City Council - Regular Meeting

Thank you very much. Good evening everyone and welcome to the special um meeting tonight for interviews of Williamsport City Council vacancy. Um I'm going to have Mrs. Frank call the role for us to get started. Dr. Mr. Yoder here. Mr. Milligan here. Mr. Mackey here. Ms. Mey here. Mr. Pizzy here. Mr. Ber here. All members of council are currently present. Thank you all for being here. It is greatly appreciated. Uh second item on the agenda. We have limited limited courtesy of the floor. Have we had any requests tonight? No requests.

No requests. Okay. Then we are going to move to our third item. We have our council interviews for the vacant seat. Couple of things that I want to go over first uh before we get started. Um obviously we're here to fill that seat that was left vacant by the passing of Bonnie Katz who served on city council for a number of years and was a great uh contributor to uh Williamsport's vision and its future. Um so we thank her for all of that yet again. Um the interview tonight is going to be done as a panel interview to be the fairest for all candidates. Uh the first question will be asked to the first candidate which would be um starting on my left your right. So Miss Danieli will have the first question followed by the second candidate and so on until every candidate has answered the first question. The second question will be asked to the second candidate down the line and then lastly to the first candidate and so on. This process will help eliminate any end any unfair advantage a candidate may have by continually going first or last. I will stress the importance of decorum during the interview. This is not a debate and no member of coun and and no candidate shall interrupt another candidate or answer out of turn unless asked to do so by a member of council. If a candidate does not follow the rules, they will receive one warning. If a candidate continues to interrupt or speak out of turn after they have been warned, they will be asked to leave the proceedings. Again, decorum is what this is all about tonight. We have you all here because we want you to be participants in this process and we want to find out who the best person is for this position. Uh, that being said, Councilwoman Bonnie Katz, longtime Republican, when I called all of you, I told you that the president in the city of Williamsport has been to appoint someone of the same party. However, you have all been

invited to interview regardless of party because we are going to get everybody's input on this um interview process. So, we appreciate that and thank you very much. And I will start off by asking the very first question. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay.

So, what do you believe is the most important responsibility of a council member and what does public service mean to you regarding that? I believe the most responsibility, the most important responsibility as a council member is commitment to the people in our community um in every area and transparency. I think it's very important that people on city council be transparent and approachable to members of the community from all walks of life. Public service. Um I work as a public defender. That's my full-time job. I work with the public every day. Um, I believe public service is doing what you can in any capacity possible to make our society and the community a better place to live. Um, there are multiple areas that this reaches across the criminal justice system, housing, um, mental health. Right now, I believe a big issue in our community is juvenile delinquency. Um, so that's those are some areas I believe touch on the public service. Re

real quick with your first answer, if you would be so kind as to just state your name. Thank you. Um, just to make sure we're there's a number of you I haven't met before. Make sure we're um in line. Thank you very much. Giovana Danielle, is it possible for you to repeat the question? Absolutely. and as many times as needed. Um, what do you believe is the most important responsibility of a council member and what does public service mean to you?

So, I am Jenny Bratis and um I believe uh the most important job of a council person is to be open to listening um to the people that that are in their community. I think it's important to have a pulse on what is happening in your specific community, a finger on the pulse of that community. Um, I think that begins with listening. I think that begins with being comfortable with opposing opinions. Um, I think that also translates to um being open to learning a different side than you were used to understanding and being willing to uh listen to others. Um, I think part of public service is really embedding yourself in the community in which you live and wanting to do the best for that. uh community. I think public service for me specifically um in my career is um being a counselor and recognizing where I can help people through um varying problems that they may have. I think that um that extends to public service as recognizing what is going on in the community as far as mental health, what's going on in safety in our communities. um as well as the support of businesses and the support of families. Those would be primary areas of public service that I would see specific to Williamsport.

Thank you.

Uh my name is David Dussinger. Um so for the first question regarding responsibility, um I do believe one of the most important things um as a council member is overall improving the quality of life for the residents of the city. Um I think that is done in several different ways. Um I think the first and foremost is transparency. Um with that um uh fiscal responsibility um with fiscal responsibility and full transparency um spending the money of the city as though it was your own. um driving economic growth in the city um that will help with the revenue base um and overall help with um the quality of life in the city. Um I also believe overall improving um public safety. Um this can be done by maintaining uh the critical uh infrastructure that's in place, police, fire uh to protect the city. Um I also believe um it is also done through economic security. Um lastly, um with the responsibility council is making it a great place to live and thrive. Uh create open spaces, continue to have open spaces, maintain open spaces uh for families and the residents of the city to enjoy this area um uh with their family, friends. um regarding um uh your second question um of uh what does public service mean? Um so prior to becoming an engineer, I was a paramedic for 7 years um in Northeast Pennsylvania. Uh during that time, I helped countless people uh during their truly time in need. uh as a paramedic um and now as a current member of the city, I believe public service first starts with servant leadership um serving others, putting yourself

um putting others ahead of yourself um and serving them um through um servant leadership. the um and I also believe um by doing that you're helping others in the community to um both thrive and also for the less fortunate help them give the opportunity to grow um and um and flourish in this city. Thank you Dave.

Good evening. My name is Sha Lee. Um, I think one of the most important things as a council person is to be where the rubber meets the road. With that being said, being a part of the community that we're going to serve publicly, being a part of the community where we're seen and heard and people feel seen and heard. So that's not just, you know, kind of showing up when, you know, things are bad, but also showing up when things are good and when things need fixed and when there's other issues going on in the community that we all need to take a look at. I feel like for myself, um, public service is very near and dear to me. Um, I grew up in this community. I've lived here my entire life. Born and raised here. Um, I know what the communities are like. I know what the people are like. I have my family has been a part of the history here in Williamsport for quite some time. So, public service is exactly what it means. Public service. You're out here to improve things. You're out here to try to make things better. And even if you can't, when you can't, you're there to give people hope and you're there to help them through what they cannot understand. Thank you.

Thank you as well.

Hello, Steve Caravadrio. I believe public services is enabling the community to move forward while at the same time trying to work within the constraints both fiscal and otherwise that the that the community faces. I feel like I've been a member of this community ever since I was a child and I've seen a lot of things change as we all have and sometimes I think the positive changes have been overlooked and we continue to harp on the negative. I'd like to work toward making the positive more prominent and for making to help people feel like they have a stake in what's going on in this community.

Thank you.

Hi there. My name is Ariana Moore. Um, in terms of what is the most important uh trait or attribute that a council member can have, um, I believe that it is extremely important that a council member be communitydriven for the betterment of the community fiscally, um, infrastructure- wise, uh, socially, that these be the goals and that they work transparently. Of course, and also challenge their own beliefs, everyone has their own bias. Everyone has their own belief in how things should be done. However, the best results are always through groups working together, coalitions working towards what is best for a large group of people. And so that is what uh this any sort of council member, any sort of uh politician should really be working towards in terms of what does public service mean. Um personally for me it is a duty of empathy towards those who need it the most. a duty of how to improve your constituents lives, how to make sure that they feel seen and heard. Personally, I have done that through uh my previous role as a public school teacher. And oftentimes teaching and supporting both students and families of every different stripe, of every different belief system can be extremely difficult. And yet, you still need to show up and do the work. you still need

to make sure that each day is best for them and that your decisions are not clouded by anything but that goal. Thank you.

Uh Mike Gardner, um being a public servant means a whole lot to the community and almost everything that was echoed and and spoken already is my beliefs also. But as a council person, you have to have uh accountability for for what your duties are as a council person um and and work with other council members for that common goal for our citizens and our our public um that we serve. Um public service. Um pretty much all my life I've been uh in in some type of public service. Um, and again, we have to be transparent about how we provide those public services and the needs of our community and and how that can be driven to be more effective um and and and for our people to be secure that we are providing the right services and the right times.

Thank you.

Hi, I'm I'm Grace While. Um, in terms of the responsibilities of serving on the city council, I think we know that the job is to serve as the legislative branch of the city government. I think with that comes a lot of critical um responsibilities, a number of which the other candidates named, but being extremely in tune with not just the desires of constituents, but um the uh the the laws, the the regulations, what the city council can and can't do within its authority um in order to best serve um the people of Williamsport using every opportunity we have through commissions, through city council meetings, through um legislation um to move things forward. So for me really taking this, it's not just a responsibility, it would be an honor. Um so being extremely prepared, doing all of my research, um understanding what's been done before, what can be done, looking towards the future, that's what I really see as an important responsibility here. And in terms of public service, um, like others, I've committed my whole career to working for and with nonprofits, um, in a variety of sectors. I think, um, we all have a duty of care as citizens in a community, um, or as members of local government um, to do everything within our power to improve the lives of others. Um, I think we could go on and on about the challenges facing many different groups of people who live in Williamsport. Um but doing everything within the council's power, whether it be um budgetary, um legally, just promoting other organizations, causes, opportunities, whatever we can to continue to grow the future of Williamsport, um so that

everyone here has opportunities for a just, safe, healthy life in our community. Thank you. Thank you as well. If you can pass that up back on down. We're stopping at Jenny this time, right? Yes. Okay.

All right. Um, so next question. Um, next set of questions, I guess. Um, so what are the in your view, what are the top three issues that Williamsport is facing right now and why? And what does a thriving Williamsport look like for you? This is an interesting question for me specifically because I moved to Williamsport uh six years ago. So, I'm not a native to Williamsport. I haven't lived here my entire life. I think that comes with some fresh eyes. Um I kind of uh encourage anyone to move sometime in your lifetime to a new place because when you go to the new place, you see things that their the residents don't. You you you might see things even in a a brighter light than the residents do. Um, so there are a lot of things about Williamsport that I appreciate and I want to protect. Um, you know, before I list what I would say are the top three I I would want to acknowledge that I I don't have all of the answers and even though I've kind of embedded in Williamsport, embedded my family there, my business, um, I don't know everything. Even though it's part of my fabric, I don't know everything. I think it would be really important for me to uh listen first to you guys to listen to community before I make decisions on hey these are the top things because just because I live here and do hear and um I don't I don't know all the answers but I think from my perspective of living in this space I see that um thriving safe neighborhoods are really important right now. Um I would see that as something that we um can work on. Um I think that um internal collaboration and um transparency and uh accountability might be good within our organ within the the council. Um also um support of families and support of businesses. Um so yeah,

thank you. So for the first question regarding um what do I view as a top three issues with the city um the first one would be the bal would be the budget um and the revenue that the city um currently the challenges with the revenue in the city that's leading to the shortfall in the budget um with an with a shortfall and unstable budget it will lead to an unstable city I believe um where the council will have to make some tough decisions regarding regarding what can stay and what what will have to be cut. Another issue I see with the city um is is also related back to the revenue but is some of the open lots that we see all throughout the city and some of the blight issues that we see in the city. Those are opportunities uh regarding revenue um that the city um could take advantage of to increase the revenue. Uh one there are several ideas that I have regarding that. We can discuss them now or discuss them later. Um and then um third when we look at the city when we look at the taxes of the city compared to the surrounding area that the city's taxes are are pretty high. Um I hear a lot at work when people are looking at buying they look at Williamsport they look at loyal sock the surrounding areas and one of the first things I always hear is about how high the taxes are compared to the surrounding area. So I think by tackling by tackling the taxes revenue um and the open law issue, focusing on alternative solutions to generate more revenue, doing so collaborating with members of the council, with members of the administration and looking at alternative ways to increase revenue other than just rate increases uh what is is very important also by doing it um uh with a lot of transparency. So the city um the members of the city can understand exactly uh where the

shortfalls are and what we're doing for it. Regarding what what do I view as a thriving city? It's kind of the opposite. A thriving city is a city that has balanced book. It is able to continue to deposit into the rainy day fund. It is a city that has a thriving both small both downtown and the surrounding area with small businesses that are growing, businesses that want to come into the city um and create this as their home. Um, so kind of like the opposite of what I see as the opportunities for the city would be a city that's thriving with a revenue increase, balanced books, um, and, um, new businesses, new homeowners, new residents moving into the city, generating a population growth.

Thank you, Dave. Could you please repeat the question?

