SALT LAKE CITY — There are three candidates running for the Salt Lake City Mayor's seat: Erin Mendenhall, Rocky Anderson, and Michael Valentine.
Erin Mendenhall is the current mayor of Salt Lake City seeking re-election. Some of her priorities if re-elected include affordable housing, equity in the city's government, and addressing homelessness. Mendenhall attended Alta High School before continuing her education at the University of Utah. She proudly lives in Salt Lake's East Liberty Park neighborhood and before becoming mayor represented District 5 on the Salt Lake City Council.
"This city is moving forward, and I want to keep us moving with a partnership with people investing in us and not against us and getting the best out of the growth that's happening here for all of our Salt Lakers," Mendenhall said.
Rocky Anderson served as mayor of Salt Lake City from 2000-2008. He is now seeking his third term in the 2023 election. Some of his priorities if elected include public safety, affordability, and addressing homelessness. Anderson lived in Salt Lake City for three years growing up, he did his undergraduate studies in the city before pursuing a law degree elsewhere, but eventually made his way back to Salt Lake City in 1978 and has been in the city since.
"There are a lot of cities actually solving these problems, but it takes leadership and frankly that's why I'm running for mayor, is for the benefit of small businesses that are impacted by this crisis, the homeless population, and the residents," Anderson said.
Michael Valentine is an activist and small business owner running his first political campaign. He says his priorities include building public trust, ending homelessness, and saving the Great Salt Lake. Valentine was born in Salt Lake City before he moved to Logan. He attended Utah State University and found himself back in Utah's capital city in 2012. His cider business is also located in Salt Lake City.
"I'm running to make sure our city government is as amazing as the community is as amazing as our potential, our slogan is 'Let's build the Salt Lake City of our wildest dreams' and I think that's something within our grasp," Valentine said.
Here are the candidates' responses to some of the questions I asked surrounding a few issues Salt Lake City faces
- As the cost of living nationwide continues to go up and Salt Lake City continues to grow... How do you plan to address housing needs and keep things affordable?
Erin Mendenhall: "This is a challenge that could've been better addressed in the past, but now we are putting the pedal to the metal. My administration has invested more in the creation of new affordable housing units than every administration before us combined 55 million dollars has gone out the door it's helped to create 4,000 new units of affordable housing here in Salt Lake City and we just approved another 20 million."
Rocky Anderson: "Affordability's relative to what it is you making, for the service sector, for most working people, for those who are truly in need these so-called "affordable units" are not affordable. We need to look at what other places are starting to do and what other nations around the world have such great success in and that is non-market, mixed-income housing, where the city builds it, we have control over the rents."
Michael Valentine: "I'd use the redevelopment agency and use the powers of the mayor and the city council to actually start building public housing for working people. I'm the only working-class person running for mayor right now, I'm the only candidate that's renting property right now. The way we're going locals are getting priced out, housing isn't about just getting homeless people off the streets, it's about lowering costs across the board."
- What are strategies you believe could help with homelessness?
Erin Mendenhall: "The state is our partner, they are leading winter efforts, shelter efforts, expansion of deeply affordable housing and we're all on the same page together. this is not a city-specific issue it is at least a statewide if not a national issue and we need those state partners, county partners, and other cities to do their fair share and they're finally coming to the table and helping"
Rocky Anderson: "The first step is to get a place for people to get out of the encampments all over our city and then we in the long term though need to do what we were doing when I was mayor before and that's everybody the philanthropic community, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the business community, everybody pitching in and building permanent supportive housing for the chronically homeless."
Michael Valentine: "I would declare a state of emergency my first day of office, I'd ban these barbaric homeless abatements I would set up sanctioned camping for everybody not just 50 people, so my idea for camping is there's a lot of vacant buildings around and I would take some of those locations and restructure them so people can live inside."
- The west side has been historically overlooked. How do you hope to address the issues that face the West Side and be a champion for them?
Erin Mendenhall: "We have added bus routes, improved over 200 bus stops, and put 25,000 free bus passes into the hands of Salt Lake City school students, one of their parents, and all of their teachers, we put Via rideshare which is like Lyft or Uber subsidized by the city and partnered with UTA to help get west siders where they need to go when the bus routes don't take them there. We're improving our streets and we're not just bringing housing, but we're bringing economic development to the west side too and this is the beginning of a positive change that's been long overdue on the west side."
Mendenhall also mentioned the addition of the new regional park at the new Raging Waters site, Glendale Regional Park, that broke ground last week.
Rocky Anderson: "It certainly wasn't overlooked when I was mayor. I think it had historically been overlooked and represented. We made sure that we increased, for instance, the membership on city boards and commissions to get more people throughout the city engaged. We increased dramatically the percentage of people on boards and commissions from the ethnic minority community for instance, but also geographically. We always wanted to get people who didn't have a voice to come in and have a voice.
Anderson also mentioned the land his administration obtained for the Jordan River Park, the Cottonwood Park. As well as adding the area's first skateboard pack to the neighborhood and the Unity Center to the Sorenson Center.
Michael Valentine: "We really need to look at every aspect of the west side and how they're being disenfranchised by the lack of resources, investing in those communities, removing structural racism with the train tracks, stopping the I-15 expansion that will rip apart the west side even more I don't think the I-15 expansion would ever happen on the east side over here. There are a lot of things that need to be done, but it starts with just having that conversation that there's an imbalance that needs to be balanced out.
Valentine mentioned wanting to find a way through the legislature to add more city council seats, so the west side has more representation on the City Council.
For more on the candidates and their positions, you can go to their campaign websites:
https://erinmendenhall.com/
https://www.rocky4mayor.com/
https://www.mayorvalentine.com/
