down to critical elements before seeking additional funding from residents.

As a former member of the city’s Planning and Zoning Commission and Community Redevelopment Agency, Lowndes says he has the foundation of knowledge needed to carefully craft decisions when it comes to developing Maitland, and legal experience in forming public-private partnerships to help bring in business.

“We do have to invite new development, but at the same time we have to be clear on what is good for the community, and we have to have someone in the position that has experience in development and helping to frame agreements that move both interests ahead,” Lowndes said. “… I think I have a good history of doing that.”

It’s a balance between preserving the cultural and residential aspects that residents in Maitland have come to love, Lowndes said, and encouraging redevelopment of areas appropriate from commercial business.

“I’m not sure we’ve done all we can do to bring those two together,” he said, adding that the key to doing so is listening to what the residents think.

Adkins said he’s hopeful that there is a solution for this balancing equation, though it’s yet to be fully realized by past Councils.

“It’s not that we can’t, it’s that we just haven’t yet figured out how we can,” Adkins said. “And we have to start to figure out how we can … or the pain of non-compromise will be much greater than the pain of compromise.”