Greensboro’s current city council is made up of nine Democrats, and it doesn’t look like Democrats are in any danger of losing control of city council in the next election, every time they are held.
The Guilford County Republican Party hosted a candidate forum for Republican candidates for Greensboro City Council and only one candidate, Katie Rossabi, who applied to compete in the general race, attended. Two candidates who applied, District 5 city council candidate Tony Wilkins and District 2 city council candidate Latoya Gathers were unable to participate due to COVID-19 quarantine restrictions. District 3 city council candidate Zack Matheny had a scheduling conflict.
But even if all four won, Democrats would still have a five-to-four majority on city council. The races are technically non-partisan, but the political party of the candidates is no secret.
As she was the only city council candidate at the forum, Rossabi had five minutes to speak and then answered questions.
Rossabi said his platform has three main points, and number one was, “We need to start supporting our police. If we don’t have a safe city, we really won’t have anything else. She said, “The main reason we’re losing officers is that we won’t pay them. “
Rossabi said that in Burlington the starting salary for police officers was $ 46,000 per year, while in Greensboro it was $ 41,500 and other departments had take-out cars, which is considered like a big plus.
Rossabi’s second point was to support businesses, especially those in the city center, by dealing with the growing homeless population. She said that under current city policy, homeless people cannot be charged with petty crimes, which has allowed them to freely leave the city center.
Finally, Rossabi said she wanted to take a close look at the city’s budget. She said, “We have a budget of over $ 600 million and where is all this money going? “
Rossabi noted that the current city council “funnels millions of dollars into its own nonprofits without any accountability.”
The race for city council in general is unusual. If more than six candidates run, there will be a primary and the top six will run in the general election. Thus, the candidate who finishes sixth in the primary wins.
In general elections, the top three candidates are elected to city council, so a candidate can finish in third place and win, but fourth place is a loser.