Certainly. Um, so what are the top three issues facing Williamsport right now and why? And what does a thriving Williamsport look like to you? Um so what I would say is three issues that I see um just in being here and my eyes can see um is some of the houses some of the areas where people live or have lived for quite some time are starting to fall apart. Um, so that being said, you know, there are different programs out there that can help people who are in a homeowner's position or in, you know, a position where they can get, um, resources in order to help with those things. Um, I think some of those guidelines are a little bit strict, but pretty fair. The other thing I see is um for our juvenile population, we are just now kind of getting back into having more activities for younger folks in this town. However, we're still missing a important age group. Um and that would be kind of teenage to young adult. um which is where we're seeing some of the shootings, which is where we're seeing some of the crime, which is where we're seeing the drug dealing, which is where we're seeing a lot of the issues that we are currently having um and have had over the past few years that have impacted some of the communities and some of the ways that people view different spaces of Williamsport. not positively in a in a more negative way, but nonetheless, people still live in those communities. People who live in those communities feel like their

community may be safe, but someone else would come and they would say, "Oh, no, you live across the street from a park that somebody was shot in." That's not the entire history of that particular neighborhood. Um, I do feel like as far as a thriving Williamsport, what that would look like is there being enough jobs for people. Um, there being more businesses that want to come into the town to do business, but there also being a more aesthetically pleasing site to Williamsport as well. What things are bringing people in outside of little league? What other resources do we have around here for people who maybe are experiencing mental health, substance use, grief, different things that may lead them into spaces where maybe they're not in the greatest of places, maybe they're homeless. where can we meet them in order to get them the help that they need? So, that's what I see as a thriving Williamsport.

Thank you very Thank you, Miss Lee. Um, starting with the with the core problems, I believe probably the number one problem,

the constant push and pull between the amount of money the city has and the ability to discern between needs and wants of what the shi city should be pursuing. Um I understand there's a lot going on underneath those issues so that at first blush you may look at what's going on and say that really doesn't feel like it makes a lot of sense. But we don't always get a good explanation of the drivers that are underneath there that uh are affecting those decisions. So that goes to transparency and more to the core issue of budgeting itself. I think another issue is the governing of the city itself. the issue that's coming up with home rule and versions of that that have come up over the last few years. I don't think that's a panacea, but that's not to say there are not a lot of issues that could be discerned out of that discussion and perhaps brought into the decision making of this of the city. In addition to that, um I would say that a thriving Williamsport looks like a play. It looks to me like a place that feels safe for all for most all hopefully all the constituencies in Williamsport, but at least most of them. And I believe we need to emphasize the fact that we are moving toward that.

And in those instances where there are gaping holes, try to move with the people that are experiencing the problems in those gaping holes and help move the city to address them. Thank you.

All righty. So, in terms of the uh issues or uh problems that we see here in Williamsport, as a few have said before, uh the city's budget and overall um revenue, obviously change cannot happen unless there is money to bring forth that change. the current uh system does not allow the city to fully see its potential. So with that being said, whether it be home rule, whether it be some other type of restructuring, uh finding a way to increase revenue without overburdening one particular set of individuals um or entities is very important. And kind of under that umbrella, it's important that you with that added revenue or or things that can be addressed with that added revenue are infrastructure uh road and civic infrastructure as well as uh building infrastructure. Things that are beginning to dilapidate can then lead to a third issue which is uh population decline and business loss. These things are all interconnected and they lead to a slow decline of a great city like this. I'm also not originally from Williamsport, so I have some fresh eyes on the community and it's really beautiful. And so when I when I think about what a thriving Williamsport is, it isn't far off from what currently exists. This is a thriving place that needs a little bit of support, needs some restructuring, and needs that commitment.

Uh, a thriving Williamsport has businesses, specifically small businesses, opening and not closing, as we've seen some closed in recent months. A thriving Williamsport brings more jobs in so that those who are attending two of our colleges are staying here to then work and continue to contribute to the community. And a thriving Williamsport is a is a is a place it's a place that you would put on a postcard. We already have the natural beauty, but how do we further uh create a community that others are boasting about and asking, "Hey, where do you live? I want to live there, too."

Thank you. Some of the key issues that I've noticed over the years um is the same as the other candidates have spoken about and that is the budget and revenue toward the city. Um that is one of a large decline in population because they do not want to pay the high taxes. And as we continue to go down this same road, we're not finding new and inventive ways to create revenue. um as as leaders of the city, we have to figure this out and how we can create more lines of revenue um and decrease our taxes but continue to to provide the same services um to our our community. The other values that I see that are not just a citywide elected official, but it's also a city dynamic that we have lost family value. Um, we have family value where we sit and take responsibility of our kids, responsibility of their actions and not have them wander in the streets and and doing juvenile things that are not uh uh accepted in society. We we need to reach out to other organizations to figure out how we can work with the school districts or other agencies to to help with our juvenile system and our family values. Um we can bring family values back. I think we would really see a lot of change in in how we live in our community. Um the other issue is accountability of uh all of our department heads um and us as elected officials. Um there there's expenditures. Do you really need that

expenditure? Um is there a way we can collaborate with other organizations that may need that same service, but we don't use it all the time? Um, so we there's avenues that we can look there also that will help maybe decrease our expenditures on something we may need, but it's a shared uh expenditure uh through our our county in our community. Um, a thriving wayport is exactly a building like this where we're at the community theater league is the community arts center. um other venues, the lumber yards coming up that's bringing people into Lansport is is showing Lansport our potential and we can be uh great um we can have our services and we want people to come here and feel safe to our community and along with the smaller businesses. Um, I've been to this venue here many a time for for fantastic shows and and this is one of the venues sometimes I think that is lost. Um, that that the communities outside really don't know this smallville venue even exist. Um, the thriving wansport also makes it easier for businesses, businesses to come in and and apply for permits and apply for for less uh red tape and trying to succeed. Um, and that goes also with our codes department. um those folks over there do a a good job, but sometimes it's hard to get a hold of those folks and it's more of the you have to do this or else. Is there other programs that maybe the codes department or us as elected officials can say, "Hey, we know you're having a problem financially. You can't keep your building up. Is there something else out there that we may

alleviate or show that we can help with keeping your your building up or your house? And by having more programs to make uh ease of comfort and help instead of tearing down our our our community by giving them citations that they're never going to pay. Um, maybe we can shoot them in a direction they can fix their house, get it painted or whatever to make your community look better. Thank you.

Um, to jump right in to my top three issues, um, I think both locally, and this is not unique to Williamsport, all the way up to the federal level, we're seeing massive distrust in government. Um, so I think like many others said, we need to be crystal clear um to what is going on, what is being discussed, how decisions are being made. Um, listening to constituents. I think there's confusion across the board on from things that feel as innocuous like the fireworks to big things like the budget. Um, people in Williamsport don't know what's going on. They don't trust leadership in every position and every level. And I think that fixing that is critical to achieving anything moving forward. Um, number two, based on information I was able to find, um, it's my understanding that the population of Williamsport has about a quarter of residents are living in poverty. Currently, we have tons of data that shows about the negative health outcomes, the negative education outcomes, the negative crime outcomes that all come associated with poverty. So, I think doing everything within the city council's purview, which is not unlimited, um, but to support and uplift the people of Williamsport to not enact policies that would further um, increase poverty rates or some of the challenges our our constituents are facing. And then I'm not going to belabor the point, the budget. Um, I think every that's the topic on everyone's mind. um there's not going to be a magic band-aid, but um looking at every opportunity, every resource um to figure out what we can do because that is the one thing that um our citizens are really concerned about. And then in terms of what does a thriving Williamsport look like? Um I think Williamsport really shines when the Little League World Series is here

and I would love to see maybe with a little less chaos. Um but what it feels like during that time of year all year. So welcoming to outsiders, we have tourists, our small businesses are thriving. Um we have activities all day, all week, all month um for people of all ages. Um our officials are out and reachable and in the public. Um we're uplifting the city as much as we can and there's a sense of pride there. Um, and I think people feel like great to be here during that month. And so I would love to see that um throughout the entire year. I think this Thank you. And I think this is the end.

All right. I won't harp on the budget either. I did consolidate my three issues um sort of into broader topics here. Um firstly, yes, the budget, um county and city budget is concerning, but I believe you guys have more information than I do. That would be something that I would have to sit down, discuss, um create a spreadsheet, see where the money is going. Um number two would be our youth. Um, not only the juvenile delinquency issue we've been facing, um, most of our shootings that have occurred over the past few years have been participated in by juveniles, which is very concerning to me. Um, but also drawing in um, new blood to the city, new transplants. I believe that's needed. Um, I would like to invest in the youth, sort of stop this issue before it starts through education, sports programs, mentorship programs. Once a juvenile is entered into the criminal justice system, it's hard to get them out. And um, I know one of my other candidates mentioned family values, but also I believe it takes a village um, to raise our youth. Um, back in the day, neighborhoods were places where we would look out for each other's children. We could you could leave your child with a neighbor. You trusted your neighbors. You knew your neighbors. That has declined throughout um my generation. I believe that's something I would like to build back up. We have a great small community and I think that it can really be built upon and we can be bonded and that will solve a lot of those issues. And then my third um topic

would be property um not only house like taxes um regarding property taxes for homeowners but also property issues in the greater um broader spectrum. We have a lot of large businesses that I feel are taxed less than homeowners, which is concerning. Um, we have a lot of local businesses in the area, which are great local businesses that I think we should build up and incentivize to be here. And also, um, there are neighborhoods still that don't have street lights in Newberry, off of High Street, these higher crime areas. Um, and it's almost the broken windows theory. If we invest into these communities, put out street lights, um, that could decline the crime as well. And what does a thriving Williamsport look like? I jotted down less blighted properties, um, a decline in crime, economic growth, and big for me is community engagement. I want to be down in the road with our people, talking to them, um, engaging with them. We have a lot of great people in our community and I believe we need to communicate with them and really meet them where they're at.

Thank you.

Just before we get started with the third question, just so you're all aware, we do have eight questions for everybody tonight with a um final closing question, so technically nine. So everybody gets a chance to ask first and last. So just your everybody's doing fantastic thus far, but just keep that in the back of your minds. So Jonah, hi everybody. My name is Jonah Milikin. Um I just want to start by saying I really appreciate you being here. All of us up here did not have to sit in front of council and answer a bunch of questions in front of other people interviewing for the spot with a couple days notice. So, I really appreciate you coming out here tonight, spending the time to do this and just being engaged in your community. So, it means a lot. With that being said, um my questions kind of focus on collaboration. So, how should the city partner with the county, the private sector, communities, and regional organizations? And I got a follow-up question that I'm happy to repeat, which is one, what is one specific idea that you would want to pursue or push in your first six months of being on council? So, regarding your first question about partnering and collaboration, so I think there's an opportunity with the city um with what is going on out by the mall or what was the mall, now the district, you know. So, that project is called the gateway to the wilds, I think is what Bass Pro Shop called that. And that will be bringing a lot of people into the area from outside the area. I think there's a large opportunity with that project to also have a gateway to Williamsport by partnering with the uh county commissioners by partnering with the uh private investment sector out there. Um so as people are drawn to that

area for those attractions, how do we draw them into Williamsport? I think with strong collaboration, we can develop a plan that can bring those people that may have never seen this area before or may have driven past it plenty of times um but have never stopped in to uh shop in our local businesses um go ahead and dine in our wonderful local restaurants. So, I think there's a large opportunity there. With that project uh kicking off and getting ready to be um opening in in the summer of 27, we have a we as a city have a large opportunity to collaborate uh with county um agencies and also the private sector um to piggyback on the gateway um idea idea to push um within I believe you said the first six months. Um so we talk about revenue, we're talking about revenue base. We talk about uh the books being balanced or not being balanced in the shortfall. So something that has been done successfully in other areas is something called a land value tax. Um it was done in Allentown. It was done in Harrisburg. The land value tax is something that um incentivize people to develop empty lots or blight facilities without punishing the local residents for doing up updates and upgrades to their own own um residents. Um it is something that has shown successfully in uh thirdass cities like Williamsport uh to address a revenue problem, a blight problem, an open lot problem, increasing the revenue base by driving people and residents into the home um by look by creating a secure community um with uh better uh better revenue base other than just taxing and increasing the taxes. So that that would be an item I would really like to push. Um so that'd be a big item. The second item

would be is make a decision with city hall. Make a decision with city hall before the next heating cycle. We know that that building cost a lot of money to heat. I believe it was upwards to $100,000 uh this past winter to heat that building. Right now that's a sunken loss. It's a mostly vacant building um with some minor um people occupying it. I think we need to make a decision whether we make the decision to go ahead and spend the money, find the money and rehab it or go ahead and sell the building, control how the building will be used and generate another tax revenue off of that. But I think that is something that needs to be done prior to the next heating cycle um so we don't absorb another sunken cost. Could you repeat the question please?

