Baltimore is a city with many troubles. Crime is at an all-time high, only rivaling numbers from the early 1990s. Most citizens are unhappy with the affordability of water and gas bills. Baltimore City Public Schools (BCPS) struggle to educate students and maintain quality of school buildings. Charm city is certainly in crises. This is the reason “Your Voice, Your Future” event was held at the YMCA on Feb 4, 2020.
Fox 45 hosted a panel discussion filled with mostly Mayor Candidates including, former Police Spokesman, T.J smith, Senator Mary Washington and former federal prosecutor, Thiru Vignarajah. Pastor Alvin C. Hathaway, from United Baptist Church joined to help brainstorm solutions to the major challenges facing local citizens. Anchors Kai Jackson and Mary Bubbla co-hosted the event, while Keith Daniels monitored questions from Facebook’s live stream, as well as asking pre-written questions from the audience.
A wide variety of topics were discussed from squeegee kids (and squeegee young adults) needing jobs, the cities extremely high murder rate, good parenting techniques and the safely of children walking home from school.
The tone of the discussion shifted from formal to tense, when news broke Councilman Ryan Dorsey returned 42,000 in donations, to build a substance abuse center in the 3rd district. Dorsey isn’t the only local public servant, who ran into trouble. Baltimore has a decade of history of political figures facing persecution for mishandling monetary funds. Former Mayor, Catherine Pugh could be looking at 5 years in jail, after using her political office to boost sales of her book “Healthy Holly.” Two non-present mayoral candidates, City Council President Brandon Scott and current Mayor Jack young, returned money from the Grant Capital Management, which funded Pugh’s children’s book. And, panel member and former Mayor Sheila Dixon stole gift cards from needy children, forcing her to step down from public office in 2010.
Smith acknowledged these ongoing controversies by calling for more financial accountability from Baltimore politicians.
“Some of this is common sense.” Smith, states in a matter-of-fact-tone.
“If you know right from wrong, you know you shouldn’t be doing it. You don’t need a law to tell you shouldn’t be doing this. I released my accountability package today and we need a full transparent audit, of every single dollar in this city.”
The audience wasn’t allowed to ask verbal questions to the panel but the response from the crowd was clear with cheering and applauding in agreement to strong points. The biggest reaction in the room came after Dixon stated, she would create a system, where sanitation workers would provide dumpsters and clean alleys.
Vignarajah replied, “If that’s your pledge, why didn’t you do that when you were mayor?”
Although the audience was clearly entertained, some attendees were unsatisfied. Audience member, Danielle Markham didn’t feel the panel was clear with their strategy of improvement. “I just need to look into do some research, as to how they’re going to approach certain issues in the city.”
Others wanted the focus of the discussion to be centered on people, not politics.
Susan Brooks expressed her disappointment in the topics presented.
“I was concerned that if it was a town hall, that it not just been a whole evening of everything that’s wrong with Baltimore. And it’s so hard to get to solutions; I sure wish we could have more and more of that including neighborhood community work.”
Baltimore, like many American major cities, has plenty of room for improvement. The crowded YMCA gym is a small showcase; citizens of Baltimore support their city and hope for positive transformation in the future.