By Logan Wells, News Director | Logan@kymnradio.net
Last Saturday, at the Viking Theatre of St. Olaf College, The League of Women Voters hosted a forum to hear from the local candidates. This will be part 1 of a series highlighting some of the forum’s significant moments. Today, we are focusing on the candidates for Northfield Mayor, Ruth Dahl, and Erica Zweifel, and City Council At Large, Brad Ness and David Delong.
In one moment of sharp contrast with the current city council, all four candidates expressed dislike for how the council receives public comment. Delong said about the new public listening sessions started this year they are: “Imposing people do not feel comfortable. They feel singled out.”
Brad Ness, the only current member of the council running for re-election, agreed: “And I agree with David that the listening sessions have failed.”
Dahl referenced her involvement in the petition presented to the council last year as an example of the council not listening to the public and said that “city hall needs to be more welcoming”:
“So I feel that the City Hall needs to be open and more welcoming to people with comments and use those comments rather than throw them out.”
Zweifel focused on working to engage with residents earlier to include their feedback.
“We know what Rd. projects are coming our way. If we can get out in front of it sooner, get to those neighborhoods sooner. And then that way the Community knowledge that we receive can be incorporated into the design process. Right now, they’re coming to you with here’s the design. Thank you very much. We need to start earlier and truly engage with the residents.”
Both mayoral candidates expressed some concern about the many capital projects the city is currently undertaking. Dahl stated that the current number of projects is confusing, and the city should slow down and reconsider: “I’m a firm believer we’re doing way too many large projects. They’re all stacked up and if we can withdraw and back off a year or two or three or 10 on some of these projects, that’s perfectly fine. There’s nothing wrong with waiting a year or two.”
Dahl stated that waiting can be helpful in case “better options come along” or in case of emergencies needing city funding. Zweifel said that we need to keep “the big picture in mind” and that projects should align with the city’s goals “I would use the priorities I listed earlier to look at the at the projects that come before us. The strategic goals of does it add to the commercial industrial. Space. What’s the climate impact? What’s the equity impact? What’s the housing impact? All these things that we say that we desperately need as a city, we have to focus on those and set those priorities.”
Zweifel said that the city has put projects like remodeling and fixing the Community Resource Center on the “back burner” in favor of “bigger, shinier projects.”
You can learn more about the candidates at the KYMN Radio 2024 Election, and we will have posted links to watch the full League of Women Forum there as well later this week. The Northfield Mayor and City Council candidates will meet again for a second forum hosted by the Northfield Chamber of Commerce on October 3rd .