Absolutely. So how should the city partner with the county, the private se sector or community and regional organizations? And then secondly, what is one specific idea you would want to push or pursue in your first 6 months or so?

Okay, so collaboration is very important in anything that we do. Um, I feel like there's a lot of nonprofits around here that, um, have been building themselves up. I feel like, um, county and state, there's definitely some things that we could work on collaboratively there. State definitely probably has some funding that we could utilize within our communities um, and get some additional resources to become available for our population. Um, same with federal, same thing. Um, I do think that collaboration for the most part is something that I feel like as a whole lacks in some spaces. So, you know, we may have people who are very collaborative. We we may have agencies. We may have businesses that are very collaborative. Um, but there's still a group of people who are kind of outside of that, right? So for those folks, how are they being heard? How is their ideas, how are their thoughts, opinions, whatever being conveyed? Typically, they're not. So being able to collaborate in some of those spaces as well for folks who maybe don't exactly know how to articulate what they want to say or you know maybe those folks who have had negative past or whatever else doesn't necessarily mean that they don't have additional good ideas. doesn't necessarily mean that they haven't made changes in their own lives that they could share to help somewhere else.

So, one of the things that I would love to see in Williamsport um relates more to my profession and some of the things that I see there. Um, I really would love to, um, do a little bit more with like treatment court, for example. Um, where, you know, we've had meetings with West Branch and and have had treatment court clients say, "How do we have fun? H how do we have fun?" like previously we were using drugs or we were doing this to have fun and now it seems like there's nothing. Having more drop in centers for those folks. Having more places for people who are struggling with mental health or substance use be able to go and get the help that they need. whether that is a um facility so to speak or like a Oxford house type of situation but more of that we have some of those things a lot of times they're geared specifically towards a particular population YWCA women and children We have Oxford House who is women. Um, you know, we now have transitional living centers where they have re-entry and they now do men. Um, and previously they were an all women facility. Now they have three locations. So getting some of those other people involved to move some of those projects even further

to really be there to help some of those other people change their lives I feel like is something that I would definitely pursue. Thank you. Thanks. Thank you. I have a question for city council. Fire away. How do collaborative issues get to you? When are how are they identified and what are the holes you see in that process?

Sure. So, um, one of the biggest collaborative issues that we're dealing with right now is the levy system. Uh, obviously that's been going on for quite a while. I mean, at least a decade, would you say, Liz? You've been you've been here that long now. 16 years. So, that's one of those issues that it takes the entire community, specifically the county to be the lead on. Um, so that way we can go to the federal government as we did. Um, I give Mayor Derek Slaughter a lot of credit for that. He went and lobbyed our federal legislators for earmarks within the budget. We've gotten roughly 10 to 12 million in federal earmarks over the past several years so we can get that project going. But the city doesn't have the resources to do every single thing on that list. we need engineers, we need planners and so on. So that's where uh folks from the county come in. Uh and then also with our state um representative and our state senator, we have to go to them to help get letters of support. Is there a would there would there be something like a clearing house that would be helpful for that or do you just depend on the issues boiling up and then the different affected constituencies and legislators drawing you in. DCED has been a good partner for us in that where they will tell us a lot of these issues um before they come up to be bigger issues, but sometimes they just do happen. Um just like anything else, you don't know that you're going to have a pipe burst in your basement and you got to take care of it. So sometimes you just got to take care of it and all the parties involved have to get on board as quickly as possible. So I would think that that that something that would be helpful is a place that can act as the conduit for that before the issues as the issues are identified and the constituencies that can help can get involved.

I wouldn't disagree with you. Where where would that be? Where that that would be one of the things I would recommend but I would have no idea where you put that. It's a good question and I unfortunately I can't answer that there's a specific place where that's going to go at this point in time.

That would be that's a hole that I see and it's our elaboration. Um, echoing the thoughts of a previous panelist here, I think disposing of the issue of city hall for any number of reasons, but for the simple visibility of that, get it off the table, get it away as an issue, and stop making it something that there's a constant rehashing my opinion.

Thanks. Do you mind repeating the question one more time? Yeah, absolutely. So, um, how should the city partner with the county, private sector, our community, um, and regional organizations? And what is one specific idea um that you would want to push or pursue in your first like 6 months on council?

Yeah, so someone else mentioned the uh Lycoming Mall and all the development there and what can be brought to the community. To build on that, I think it's also a huge opportunity to collaborate with uh state programs, specifically our state parks uh and and uh to to utilize Williamsport to market Williamsport as that gateway. We have so many outdoor recreation opportunities within a stones throw of our front doors. And I hardly hear anyone ever talk about it. And I know a whole bunch of people in a city that's what they want to do on their weekends. They want to take a day trip. They want to take a weekend trip. They want to recreate outdoors. They don't necessarily want to camp outdoors. and how convenient that our city is located so close to all of these opportunities. So, collaborating with state parks, how to uh to be more connected, have our community be more connected with those so that there is that visibility between us and this really vital resource uh could really build on that again with uh what's happening at the Lycoming Mall. this brings outdoorsmen to our area, which again seems like a very easy door to step through, to build off of. And so that actually really builds on uh what I would want to to look into in the first 6 months. How do we hit the floor running, hit the ground running with that opportunity? this new business, this huge income bringinger is going to open in the summer of 2027. How are we ready to take advantage of that?

Could I repeat the question again? Sure. I question. Yeah, I lost my focus. Um, it's how should the city partner with the county, the private sector, and regional organizations? And what is one specific idea that you would want to push or pursue in your first six or so months?

Okay, collaboration takes trust. We we have to build that trust up with with with the the local county uh constituents and know them and that they can trust us when when we say we're going to do something, we're going to do it. We're going to work collectively with you. Um, as other panelists have identified that they come not from Lansport, but other communities, we're not the only community that's facing these problems. Maybe we can reach out to other third class cities and say, "What programs are working for you? Maybe they'll work for us." And then again, maybe they'll reach out to us doing the same thing. Uh I know there's uh um a group I has blown my I can't think of it right now the the leagues of mayors the leagues of cities that the mayor has attended to they collaborate ideas there uh and then again we can build on those collaborations from near and far uh identify uh some of our community needs with our nonprofits. We have a ton of nonprofits that are doing extremely good things to our community. Let's reach out to them. How can we help you? What can we do to make your job a little easier? Um, and you be more successful um and how you operate. And there's anything that we can do to to be a good partner with them because they can identify a lot more needs than we can in this room here. Um, the first six months of the job is learning the job. I've never been a councilman. I don't know what you guys do. Um there's a lot of behind the scenes work and you see uh um your meetings on on YouTube and think that that's all you guys do once a week is have a 2-hour meeting and and that's it. There are a lot of behind the scenes work that gets done that uh people don't

see. um and learning those behind the scenes uh works, the committee meetings and the dedication that it takes and and it's going to take a long time to to just to get to know how to do the job. So the first six months be focusing and mentoring and you as council members mentoring a new person to to do the job. Um I think that you know I have a good amount of experience in working um towards your question about collaboration with a number of different types of government um different business nonprofit through my work with nonprofits and one of the things the tools that when I'm working with nonprofits that they use is this thing called relationship mapping and it's really understanding um what relationships are currently held and by who um what is being given in and take in each direction and then what are desired relationships and so as a new member of the council I would love to have a better understanding of what exists what doesn't where we could grow who holds what relationships to individuals or businesses um and I think like part of that is sort of developing a plan of what do we want or what do we need um from some of these other groups in particular I'm thinking of some of the larger um job providers in Williamsport How can we get these businesses um to contribute in other ways back to Williamsport? Um so is that other forms of investing? Is that helping develop partnerships between private and nonprofit sectors which ultimately uplift some of the goals of the city council? Um but I think it's I I love that you asked that question because I think it's really important and I know that it's not easy. Um I've talked about trust, other people have talked about trust. is not something that's gonna happen overnight but gonna take some time and so I think that's why

understanding what exists and what doesn't is really important. Um so I would say one idea to push as part of that um really thinking through a comprehensive plan of what are the things we need to be asking of some of the large and small but powerful members of this community. um where are things we can ask people to further invest in and then also um once having a better understanding of what is already going on in the council but certainly um increasing numbers of um town halls outreach whether it's farmers market or first Fridays or some kind of survey um anything like that to really understand what is in the minds of people of Williamsport um and using that to make plans instead of just sitting here and saying this would be my pet project. So, thank you.

Thanks. I'm gonna pass back.

These are loaded questions. Mhm.

Okay. So, in regards to collaboration um between the county, private sector, community, regional organizations, um I like what Steve said um where he said like we should all set up some sort of meeting um between these agencies. I think even quarterly meetings with a representative from each um area like one of city council, one member of the county commissioners. Um quarterly meetings with representatives could go far with discussing how we can better collaborate. Um it's very important to make everything run smoothly together within the first six months. Um, an idea I would probably focus on would be to learn the job as the gentleman down there stated. Um, because I would have to learn from all of you and attack the budget. I'm a neurotically organized person. I would like to probably set up some sort of Excel spreadsheet and go through as best as possible um to start looking at the budget and how we can address those concerns. um and build community connection. Uh get out in the community, rebuild trust with the community. Um listen to what they're saying and be transparent with them on the decisions that city council is making and why. I think communication with the community um and that transparency goes a long way. um whether it's something they agree with or not, just explaining why you're doing something is immensely helpful for people as far as collaboration is concerned. Um I see that local nonprofit

organizations, regional organizations are already doing things that can be seen as a resource for us. So we just need to make relationships with them. um where we can build a collaborative um rel a future relationship because there are a lot of things that they are doing that we we can learn from that that we can work together to do. Um you know without naming names there's a there's a very large employer in our area that brings in a lot of employees and the majority of those employees do not live in Williamsport. So there is a collaboration that we can work with this local big uh organization to uh when we are bringing in people to find a way to show the beauty of Williamsport and why you want to live here even though the taxes are higher. So I feel like that's a collaboration that has to happen. Um and I don't know the percentages of the employees but I do know that there's probably there is a larger percentage that live outside of Williamsport City. Um, as far as um, ideas to push the first 6 months, um, I echo what others have said about, you know, I I don't pretend to come on here and have all the answers. I do know that dissension voices are the loudest voices and I think we need to be uh, more open with the honesty and transparency so we can get to some answers. But we have to be just as vocal with the truth and just as vocal with the positive so that we can get to uh the collaboration within our community. So yeah, but try to silence some of those uh dissension voices by being just as uh just as loud.

I appreciate that. Thanks everybody.

All right. Um, first, uh, John Mackey, Williamsport City Council. I've been here now for six years. Does that sound right? Six and a half. Um, I want to mirror Jonah's, um, initial comment. Just thank you all for being here tonight. Um, it it does take a lot to put yourself out on the line like this. Um, I will correct Councilman Milikin and remind you that six years ago, four of us had to sit up in front of a completely packed trade and transit center to to have a city council debate. which at the age of 42 forced me to buy the first suit I ever owned in my entire I dodged that which I bought locally and maybe spent a little too much money on. So, right. Yeah,

I would appreciate I wore I think I wore that suit. Yeah. Anyway, next council meeting I better see it. Should buy now biter.

It probably doesn't fit anymore either. So, all right. So, next question. uh fiscal responsibility and decision-making. And I will just as a quick side note point out to not only you folks, people here, anybody that's watching at home that that the city's budget is available to view. Um anyone in the city can get a copy of that budget, take a look at it. Um just a just a point of note there. So um again, this is probably our most important job, right? we are the the stewards of the taxpayers's dollars. So, um how would you approach difficult budget decisions with the limited resources that I think you all know Williamsport has? And furthermore, how should you or how should the city evaluate whether a project is quote unquote worth it? Okay. So, in terms of making difficult difficult decisions regarding budgets, um it would be more of helping people understand that we are within certain confines that we may not be able to get to everything. um in that it's not that any one project is more important, but there may be something of urgency that we need to deal with now versus um later and having to wait. Funding wise, I honestly see a few different things that could assist with with maybe increasing some of the revenue. I know that there have been talks about um city hall and shutting it down and different things like that because you know whatever reasons we

can't afford to fix it all this stuff. We refurbished the pajama factory. Why couldn't we start to look at doing something with city hall and then making it somewhat like the pajama factory where there's people that can come into that historic building. They can do tours. They can do different things. They can start small businesses in there and create an additional revenue stream outside of that to help fix it. Now, I know with codes and and some building structuring things, there probably will be some limitations to what could happen there, but it's definitely something that's not out of the realm of possibility. Um, also in just thinking about the budget and the mall situation, um, you know, regardless of how we looked at it, the mall did bring in some outside people. Like there was there were a lot of things at the mall um that were not in other places. some of the smaller shops, some of the things that you can't find in other places. Um, the plaza that they have built outside of the mall is great, but there's still not really enough there that attracts people completely. There's not enough uniqueness there. um different stores that people actually like and want to shop at more frequently um are some of those stores that you know as Windport people we still have to travel to whether it's going to Tannerville outlets whatever it would be nice to have outlets here just saying um and can you repeat the second part of the question?

Yeah. um how should the city um evaluate whether a project is quote unquote worth it? So I think of I think of it sort of as identifying what needs are being addressed, I guess. Um, kind of like you you were saying about the levy and like a pipe bursting, things like those. It would definitely be a little bit harder sometimes to justify something that maybe isn't boosting or helping Williamsport thrive as people should see it thrive. But at the same time, you know, we talked about the economic development and all of those things as well. And my first thought was, you know, my cohorts here that are sitting near me are talking about, you know, is there a hub where some of these things can go through? We created a crisis line for mental health. why not create a crisis line for economic development and have everybody collaborate and be in on that and have somebody on call that can go out and do those things. Um so I think priority really depends upon safety um first and then you know what the needs of the community actually are at that time. I hope that explains Thank you.

I would think that as a quick overview, the items I'd want to look at with my uh fellow council people would be return on investment, social impact, time frame that the issue needs to be addressed in and other entities that could contribute to addressing the problem. Um, all of those are going to compete at various times and no one issue can control that. But you would have to develop some kind of scale to figure out which of those issues is most important in any pertaining to any single issue that's going to come up in front of council for financial consideration.

Do you mind repeating the question one more time just so that we have it fresh in our head? Absolutely. Uh again, how would you approach a difficult budget decision with limited resources and how should the city um evaluate whether or not a project is worth it?

Yeah. So to evaluate um if something you know a new project I think it's important to take all aspects obviously fiscal what is the community return what are the potential drawbacks um in terms of uh risk either to the a failure of the project uh financial loss and anything like at and then evaluating them in terms of a point system. Uh having some form of point system or rating system for each one of these things, how do you value them? Uh so for instance if uh this is a community decision. If this is a project meant to support the community rating it on a scale of cost on a scale of what is the actual uh benefit to the community. What is the amount of time that it would take to actually complete set projects? Um and then what makes it worth it? Obviously things that are critical infrastructure or for safety go above anything else as a high priority. Uh and then you can also in your from your evaluation uh use those other values to make choices uh that are not that like P 0 high high priority uh because not everything will be make or break. not everything will be a hazard that needs to be fixed right away or else the the system will crumble. Uh so having that two-part priority system uh can can determine what different initiatives are worth it or what maybe needs to be dep

prioritized for now to then be re-evaluated in the future. I know in the past the city has basically uh flown by the seat of their pants when it comes to budget processing. It seems here in the past couple years we've we've have more direction and more um looking at a plan in the future 5 10 year plan and that that continues to to to happen. Um where we are now, where we want to be and then also justification of where we are and how we're going to get there. Um, and those justifications can be such as a rating system or or or anything else that that what our measuring cup I would say would would help us determine what hard decisions are going to be ma need to be made. Um, can we afford the the same services that we provide today? Maybe in 5 years the answer is going to be no. Um, but we should try our hardest to make those decisions and justify our decisions and being transparent about the decisions and and let our community know that this is why those decisions are being made. Um, and the second part of the question was I forget that one there, Councilman Maggie.

Yeah, it's um how how should we as the city evaluate whether or not a project is worth it? Okay. And again that that's one thing uh what the project we have to evaluate those those those areas of how is this going to uh affect our community economically and socially. Um is the project going to be something that five years from now um is going to be profitable for for our community? Um I know in the past there's been some initiatives about um the KZ taxable free properties and sometimes those properties are are free of taxes for a while then after the time expires they had to pay taxes and a lot of those businesses sometime just get up and leave um because of of the incentives are gone. So if we offer those incentives for projects, we have to make sure that we stand by those incentives and um have value to them and and honor what our incentives would be for those projects.

Um when you first asked how do you approach difficult budget decisions, what immediately came to mind was um I would sort of call well-informed fearlessness. Um, I think that this Williamsport has had a number of issues that just continue to be brought up over and over again and I think there's a lot of due diligence that has been done in the processes so far. Um, and at some point we're going to have to make an unpopular decision. Um, 50% of the people aren't going to like it potentially. Um, and that's just the reality. You don't have an easy job. Um, and so someone's going to be unhappy. Um so I think how to approach those or really understanding like what is our plan um whether across political parties we agree on every single issue um I think we can come to some level of concrete understanding of where we want to head as a group have an understanding of the mayor's priorities whether the council wants to support those or not um but move forward in a direction that we are all trying to head towards Um, I think in terms of evaluating if it's worth it, like others have said, um, you know, I've worked on a number of federal grants, um, that you you have to justify every single penny of everything. Um, there's no automatic yeses, there's no handouts. Um and so I think um having a stricter level of scrutiny and what we ask um before any yeses are given especially if they are unpredicted costs or unbudgeted for costs um I think is something that's critically important in these decisions. Um but I think you know it's worth acknowledging y'all are in a tough spot. Um joining this would be a tough spot. It's not um it's not easy to just sit here and say, "Oh, if I was on the council, I'm going to solve all the budget problems." Um this is a team effort that we are all in

together. It's not going to be a fun one. Um but I think we got to face it head head on at this point.

All right. So, in regards to dealing with the difficult budget um or difficult budget decisions with limitations, I think every budget is difficult and has limitations if you're doing it responsibly. Um not to parrot what others have said, but you're never going to make everybody happy. Um I currently am chair of the community outreach committee for the Lycoming Law Association. So there I've seen where we get grant applications. Um you have to approve them, deny them, or sometimes we can send them back and revise them for a lesser amount. Um determining if it's worth it. I believe you'd have to do costbenefit analysis um for every decision. And if there's a decision that's on the line, conducting public forums, getting some public input, addressing any concerns that are brought up, and seeing if any of those could be quashed um before continuing on with the decision um and compromise. I think a lot of budget decision making is compromise. they might not get the full amount that they want, but you can pull and give where you can. Um, and you also have to look at the adverse effects that it might have down the line. Um, the impact on the people in the community and current structures that are in place and as was stated before the im immediiacy of the concerns. Is it necessary right now or is it something we can budget throughout a time period and work on down the line? Um, but yeah, costbenefit analysis is the basic umbrella term I'll use to address budget decisions.

I would approach fiscal decisions from both a right and left brain. Um, I think it's important for any organization, especially its leadership, to have people who are leftrained and rightrained. Um, just in our time together on this panel, I can tell I'm not your Excel girl. She is. Um, she's going to approach it from a space that I wouldn't and it's necessary. And I would approach it from the creativity side where hey, we need both um in order to make these really difficult uh decisions. Um, and that does, uh, require both of those concepts. Um, I'm a therapist by trade. Um, a lot of people think that means, uh, I give a lot of really good advice. Actually, I'm an expert on asking good questions. So, that's how I would approach um, my position. Um, how I would approach phys uh, fiscal decisions is by asking really good questions. At our last meeting where we were going to have the interview, um I left going, I need to know, are they going to up security of that uh uh lumber yards now that they have this resolution to serve beer? I'm like, nobody asked that. Do so that that's that's me. I'm going to ask a lot of questions. That's how I'm going to approach it. Um as far as is a project worth it, this is how I would approach it in my family um in anything is what value does it add? Who does it serve? and in a decade will it matter?

So, regarding the first question about approaching a difficult budget with limited resources, I think the city has already done this um and it was shown last year or last summer with the third party financial report. Um so the collaboration with that group um I I think was was a big movement for the city to understand that resources are limited. what resources are out there and how can we utilize those resources. Um so I think the city has already started doing that. I I think uh from an approach standpoint um the city needs to continue to collaborate with that third party, leverage their um their expertise, leverage their advice um and I think with strong collaboration with that third party um the city can make some tough decisions but with full transparency we'll be able to explain those decisions. Um, regarding evaluation of a project as an engineer, uh, this is something I do every day. Um, and and I take, uh, a very stepped approach on how to do it. The first thing is, is the project practical? Is it achievable? Um, second, what resources are needed? Are those resources are available? Third, what's the return on investment or what is the risk? Um, and then lastly, what is the timeline? Is it a project that's going to take 10 years and we're not going to see a return for, you know, generation? Um or is a project that can be executed within a year with a great return investment. Um so I I do um believe that approach um is very very valuable when evaluating is a project worth it. All right. I'm told that it is my turn

uh next. And um actually I think I I was uh this is a question that yes, Mackie and I will eventually come to blows, but hopefully we've gotten to question number nine. Um um this was a a a question that I actually thought um Grace's response a couple of minutes ago began to lead into um which is uh about relationships with other people within uh city government and within city staff. Um, as uh can you tell us about a time that you had to work with people that you disagreed with? As you know, of course, we have a multitude of political parties, also a multitude of different viewpoints within the city and within city staff. Um, and uh, and I'm about to punch one of the other Democrats, but they do. Tell us about a time you had to work with people you disagreed with. Um, what did you do and how would you build relationships with other council members? um the mayor and his administration um members of city staff and uh I guess the the final component of the question is um if you strongly agree with the decision by the majority how do you respond how do you handle that? I guess in my case the the most prominent memory for me of doing that was I was an IT person. When I came to Lycoming College there was no IT infrastructure and there were probably 24 standalone computers. Um, we had to push the college into adopting it as a serious investment until they got to the point where they began to get feedback from students and faculty that it was important. Now, as

that moved forward, we were dealing with faculty, we were dealing with students, we were dealing with administrators, we were dealing with people that had their own solutions they wanted to bring into the system. We had systemwide solutions that conflicted with some of the standalone systems. And always there were people behind all of that. And as long as we could move forward with some kind of common goal, we could get through almost any problem. But lots of times it was very hard to keep those constituencies interested in the common goal when they had their own individual priorities. So I would say it was the idea of trying to keep everyone focused, not trying to repeat the same steps and trying to identify commonalities with almost everyone I was dealing with. And that didn't always work. If there was someone that I could not identify commonality with, I'd try to find someone else that was an associate or a member of the same department or the same constituency and tried to influence them so that they could influence the person that we were trying to have come on board. So I would say it was trying to identify common goals and try and keep everyone moving the same direction.

Uh it's I I love this question because I'm sure everyone here uh will experience something like this probably every day. Um I don't agree with the people that I love the most most days. Uh but we have to work together anyways. Uh but I'll tell you a really specific example. Early on in my career, um I was actually a a high school biology teacher, fresh out of school. And uh in the curriculum, you teach sex education. And I was teaching in a rural school in the middle of nowhere. And that did not go over very well with parents. that did not go over very well with uh administration. Um, and the reason ended up being for religious reasons. Fresh out of school, I did not understand that and I was hotheaded. Of course not. This is science. We're going to teach science. Um, however, uh, one parent was very kind. Um, and she she came in after school and she started by understanding, I understand that you're a science teacher and this probably sounds really weird to you. This is what my perspective is as a deeply religious household. And she imparted on me that the most important thing when collaborating with anyone who you don't agree with is understand their side first. Because with understanding you can then lead in a way with your own beliefs even that is not necessarily as combative and is has the goal to find where that middle ground is. And so in this particular instance the middle ground was that I actually taught both. I knew nothing about abstinenceonly uh teachings at the time. I did it because that was what was

was important to the community and what was important to me was to make sure that my students knew the actual scientific background and had that education and parents respected that too. Uh so having those commonalities understanding is extremely important and uh Miss Millie if you would actually repeat the second part of the question. uh believe there were four. Um so I was like how do I put this more simply? Oh, there isn't a way. Um if you strongly disagree with the majority decision, how do you respond? Do you strongly disagree or not?

Yes. That is to say, if I'm assuming this mainly references, if the if five or six members of council make a decision that you personally don't support, um how do you respond to that

and move forward? Yeah, it starts also with understanding and also uh an understanding that tomorrow is a new day that a majority has spoken and with the positive intent that it was done for the betterment of the community. Let it rest for the day and begin a new conversation tomorrow. Just because you don't agree with something, it may end up being best for the community at the time. And time will tell. And time will also tell if it is not the best thing for the community. And in which case you can begin that work to start a new plan to begin something new to make amendment or changes. Uh so often in any sort of project the first iteration, the first deliverable isn't always the best and you often get feedback. This is what needs to happen. Uh these changes would be key. And so part of it is having that ability to if not agreeing to let that happen and then understand that tomorrow is a new day and it may change your perspective and if it doesn't work with those stakeholders, work with your colleagues so that you can find that compromise. You can move the needle in that direction. That was a that's going to be a hard one to follow because I echo everything she says. Um the being in the public service um sector mo most of my life in emergency services um conflict resolution is has always been a forefront on how to conduct yourself, how to handle yourself um at different times of needs of the community and uh

the organization that you're working with. Um there's some many times, numerous times that it probably I can go on all night about conflict resolutions and and times that I've been in um some type of disagreement. And as a young younger gentleman, uh my head wasn't always uh um open to what your thoughts really were. as we age and and get a little more experience and a little more education, we realize that everyone has a a thought different from yours and you have to respect that. Um, and you have to move forward in the common goal, whatever that common goal may be. uh if you have to make a tough budget decision, I may not agree with everyone, but everyone has a say and we voted on it and I have to stick by what the majority says uh and and be supportive of it. Um when I disagree with it or when there's something that is that needs to be really addressed, there's a time and a place for that. um sometimes not in a public sector or a public view, maybe a sidebar, maybe an executive session that we can express our our differences. But again, we have to make sure to res respect everyone and just listen. Listen to what the other person say. You don't need to interrupt. Let them get their story out and and and be respectful o of each other's thoughts. Um, I think everyone has realistically experienced this and hopefully they handle it better or well. Um, whether it's, you know, when you first start out in an entry- level job and you don't agree with your boss and the way they want you to do things or working in nonprofits, when the board of directors decides what's going on and you're like,

"No, but I do the work every day and you don't understand." Um there's those frustrations that happen all the time. Um in my work, I own a small business that works with nonprofits um particularly around um uh organizational growth and fundraising. And shockingly, they don't always want to do exactly what I recommend to them. Um and so it is really developing a set of skills, a thick skin where you can give advice, have conversation, offer informed, you know, um decisions and then you have to trust the others to use that information and make a decision. And sometimes it's going to be the one you want and sometimes it's not. And so I think like others said, um you have to have the ability to move on. um you have to have a forward mindset of maybe it wasn't this one that I wanted this decision. Um how can I work with others in the future to maybe get something um towards this larger goal? How can I help shift perspectives? Um how um yeah, how can we continue to work together? um disagreeing with the majority. Um I think it's you have the opportunity to offer your opinion. Um and unfortunately whether it's the other members on the council you don't agree with or what I think is the you know biggest responsibility um is your constituents is whether you have an unanimous decision on the council there will probably still be some people letting you know that they didn't like the decision you made and so knowing that that is an important responsibility of being on the city council um is learning to devel develop and really handle those skills um with

um maturity um and growth as you as you work through that. Um yeah, that's all right. um working with people I disagree with. My job in its bas basic form is adversarial. Um I'm a defense attorney. I every single day I disagree with the prosecution or with the judge or with my client. Um, there are more times a day that I can count that I have discussions with other parties involved either on the other side of the aisle or with my own clients um, telling disagreeing with them, telling them things they don't want to hear or listening to things that I don't want to hear. Um, for example, a client of mine I may think needs treatment or needs resources, whereas the Commonwealth may think they need to go to state prison for a decade. Those are difficult things to resolve, but every single day, um, you take it, you have to respect the other side, see where they're coming from, communicate with them, um, and above all respect them. I think there's not an attorney or a judge um that hasn't told me something I didn't like to hear or disagreed with a perspective of mine and I still respect every single one of them. Um I also work with family. Um I worked for my family for about 20 years and you disagree every day. I think I fought with my father at the restaurant more than anybody else. But you respect the underlying decision and

you compromise. You work through it. Um but above all I would say respect other points of view and if a majority disagrees with my perspective I would probably express my idea but the majority is the majority. If the majority decides something that's what they decide. Um it's a public position. You're publicly elected. It's not always going to go your way and you have to have tough skin and respect that that's what the majority decided.

Um, I like to think of myself as thriving in the in between. Um, I I like being there. I like um I appreciate the opportunity to hear both sides to do my own research and form my own opinion. Um, I'm comfortable sitting in the middle of opposing opinions. If you've ever done marriage therapy or been a marriage therapist, you know what that's like to be on opposing sides. And I'm comfortable in that space, not reactive, um, choosing to listen. Um, you know, in my current practice, I teach the soft skills of leadership, which would be, you know, conflict resolution, um, regulating your emotions, learning to regulate the emotions of those around you, not being reactive. So, I'd like to hope that I teaching that, that I do practice that. Um, you know, I tend to believe that ethical leaders are leaders who can change their mind. And so I would hope that I'd approach it in that way that if there's uh a side that I've listened to um and it it it makes sense and is for the best of the goodwill, then I would um change my mind. Um but in those times where it's important for me to speak up to share my opinion but then at the end of the day support if it's a elected position. So regarding the first question about um working with people you disagree um you know so I I have this issue uh it seems like on a weekly basis around projects and a lot of times it comes down to uh budget versus schedule and the biggest thing that I find is finding the commonality find the common ground um reviewing the facts and let the facts drive the decision um you know so you

know in some instances it makes sense to overspend to get the budget because of what the rate of return is in other other areas it doesn't but let the facts drive the decisions clearly articulate and communicate the facts um and find that commonality that common ground to agree on. Uh the second question about how to build relationships with uh other council and with the current staff I think it all starts at trust doing what you say you're going to do. Um I think that is the most important thing an individual can can uh do is do what they say they're going to do. um understand what they're passionate about, understand what their responsibility is, um and understand how uh future collaborations can occur um to um um on on those commonalities. Uh the third question um if the majority agrees um and I were to disagree I I think the biggest thing there is understanding the others perspectives understanding their viewpoints understanding where they're coming for coming from. Um I think by doing that understanding their background understand where they're coming from uh will help lead to an explanation of of of their decision that was made. Thank you. Um, first of all, I just want to say uh, Councilwoman Neely, that on the inside I was definitely like, "Oo, pick me, pick me." My inner child was going back to first grade. Like, this is for me. Um, I deal with this almost every day. I am a very participatory leader. Um, and the staff that I work with are great. Um, as an executive director, you know, I have to I guess I don't have to, but I sit in meetings with my staff. Um, and we

discuss very important things from treatment all the way up to budget grants that I'm applying for, different things like that. So, there are times that we don't agree on anything. Um, sometimes it's it's um in regards to ethics, sometimes it's in regards to regulations and guidelines, right, from the state. But regardless of what's going on, we do have the ability to talk and work through those things. and they also have the ability to share like hey I don't agree with this because if there's something that comes up that you know maybe I don't agree with it right now or maybe we can't do it right now but maybe there are some aspects that we can look at to see how we can get there. Um I'm always very open-minded when it comes to different things as far as treatment and the way that we run our facilities. um because we have three facilities and three different counties and each of those counties are very different demographically and in dynamics of the offices. So, it's very hard to say what Williamsport is doing is going to work for Harrisburg. It doesn't work most of the time. Um, so I thrive in those types of situations where we don't always agree. You know, there are times that as an executive, I can say, "Okay, this is what the way it's going to be and this is what we're doing." But most of the time, that's not my stance. I like for them to explain to me how you think this will be helpful.

Okay, if that's the case, how do we implement this? Where do we go from here? And get all of the input and the information that I need to really make an informed decision. So, at the end of the day, I continue to stay open-minded. I am definitely a lifetime learner. I'm never the person that's like, I can't learn anything else. I know everything. Um, so my staff really appreciate that a lot and I'm very transparent with them. Um, so I feel like that makes it a little bit better for them to come to me with different things or disagreements or be able to say whatever it is that they need to say. So that disagreement is never a point of anger or it's never a like I'm sucking my teeth and I'm storming out like I'm five. Um it's always a learning opportunity. It's always a growth opportunity. It's always a okay, if we can't do it this way, maybe how can we do this better? How can we do it a different way? How can we stay within the guides of what we're doing now and still accomplish the same thing? I think the common goal is is very necessary to keep in mind at that point and understand where it is that we're trying to go and what it is that we're doing at that time. Well, I along with the other council members here, first and foremost, would like to thank all of you very much for your interest in wanting to serve your community. Um, yeah, it's not easy and it certainly takes a lot more time than the public perceives. Um, no, I I I do

very much appreciate and I'm sure everybody else up here would would echo my sentiments, uh, your insights, your answers, the different approaches, perspectives. Uh, they all bring a lot of great value to who each of you would would be as a as a member of this council and the approach that you would take. Um, my question is two parts and I'm really going to be paying attention. Um, not that I haven't then, but um because the first part is definitely hits home and the second part is even though up here I'm usually quiet when the microphones are off and the cameras are off, I'm usually pretty loud. So, I really want to understand how everybody else would deal with this. So my first the first part of the the question I have is how would you handle a situation where residents strongly oppose a decision that you support? And the second part of my question is how do you ensure that all verses are heard not just the loudest one

voices. Is that what I said? You said verses. I'm not trying to sing. Oh I'm sorry. Yeah. We've been listening to some practice here in the background. I don't know if you guys can hear it over there. So, how do you ensure all voices Thank you, are heard, not just the loudest ones.

So, for the first part, uh when when there's strong disagreement about something that I supported, um part of it, and I think the really human response is that you want people to understand you and where you're coming from. However, that's not necessarily the role of a public servant. um a public servant. Uh yes, it is so that others understand you. Uh but you're there to serve. Uh so uh how how to address feedback, how to um accept and then and and go forth with feedback for something that I supported um but but the community does not is to start with hearing that what is the actual issue? What is the disconnect and why is it there? Is it an emotional response? a response because of finances and the perceived corruption. Is it um something deeper uh having to do with either character or or a mistrust of how the city's being run um and understanding that and only once someone else has been heard are they willing to listen to you. And so, uh, really focusing on, okay, what is this? What is this feedback? Why are you not hearing that? Here's my beliefs and why I would why I went forward with this, why I pushed for this. Here's how it can support the uh you as members of Williamsport. How how can it support you? how can it support this constituents? Uh something that I might again might have pushed forward. Um and

how even though it is not currently uh acceptable or or favored, how can it still benefit those in which don't favor it? And again, similar to what I have said previously, tomorrow's a new day. pushed it forward, believed in it, and and then found other perspectives. The next day is something new. Everyone can change what they're doing, how they're addressing things because because things change because perspectives change because the situation itself changes. Um, do you mind repeating the second part because two parts are hard?

No, not at all. And I'm going to try and articulate it correctly this time. So appreciate that. Thanks, Liz. H how do you ensure all voices are heard, not just the loudest ones?

I think that's really deliberate. Uh it's really easy to hear squeaky wheel. It's really easy to hear disscent because descent, as someone said, I don't know who, uh is really loud. Uh it's important to actively seek out the voices who aren't being heard. Uh oftentimes I'm thinking just of a a situation of like city council. The people in attendance are often the ones with the strong opinion. However, uh a strategy to to hear the voices that aren't heard. Go to the community events. Knock on doors. Join groups. Attend groups. Meet people you've never met before. You'll hear their perspectives and it's they probably weren't at the council meeting. They probably didn't even have a strong perspective or a fully fleshed out thought on what they wanted. But when you seek out those spaces that you wouldn't necessarily hear those strong voices, it's where you will inevitably hear the voices that didn't even know uh needed to come to the forefront.

Thank you. to handle uh residents that disagree with their decision. First part is is listening listening to what they have to say uh and listening to to their thoughts, their points, their views and see if you're the common value between your views and theirs to discuss why you come to the decision that you did. Um usually there's some common ground that we can come up uh agree upon. Um, and maybe that common ground is that we agree to disagree sometimes, but show that person, that residence with respect. Listen to them and encourage that person to be more vocal prior to our decision-making process. Like like uh she said about going to certain events throughout the community, First Fridays or or whatever the event may be, encourage that residents to to become more heard uh more vocal prior to our decisions. Um maybe I can see your point of view, but my decision has already been made. Our decision as city council has already been made and we might not be able to go back to to correct it or or or see uh your view. So be more encourage the residents to to be a little more vocal. Well, that means for us as council members also to to have that transparency, be out there for the community to see us, to be out there, that they know that there that we are approachable, that, you know, there there's a council person that maybe I can go up and speak to and and have that uh type of relationship with our community. Um, and as Councilman Palooi says, um, I I can be quite vocal

sometimes, too, when I need to be. Um, and the squeaky wheel sometimes uh shouldn't get the the oil, as they say. That's because some of those times those conversations can be uh passionate and you feel deeply rooted about a conversation. It doesn't mean that you're wrong. It just means you have great passion. And I'm kind of sometimes um taken back by that person. I don't say taken back, but I agree with the person, their passion. Even though I may not agree with their thought, I agree with the passion that they have. Um because that means they still care and they still want to do good. Um, in terms of how to handle residents that strongly oppose, um, I mean that doesn't sound particularly fun. Um, no. Um to be to be realistic, I I think coming from a place of strong conviction and trust in the group and in democratic decisions that we are operating from a place of long-term care for this community and not everyone is able to see the long-term vision. So whether it's like people have mentioned and I'm sure others will, you know, transparency or explaining how things will work in a short time to get us to a long-term goal. Um but I think there is a lot of trust that has to exist within this group whether you agree on everything or not. Um that we are collectively working towards a better Williamsport. Um and you have to be firm in knowing that um because there will be unpopular decisions that get made on a number of things. Um in terms of how do you ensure all voices are heard? Um I don't know if you've had this opportunity at a

doctor's office where they ask you a question. Do you learn best by listening, by reading, or by demonstration? And I like to think of that um when I'm working with different types of people in terms of how do I make sure that everyone has all of the opportunities they need to fully understand the background on an issue. So is that you need to read it all multiple times? Do we need to have a conversation that's within the purview of what is allowed within meetings and the scope of our responsibilities? Is it that you need to talk to an expert about this topic? Like what is it? um that is needed for you to make um a a decision that you're confident in. And so I think that applies to within the council, within other bodies that we work with, um within other officials. Um and then I think it's sort of also to the community. Um we've talked a lot about town halls. Those are the people who are bold and brave and willing to talk into a microphone and say their opinions. But what are ways that we can get the quiet people or the people who um have the least amount of trust in the government um to be willing to share their opinion with us. Um and so I think that's you know there's many options. I'm not going to suggest a bunch that would cost a bunch of money because that would be contradictory to everything all of us are saying. Um, but finding ways beyond just the Facebook comments of the world, um, and really trying to dive into some of the the juicy meat, um, and what the people who are unheard, you we have to seek it out. Um, they're not going to come to us. So, I think that applies from constituents to fellow council to anyone we would work with.

Thank you. All right. So, how would I handle a situation where the public is against me? Um, disagreed with, not against. Okay. Same thing. Not not quite pitchforks, but yeah.

So, I'd say to be transparent. That's number one. I believe transparency is of utmost importance and just clear communication with the public. Um, and just giving an explanation. Explain your point of view. Explain why you did something. Um, that goes a long way. Even like real world example, if I forget to ring someone's food in at the restaurant, just ignoring that and not saying anything to the table makes it worse and they're wondering what happened. But if I go up to the table and I'm like, "Hey, this is my mistake. This is what I did. this is why this is happening. You get a much better response from people that way. Um you have to have some tough skin if you're in a public position. Um encourage involvement in the future and also um I think we have to hold ourselves to a higher standard as city officials. Um listen, don't argue with people. Just always sort of listen for common ground. Try to make connections with people. um and encourage them to voice their opinion in the future. Um how would I ensure that all voices are heard, not just the loud ones? Um engage the community. Get out and talk to people. Go in places you normally would not go. Um make an effort however you have to to engage in different dynamics of the community as well. Um, and I also jotted down different formats, maybe not just a public forum where people have to come speak. There's also online input options, um, other things like that that are more passive than aggressive for people to communicate with us through. And I think

that if we get out in the community and we are one with them, they'll feel comfortable talking to us about things. Um, and we have to be purposeful in seeking them out as well.

So, transparency is obviously the buzzword tonight. And, um, I'm going to try to demonstrate that by telling you this is the number one uh, thing that I considered not putting my name in for, and it's this that the idea that, hey, I'm not going to please everyone. And from a personal perspective, I don't like that. um I want to please people. I want them to understand where I'm coming from. So that was something that I thought long and hard about was could I handle that? And and from a personal perspective, I think it would require me to come up with like a tiered kind of uh pyramid of this is when I'm not going to engage. This is when I'm going to listen. Um this is when I'm going to um put put my energy into efforts of understanding more. And I think for me that that would be su that would help me be successful in not getting in my head about that because although I mentioned that I do like living in the in between that's for me um it's more difficult on a public forum. Um so how do I ensure all voices are heard? Um not just the loudest ones. Um, again, I think that pyramid for me, um, and then putting my energy and efforts, I I don't exactly know what this would look like, but I started doing something recently in the past 2 months, and I go to Sweet Spire every Friday. Uh, usually get there about 9:00, and I've told all my friends and and family that I do that, and people just show up, and uh, we have time together. Even my mom showed up one day to talk to me about something, but she showed up to my sweet spire time. And I learned more about my mom and my mom learned more about me in that time even though I'm in her home every day. So, I don't know exactly what that looks like for our community. You'd have to think about that a little bit more. But um using a forum in a space that's um safe where people can share uh their their feelings, their thoughts um might

be something that I learn more from in a space like that than um you know Facebook or you know some other space. So, regarding the first question regarding how to handle when residents oppose. So, as every council member um has went through and I recently went through it, you know, in order to get on the primary, you have to get your petition signed. To get your petition signed, you have to knock on hundreds and hundreds of doors. Sometimes you don't know who's on the other side of that door. Sometimes they're going to be fully agreed and align with what your viewpoint. Sometimes they're only going to talk national politics and fully disagree with you. Um, what I learned going through that process is the last thing you want to do is prove that you're right and they're wrong. Um, the best thing to do is listen, understand their viewpoint, understand their perspective, understand where they're coming from, and at the end of the day, we're all human. We all have commonality. There is common ground all between us. So, exploit that. Exploit that commonality. Um, and just at times agree to disagree. Um, all voices being heard. So, a couple things there. Um, and and a couple of the other cans have mentioned it, you know, using different platforms to collect uh people's voices. Um, whether it's Facebook, whether it's email, uh, phone call. Um, but at the end of the day, um, it's very important to be open, to be reachable, um, to have multiple forms of communication uh, that people can reach out to you. Um, second expression, I use that to work at work all the time. Go where the action is. go into the neighborhoods, talk to people, have monthly open discussions, have community nights, uh be visible, be present, um be approachable. Um I think that's very key um to have um some set schedule throughout the neighborhood um throughout the city where people can

approach um and have open discussions with you. Thank you. So, how to handle a situation where I guess the public disagrees with you? Um, I think the most important thing for me is just engaging my active listening skills. Um, something I do every day, something that is very common to me. Um, and it's kind of like a listen and we don't judge thing, right? So, just because you may disagree with something that I supported doesn't necessarily make whatever you supported invalid. It just means that there was a difference in the opinion or what happened. So being able to understand their perspective and why they don't support or agree with I should say what the decision was and then you said about she

how do you ensure that all voices are heard not just the loudest one.

So as a person I'm never the loudest person in the room. So, um, I'm typically quiet as a church mouse. I'm very observant. Um, so I would be going to the person probably who's more like me and the person who is observing and looking around and, you know, not being that boisterous person. That's the person I'd want to hear from. That's the person I'd probably pick out of the crowd and call out and ask, you know, what their thoughts are and what's going on in their mind. Um the other thing is is I I hate to say this but there is a very strong strong connection with social media whether it's X, Facebook, Tik Tok, um Instagram, it doesn't matter. Um you can post a little brief poll on any of those things and people are able to answer. You can go out and talk to people. You can meet people where they're at. Maybe people are coming out of the doctor's office. Maybe people are coming from treatment. Maybe people are going into court. Maybe people are out shopping. Um I'm thinking of just being in Sam's Club the other day and you know they have the people and they're like, "Hey, you want to win a gift card?" Like, and it's like, "No, I don't want to win a gift card." But if you see like a council person out and they're like, "Hey, we have this hot button issue and we'd really like your opinion um and you just engage and really talk to people and get to know them a little bit better and what their views are of the community and what their ideas are that are surrounding what they feel like they need as a participant in the community or the city.

as far as being in the minority position. Um, I think you just have to believe in what you did, believe in the position you took, be able to support it with the greatest of transparency, and listen in earnest to those that disagree with you in the community. And as far as trying to gather up as many different opinions as you can within the community, get in as many spaces as you can certainly do much more listening than talking. I think listening is listening is so much more important than talking most of the time that uh that's where you do your learning and that's where you convince people that you really care. Thank you. Thank you very much.

So we are we are at the last question. We do have two parts to this question. The one part is relatively easy to answer. The other one is going to take a little bit more of your input. Um but before I get into that again I cannot thank you enough for being here tonight. And what I will say is you have all presented yourselves in a fantastic manner. And I will also stress the fact that next year is an election year. So if you are not selected tonight, please keep that in the back of your mind because we are going to have four seats on this council that are going to be up for reelection. Some may decide to run again, some may not decide to run again. Uh and when these four seats were up six years ago now, uh there was eight people that ran. Yeah,

there was six. There was six people that ran for council at that time. It was also the election of the mayor in that year in 2019. So, it's a very exciting cycle. Um, it'll get a lot of media coverage, so you get to do this again, I'm sure. Um, you'll get interviewed by newspapers and so on, and you won't be able to go to Wegman's because people are going to know who you are as you walk around. They're going to stop you and ask you about all these issues in public. He's not speaking from personal experience. Not at all. Not at all.

But again, thank you all very much. you've all presented yourself wonderfully and um it it's been a valuable use of your time to be here to share your viewpoints on how you feel the city of Williamsport um should operate and and the council in particular. So the two parts for the closing question are are you a registered voter a member of a political party and if so which and then why would why should you be selected over the other candidates? First part again Republican. The first part has to do with party and voting. Okay. So um are you a registered voter?

Yes reg registered voter. Um Republican party. Um the what makes me probably stand out most from the rest of the candidates is the public service that I served for the city of Lansport for over 22 years um with the burough fire. um become uh during that tenure of service came became very familiar how the city operates um and the the way the department heads uh conduct business uh and how um the city council meetings uh affect um every aspect of the city. Um, one of the greatest values of of the city is their employees. Also, um, my former employer when I was a young lad offered many incentives on how to do business better and be more effective about it. Um, one of the things that is discouraging for us in the 20ome years of service is that no one really asked the employees of the city, what can we do to make your job better? What can you see that would be more cost effective in doing your job? So, we we have a a valuable workforce that sometimes we need to reach out to and say, "Hey, what is your thought? What is your idea on how to make this uh um business uh more profitable for our our customers? Our customers are constituents. You know, um when we have a a a bad snowstorm, everyone complains that the the snow's not being plowed off the streets quick enough. Um, well, there's a maybe there's a reason why that there's, you

know, there are more effective ways we can handle those situations. Um, and we need to listen to our employees and what they have to say because they might have more valuable input. And being part of the city of Wansport's workforce for over 20 years, um, I can see those valuable assets that sometimes we just let slip by. uh um and they are the faces of our community. Um the police department, the fire department, the streets and parks and how those folks interact with our community is vitally important. Um they carry a a a deep role in what our image is and how the city conducts our business and how we can take care of our city residents. Um, and being familiar with that, I I I believe that my uh experience can be very beneficial in in helping out with that.

Um, yes, registered voter, Democrat. Um, why me? I think like a couple of others, um, I made the choice to live in Williamsport. I didn't grow up here. I didn't even grow up in Pennsylvania. Um, and it has been a privilege to learn about Williamsport, to become invested in Williamsport and its successes. Um, over the last several years while I've been while I've been here. I think that brings a really unique perspective, not just as a new resident, but I brought my business here. It operates remotely, but I know what it is like to um to adapt to living here to Sorry, letting the good people do their work. Um to um to what the realities of working in Williamsport are, what might bring other people here, um what works, what doesn't. Um, I have a lot of background. Um, with public service, it's truly whether it's been working for or with nonprofits, it's what I've dedicated my career to. Um, I think that has brought a lot of um specific skills that I can use from things like um running projects with budgets of over a million dollars, writing and reviewing grants that have been seen before city and councils or in county commissions. Um, working with a wide range of people, bringing a fresh perspective. Um, but most importantly, I'm I'm willing to put in the work. Um, this is more than just a couple hours every other week at a meeting. Um, I want to have the opportunity to serve Williamsport by doing the research, by understanding the background, by doing the hard um, not pretty background grunt

work that goes into this job. um with the opportunity to help my fellow um community members. So, thank you. All right. So, currently I'm a registered Republican. I am and always have been nonpartisan. Um, I do not believe in political parties. I don't like to label myself as a political party. I've been registered Democrat, been registered more recently Republican. Um, I do believe there are pros and cons to each party. Um, I've never fit concretely into either. I'm more of a centrist. I don't like the extremes of either side. Um, and I do think that we all as humans have more in common than not when we boil it down outside of political parties. Um, why me? So, I feel like I know this community inside out. I grew up here. I went to school here. I moved away and came back. I own a home here um on High Street. I've worked in spaces where I've gotten to know personally um high rollers and every day I work in spaces where I more importantly get to experience and get to know people who are the most vulnerable in our community. Um people who are dealing with criminal issues, housing issues, mental health crisises, um substance abuse issues. I think that gives me a unique perspective. um just working with people every day that really like need the community's help

more than ever. Um I love our community. I've always been involved in our community um through the local businesses and seeing my family grow up working in local business um trying to fuel the downtown economics and survive through pandemic through any issue that arises. Um but yeah, I think I'm a workingclass person who offers a unique perspective of all kinds um for city council. I am a registered voter. I am registered independent and um for many people that view that, they may see that as a copout. Um, for me, um, it's always has been, um, an honor to be able to look at multiple situations, to look at both sides, to research, and to form my own opinion. So, I use that same practice in um, all other areas of my life. So, it makes sense to use that um, in when I when we're speaking politically. Um, I would like to challenge your precedent of maybe putting someone in based just on um, party. I can't imagine that this situation has happened too many times. Um, in addition, um, I think it's a time to be able to uh, pick your choice um, and not stand on something, you know, that looks like an election year. So, that might be a challenge to you. Um, what makes you stand out most? Um, I echo a little bit about moving to Williamsport. We chose Williamsport specifically to live. When we came here to interview for a job, we chose Williamsport um, city. Um, and we've embedded our family. I have six kids who either are in the school district or have gone through the school district. So, I have some experience with uh,

various uh, ways of life here in Williamsport. Um, I'm a business owner. Um, I work downtown and I have a PhD in organizational leadership management. So, I have some insight into the systems that uh help or hinder organizations and hopefully that knowledge could um uh help this organization. And I've been an LPC, a licensed professional counselor for two decades where I have worked um really honed in on my listening skills, on asking good questions and helping people with high intensity situations. I think I bring a steadiness to any organization that I work with. So, regarding um registered voter, yes, I'm a registered Republican. Um still, to be honest, I didn't know how tonight was going to go. So, I did create an open statement um that I do feel fits um the answer to this question quite nicely. Um so, as most know, back in November, I did run um as a Republican nominee uh for an open position on council. Um knocked on hundreds and hundreds of doors, met uh wonderful people all throughout this city. um and more importantly heard firsthand um what was important to them what they wanted and what they didn't want. Um I demonstrated to the public first um that I wanted to serve them um to improve Williamsport. Though my campaign was unsuccessful, um it is still my very strong desire to become a member of city council. Um it is my aspiration to make Williamsport a thriving and and improve the quality of life for the residents of this great city. During my career as a paramedic and now as an engineer, I have led many urgent situations, many complex organizations through success through strong collaboration, strong problem solving and sound leadership skills. As a member of this community, I understand the challenges that the city faces and I have the nec and the necessary experience to help solve those

challenges. Um so um like I said during my uh experience of running um that started back um well over a year ago um really got the great opportunity to meet hundreds if not thousands of people of this great city. Heard firsthand um exactly what was important to them, what they wanted and what they didn't want. um which uh taught me a lot and taught me a lot um what this city uh needs and if selected um bring that knowledge um to council and uh help improve uh the lives for all the residents of the city.

Can you repeat the question please? Yes, absolutely. So, are you a registered voter, a member of a political party, and if so, which one? And then why should you be selected over the other candidates? So, this is going to take me out a little bit, but no, I'm not a registered voter and I'm not in a political party.

Um, a lot of that throughout my life was based on religious purposes um with my family. Um, as I've grown older, again, I'm a lifetime learner, so I have began to educate myself on politics and am aware of the political climate as it is stands right now. Um, but continuing to learn about both sides still. Um, why me? I feel like I'm a normal person who's a part of the community. Um, I get to see people in different aspects of their lives. Um, again, you know, I've I've done some grant writing. I've secured monies for different things through DDAP, through Armstas, um, working with West Branch. Um, so I know my community resources. I know my community for the most part. Um, and as I said, I do think there is some advantage to being born and raised in Williamsport and seeing how it's changed over the years and knowing that there are some things that definitely need to change more for the better. Registered Democrat. Um, it's going to sound hokey and it may sound even insincere, but my sister and I are the only Americans in our family. My parents came to this country in 1958. All the rest of my relatives are in Italy. I've been there a couple a few times to compare and contrast with American society and American outlooks and European outlooks. But in addition to that, I've been pretty much a lifelong member or lifelong member of the

Williamsport community. I've seen what felt like in my early childhood much worse times around here. But I also understand there are a lot of people hurting here and that we need to get them the attention that they deserve. In addition to the fact that we need to keep a forward-looking outlook on how to William sport ahead. Um I think I offer a unique perspective for that and I would like the opportunity to share it with you. Yes, I am a registered voter. I am a registered Democrat. And why me? Um, I am, as I've mentioned before, newer to this community. However, I'm old hat to communities like this. I was born and raised in Colorado and uh more specifically in a small mountain town with very similar issues and very similar culture. Um it's I have seen a town uh struggle and I have also seen that town uh reform and thrive. Professionally uh I have worked in uh the forest service as a public school teacher and now more recently in a in a corporate setting. uh in these various roles uh both obviously stakeholder uh communication huge um and developing relationships with individuals you agree with

and then forming coalitions with individuals you do not agree with. Educating the public and letting them know what resources are available and what what is not. um and then formulating that, creating a process and seeing it through to uh completion are all skills that I have been able to cultivate over those time and over those careers and so I would be able to bring that to the city council.

Thank you very much. No, no, no. Um, Mr. Garner, if you just want to set that on the um mic stand right there, please. I would appreciate it so it didn't get um knocked over and all that. Uh that does conclude uh our interview portion for the uh council vacancy. So now we are going to move on to item number four on the agenda. Mrs. Frank, if you would please. So, we have a resolution of the city council of the city of Williamsport appointing blank as the city council member.

Can I have a motion, please? So, moved. Second.

Okay. Members of council, we just sat here and we listened to some great candidates talk about what their vision is for Wingsport, why they feel that they should be uh nominated or selected for the vacancy on city council. We have a great cross-section uh from the community. Uh we've got folks that have lived here their whole lives. We've got folks that have moved here very recently and we've got folks that have decided to move back to Williamsport. Uh all great testaments to our community and what we have uh but act where is it going to be in the future. So we appreciate the uh active role that you have played in this interview process. So I'll open the floor to um my fellow members if they have questions or if they'd like to start debate amongst ourselves. Dr. Uh, I'll take a stab at I kind of starting this and I'll echo a lot of the sentiments from the group to all eight of you that are here tonight. Um, you know, I appreciate you sticking your neck out going through the process. Um, it's not easy at all. Um, I I remember 2019 specifically very vividly. Um, and so that is very gracious. Um, I was impressed with each of you. Um, I I I to be frank, I I thought each of you represented yourselves well. I think that each of you had pockets within the questions that like you crushed it to be candid. Um, and so, you know, I think regardless of where this decision goes, um, we've got a lot of great people here that make it, um, a pretty level playing field in terms of who we're we're picking from here. Um, and I'll also note, um, you know, by my count, four of these people are not from the area.

Correct. And as a Pennsylvania transplant to Williamsport, I I appreciate that specifically. Um, and putting yourself forward in that extra situation is not easy as well. So, I would just commend the four of you and thank you for picking Williamsport as your home. Um, I'm going to Are we making motions to amend or just making a nomination? How do you want to play that? We can make motions to amend. We can if there's anything that other members of council would like to add. Before we do that, uh, I feel the motion to amend, okay, would be the best way to go about it.

Okay. Um, I'll I'll make the motion the first motion then and we'll see where it goes. Um, I'll make a motion to amend this to reflect the pointing Dave Dinger to the seat. And I'm going to note that for a couple different reasons, right? Um as I noted, you know, every candidate did phenomenal, right? Um and you know, with with all things I think being um fairly level, um there's a few things about Dave that I think stick out um that are advantageous for for the group. Notably, so this term has what, one year, eight months left, right? Correct. um

January of 28 is when this particular term would end. um in that what 16 18 months there's there's a lot of stuff that's going to be coming through right um and I think you know the themes were captured here right budget levy economic development um frankly a theme that I don't know how much we talk about but I think is important is public trust right um it's a big one um we're seeing it ac across the the spectrum here and so you know I I I throw Dave's name out there to amend this for a few different reasons, right? Um, you know, I individually value the fact that he has gone through the process. While he was not successful, um, there is value in having somebody that has gone through the process. Um, and I think frankly has started to build that trust with the public and a lot um, of a more hands-on ability perspective. um that is advantageous to us, notably in the next 18 or so months with some of the things we've got to do. Um and secondly, um with all due respect to all of our candidates, um every candidate's got a learning curve in front of them. Um I think Dave's is probably a little bit less and I think that is valuable to us um over the rest of the term. Um thirdly, you know, I'll I'll be the one to say it. Um you know uh I I I do think there is value in the president of same party um of the person who we are filling. Um, and we've done that pretty recently, right? We did it in 2019 with with uh Mayor Slaughter's vacant seat with with David Banks, who also happened to run in in in in that situation

and had a a public profile and kind of started that effort as well. And then in 2019 when former President um Williamson resigned, we appointed that person with a Republican, Jerry Fosant, who had previously served actually. And so I think there was a level of the the trust aspect there that is certainly important. Um so uh a few different things that stick out to me with all things being fairly level. And then frankly, you know, when you look at Dave's experience, um the combination of engineer and former public safety paramedic experience, um I think are both additional skill sets that could be very valuable to us. with a number of the issues going on. So, I'll throw that out there to the group. That's my motion to amend.

I would second your motion. Um, and if I may also add a few things. Um, to everything that Councilman Yoder just mentioned as far as valuing everybody's insights and perspectives greatly. Um, like I said, I was paying a lot of attention

and whether there's a D or an R or an I next to your name or nothing next to your name, um, as we were going down through these answers, you'd be amazed at how whether what party you're affiliated with, how similar a lot of our answers are when we focus on what is best for Williamsport. um and we don't let a lot of the outside national political platform come in and and work its way into creating disscent here that we are all able to come together and focus on William Sport. And so um I do second Councilman Yodar's um nomination for Mr. Dinger, but I also want to remind each and every one of you that when we focus on Williamsport, we're an awful lot more similar than we aren't. Um, and that I think is what ultimately is going to help guarantee Williamsport success when we focus on us and care about us. Um, I don't think there's any way that we can fail. So, I would like to thank each and every single one of you again for coming out and taking the time and the effort and the energy and sharing your opinions, your viewpoints, and your perspectives. All unique. Um, and I do appreciate hearing every single one of them. Thank you. Miss, did you have something to add about the motion?

Um, well, Austin, if we have a second, is it now moved to discussion on this motion? A motion. Everybody just discuss as a

so to be candid for the record I mean like my my intent of that mechanism was simply just to to get the dialogue going like yeah sobody's Yep. Yeah,

before we vote on the amendment to be clear on correct you're right down say everything motion as amended

so I believe what you're asking is can can we discuss Yeah. Um, not to say the same thing over and over again, I have a a lot of respect for you all and I would love to connect with each and every one of you because there's a lot of work to be done in our community.

And one thing I I learned a couple, you know, after running my race, it was a moment of clarity when I realized that I can help my community in more ways than just being on city council, right? Um, with that being said, um, I think Dave is a knowledgeable guy. I got to know him a little bit during my campaign. Um, I can see him being on counsel. I think that I am, I guess, slightly uncomfortable with the thought of we've got a community of 27,000 people and I would think I don't know the exact number, but I would think that half of them are probably women and having a council with six men and one woman. Um, though Liz is a strong voice,

I'm enough woman for all of you. With that being said, um I move to amend

Dr. Yodar's motion to amend um by substituting um Dave Dustinger's name with Giovana Danielle's name. I think when I think about Bonnie Catz, you being a Republican woman who owned a business downtown, I think Giovana is part of downtown Williamsport. Candidly, I think having an attorney's perspective on this council would be helpful. And that's that. I'll uh second that. And I I Yeah, look um I think one of the questions tonight was you how how would you deal with being in the minority of a decision, right? And you know, precedent, no precedent. Um, I went about this from a from a perspective of I I I came up with a scoring system. Giovanni, you'd be happy. It's a spreadsheet. Scored everybody. Um, and uh, you know, to be honest, based on my scores, you and Dave are tied, right? Um, and I I I do think that there is a lot of value in the fact that they've ran a campaign and and actually got out there and did all that behind the scenes hard work um that uh that it takes to to to try and get elected. I've done it twice. Um I will not be doing it again. Um and that would lead me into my next thought.

Open seat, ladies and gentlemen. Open seat. Um, I I am just extremely encouraged by by you all sitting here tonight and I and I I look forward to and I hope that you all decide to run and and go through that process because you really do get a sense of of what people think and and what they actually want. Um, but I I do agree with Jonah um that um if we're going to go down the road of precedent that that um based on everything I've seen here tonight that that Giovana that uh has has the slight edge in my opinion. No.

Is this when I got to say something? Anything that anybody else would like, Dad? I think I have to say that first.

Yeah, exactly. And um and I will confess that I I walked in here tonight not being willing to make up my mind because uh because from looking at the resumes that we have before us, we had a number of very qualified applicants. And I was um frankly delighted. I actually uh sent a link to John about a city council meeting in um somewhere else in Pennsylvania. I don't remember where where uh where three sitting council members got up and resigned and appointed three of the applicants in the audience because um they they had a they had a pool of good applicants and I was like Mackie it's your chance man but

and it probably should be mine too. Um that said, I um I was on council when we appointed two separate council members, both of them because of in part related to party to party affiliation, partly qualifications, partly party affiliation. Um and I sat on council with four Republicans who voted to appoint a Democrat to a vacancy because it had been vacated by a Democrat. Um, so I feel very strongly um that that is an important tradition to uphold. It's not just Williamsport. It is most communities in the Commonwealth, I believe, was what our solicitor told us. And um and um that seems to me to be an important value. um uh put it this way. If I have been the recipient, if I have been the beneficiary of that um of that policy at some point in the past, I feel as though I need to keep it going and pay it forward because I want to be the beneficiary of that policy at some point in the future. Um that said, uh we do have um I I would agree with John that um that two of the registered Republicans were more or less even in my scoring sheet. And consequently, I'm throwing it back to you all. Let's talk about it.

Sure. And let's figure it out. Sure. So, what Dr. Yoder had said, um I'll start off, I guess. Sure.

What Dr. Odor had said um to his points and to Dave's credit, he did put in the work as far as learning budget process, attending meetings for the majority of the year. He sat next to Jonah for most of them and he understood what issues we are facing in real time right now. Obviously, things change a little bit uh over the past couple of months and things have uh gotten better, worse, say the same. Uh, but I think getting him up to speed is going to be one of the easiest, one of the easier things for us to do in this process. Not that you wouldn't be able to get up to speed very quickly, but that amount of time to attend meetings and just know the nuances of what we're talking about is something that I feel

is going to benefit Dave in the short term. And if I can jump in, I mean, you know, um, if we're looking at, um, Dave and I mean, I'm I'm so sorry. Um, uh, Giovania, um, you know, when when I look at both candidates and I think about their responses, their answers, right, both had a lot of commonality in their macrolevel themes. Um what makes me um lean towards Dave is, you know, some specific examples about that learning curve, right? The the preparation, the experience last year specifically showed through. I saw a lot more concrete examples about specific issues that they're aware of. Um a little bit more detail in potential solutions to them with all due respect, right? Um that showed, right? Um, and I do individually think it's wise of us to take advantage of that, right? That that's the root of my leaning towards Dave specifically, right? I think it showed compared to Giovana in the interview process specifically.

I would agree that I think the experience of running for a seat is valuable. Um and uh and that is part of the reason that I'm hoping that everyone who's currently sitting in front of us will will consider running for a seat

next year. Um uh because I as we've already established will have at least one open seat and probably more from what I understand. um uh in terms of um where I'm throwing my support. Um I have literally never been the deciding vote in anything on city council before. Um sorry, this is a strange experience for me. Um but uh I um my feeling in this instance is that we promise to to that's not true. Um that that we intend to appoint a Republican. We are looking for someone who can hit the ground running for a series of a year and a half that's frankly um that's frankly going to be really challenging and going to involve um a lot of work on all of our parts. And I am going to say that um all right between the two I think that that Dave is probably more ready to hit the ground running. And that is not saying that every one of you isn't a good candidate. And that is not saying that I don't in um that I don't hope to be well either to lose my seat to one of you. That would be fantastic. um or to um or to see you sitting up here with me for two years starting starting at

the beginning of 2028. Um this is a very valuable um it's it's a valuable experience as an individual and it is it is would be incredibly valuable to our community to have um to have all of you sit on this board. Um all of you would bring a fresh perspective and I am not um I shouldn't swear in this form or we still want we're yeah filming and I'm not messing around but uh but okay um there there you go decision made for me not speaking for the rest of you.

Yeah. Um sorry if I could. Um yeah, there there has been and this is just more of a general statement. There has been a lot of Democrat Republican discussion tonight. Um while I may not agree with the president, I do understand where council members who um believe in that are coming from. Right. um the the people of Williamsport elected a Republican for whatever that means. But you know, and and I say that because I can say with with great confidence that in my time working with most all of these people, Jonah is pretty new. Um that Democrat, Republican, has never come into any decision that has been made because it really has no bearing on anything that happens here in the city of Williamsport. Um, and you know, some of some of my better friends, not that they're not all friends, but some of my better friends on this council are are Republicans.

Some of my better friends on this council are Democrats, right? Um, and there and and and again, there there is definitely value in in Dave running that campaign. And I and I really hope um Giovana that you you decide to go through that process again um in a year. So I'm Is it okay if I withdraw my my second to Jonah's nomination? Huh? I did. Yeah. Okay. So I I'll withdraw that second. Um because I um as I said um David Giovani you were you were both

tied in my opinion and and Dave I I do think that you running a campaign and actually going out there and getting signatures and talking to people that that that probably does and should put you just slightly over that finish line. procedurally because he withdrew his motion. We have one candidate. It's up for discussion on the Yeah,

correct. So on the motion to amend in favor of appointing David Dussinger just a motion to appoint. All right. So I need a copy of Robert's rules. Let me say one more thing before we take the motion.

Yeah. Um again to echo the sentiments of my fellow council members um yeah some of my favorite people um are Democrats um again because we focus on William Sport. Um I said national politics doesn't come in near and um I think that's what makes us as a council body um so good at working together. Um and with that again seeing the broad spectrum of everybody that has obviously is showing a willingness and a passion to come out and serve this great city. Um 18 months seats are going to come open for election again. And I truly truly hope that whether you're a Democrat, a Republican, an independent, um I hope that you all still find the passion and the ambition to get out, start a campaign. Um there's an awful lot of great insights and value that I think can be gained um when you go out and run for the seat. So, thank you again all of you. Mr. Frank.

Hey. Dr. Yoder. Yes. Mr. Milligan. Yes. Mr. Mackey. Yes. Miss Mey. Yes. Mr. Pizzy. Yes. Mr. Ber. Yes. Motion passes 6. Thank you very much all of you. Greatly appreciate you being here and your time this evening. Um I would second that. Yeah, I would second that. Um like like look like we're all being furious when we say like next year is an election year.

I I hope I see some of you on the ballot. Um and you know look if you've gone through this process and you're like yeah I mean this isn't for me. It it's fair. It's hard. It's stressful. Like all of that there are other ways to get involved to help the community through the city. We've got numerous boards and commissions. Right. Those are excellent ways to get involved um to serve the community in a much more targeted way. Um I would encourage every one of you to consider that. We have a number of openings on a number of them. Um a lot of them are mayorally appointed with council approval. Um if you have questions on those, reach out to his office specifically or one of us can can can connect as well.

Yeah. Right. Yeah. Absolutely. Please consider that. it it would be a very important to me um first step toward running for office because it gets you a level of familiarity with what's happening in the city. Um chances are you would have to give up that the seat on the border commission if you were to get elected in the next cycle. But um it's um it's it's a really good way to gain familiarity with how the city operates and decide whether or not you really really want to hang out with us. Um, I heard quite a few references to our city's housing stock and I think that there is going to there's already currently an opening on our blighted properties committee, right? Which which should be a great place to serve. Um, absolutely.

Yeah. But yeah, we we desperately need people on our boards and commissions. I I I would heavily encourage all of you if you're interested to to um to to sit on one. Um, it's neat work.

We'll move to item number five then, announcements. The next regularly scheduled city council meeting will be held on Thursday, April 30th, 2026 at 7 p.m. Trade and Transit 2, 144 West 3rd Street, Williamsport, PA. That is the building right next door. Upcoming meetings, Tuesday, April 28th at 11:30 a.m. Redevelopment Authority, 1 p.m. The Committee of the Whole. Thursday, April 30th at 7 p.m. City Council. Are there any comments tonight from members of the public? Any comments from members of council?

Yeah, just again real quick, thank you all. Um, if any of you do decide to run, um, please don't hesitate to reach out. Um, one of my favorite things to do is go to any one of our local establishments here, have a beer, talk about life, get to know people, and um, I'd like to think I I have, uh, some perspective I could give you on on what to do and what maybe not to do, both when you're running and if you were to get elected. So, um, yeah, please like I'm definitely not running again. So, my committee closed out.

I don't got no money. my my bank accounts are closed. My wife refuses to be my treasurer again. Um so that's it for me. Um so please reach out. Use me as a resource. Um I'd love to get to know all of you more. So thank you again. I I would say the same thing. I believe that I'm not even allowed to run again. Not to mention I didn't want to run last time, let alone this coming time. So um but uh so I I would um welcome anyone who uh needed help kind of formulating a plan of attack for um Iran next uh in in uh 27. Thanks Dr. Yod. Um let me thank you President Ber. Thank you. So um appointments are not easy. Um, not really.

And you know, there's a lot of behind the-scenes work that happens in getting everything together, trying to organize things. Um, you know, that that whole process, it's a grind. It's tough. Um, I just appreciate your efforts in and doing this and spearheading this and um, grateful for your leadership. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. As am I. Thank you. Thank you all. I greatly appreciate it. Uh, are there any comments from the administration? I see no one here tonight from the administration. And any comments from the news media? We have folks from the news media here for the first time in forever.

We'll can we do that afterwards? Yeah. So that way we can all stand up. I'll take a motion for adjournment. So move. Second. On favor.