1. What is it that you love about Ann Arbor?
Ann Arbor is a wonderful community with a long history of being on the forefront of both innovation and progressive movements. We highly value education, have every kind of restaurant you can think of, a vibrant arts scene, incredible local game stores, and more parks and nature preserves than you’d think possible within the city limits. I love all of those things, but more than that, I love the people of Ann Arbor. The people of our community care so deeply for our neighbors, always striving to make our spaces more inclusive and welcoming to people of all backgrounds. We come together in times of hardship, with 500 of us braving sub-zero temperatures to mourn the loss of Alex Pretti together. Oh and we’re the hometown of the legendary Bob Seger!
2. What are the three most pressing problems that you care most about fixing?
1. Real, affordable housing is something that we as a community have struggled with for some time. Housing in the city has become too expensive for working people, which is contributing to pushing them out of the community they serve.
2. Childcare is more expensive in our city than anywhere else in Michigan, with infant care being as high as $2,600 per month for one child. Our school system is seeing declining enrollment year-after-year because our city is becoming more unaffordable and pushing out young, working families.
3. Renters are struggling. Between rent also being more expensive in Ann Arbor than anywhere else in the state and renters not having strong enough protections in place to protect them from being exploited by corporate landlords, renters deserve better.
3. How would you go about fixing those problems?
Real, Affordable Housing – Most folks in the city agree that we need to build more housing. However, where we have some disagreement is in the type of housing that should be built. Some people believe that building largely market-rate housing will solve the affordability crisis. I don’t subscribe to the idea that building more $1 million condos will trickle down to the teachers, nurses, and first responders — people that serve the community — being able to afford to live here.
I am proposing that we put a greater emphasis on building more affordable, social housing options like co-ops and land trusts, housing that will actually be affordable for working people.
Childcare– Next to housing, childcare is the biggest expense facing working people today. Working people simply cannot afford a mortgage payment to ensure their child is taken care of while they go to work.
I am proposing a pilot program for municipal-run childcare that would first cater to the working people who take care of us — our teachers, nurses, and first responders — at a heavily subsidized rate. If the program is successful, I would want to roll it out for other folks in the community.
We’re Ann Arbor; we shouldn’t be afraid of trying bold ideas to address the problems facing our community. After all, how can we expect our teachers to watch our children, but not pay them enough to have someone watch theirs?
Renters Protections – There is so much more we can be doing to protect our renters in the city. The first thing I would do is work to ban software in city limits that allows corporate landlords to effectively collude with one another to artificially inflate the cost of rent. I would also work to implement a tenants’ bill of rights ensuring safety and transparency for renters.
4. Let’s say that your solution meets resistance or some part of your plan doesn’t work. What do you do next?
The way that I craft policy in Lansing starts with ensuring that all stakeholders are at the table. I think it’s important for everyone to be heard, particularly when it pertains to something that impacts their own community. Folks with diverse lived experiences also provide really helpful insight, offering up thoughts and solutions that may not have crossed everyone else’s mind. In other words, I believe that leading with listening and through a bottom-up approach with community buy-in typically results in the best outcomes.
I will be a city councilman who people know has the right motivations and the best interest of Ann Arborites at heart. I don’t pretend to have all the answers, but I do know many of the problems facing working people in our community. That’s my North Star.
And to be clear, nothing ever fully goes according to plan, that’s to be expected. If met with resistance or if my plan does not work, I would go back to the drawing board and work with council and community members to figure out something else that does. Just because one approach might not work, doesn’t mean that we should give up on solving the big issues facing our community. One of our biggest strengths of our community is our people, and I intend on leaning on them as much as they lean on me.
5. The way that we do politics in this country has been changing rapidly via Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Marjorie Taylor-Greene, Abigail Spanberger, Mikie Sherrill, and Zohran Mamdani. What are your thoughts on this decade + evolution in how we do politics in this country, and how has it changed the way that you approach running for office and delivering for the people?
I began the decade working in politics as an Obama White House intern. I was always progressive, but at the time, I believed more in incrementalism — that change is hard and takes a while to achieve. Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump then emerged onto the scene, tapping into people’s frustrations around a system that was not working for them. Bernie correctly identified the cause as the billionaire class and large corporations exploiting the working class and growing wealth inequality, whereas Trump has tried to keep us divided as he and his rich friends continue to rig the system more in their favor.
What we are seeing now is the logical end point for this decade in politics — flagrant corruption out in the open, the dismantling of programs and institutions that help working people, and the largest wealth transfer in American history from the people at the bottom to the people at the top.
Where we are now is not sustainable. Working people cannot afford the basic necessities of life, and they are tired of waiting for a system to work for them that never will. I’ve been inspired by people like Bernie, AOC, and Zohran Mamdani, people who understand that the only way to solve the big problems facing our society is to change systems and try bold, outside of the box ideas.
Today, I’m proud to follow in that tradition of Democratic Socialism. In Ann Arbor, the most progressive city in Michigan, we too must be bold if we hope to address the problems facing our community. That’s the kind of energy that I will bring with me to City Hall, and it’s why I kicked off my campaign proposing ideas like a municipal-run childcare pilot.
6. You are one of three candidates running for this seat. How do you think that the voters of Ward 3 should think about the difference between you and your opponents?
I believe there are three stark differences between my opponents and I — my take on community collaboration, addressing concerns about ICE and federal overreach, and a willingness to challenge the status quo to make lasting change.
In recent years, many people in Ann Arbor have felt left out of conversations they deserve to be a part of, conversations that are vital to the success of our community. Policies need to be shaped with Ann Arbor residents at the table, not just handed down from City Hall. During this campaign and once elected into office, I am going to be spending a lot of my time listening to my neighbors, small business owners, renters and homeowners, seniors, and families so that the policies created best meet their needs. When residents and elected officials work together, solutions are more sustainable, equitable, and more reflective of the community’s lived experiences. Listening and collaboration means open communication, as well as transparency, which our community needs right now more than ever.
While my opponents have not addressed concerns about ICE and federal overreach, I believe that our community deserves leadership that will stand up for our shared values and make sure every resident feels safe and supported. Ann Arbor’s values are rooted in protecting civil liberties, community care, and ensuring that all Ann Arborites are treated with dignity and respect. With the possibility of increased ICE deployments in nearby cities, we have a responsibility to be proactive. This means preparing for potential ICE activity in our community by ensuring residents know their rights, and learning from other communities like Minneapolis that have organized to protect theirs.
Lastly, I’m someone who understands that working people in our city literally cannot afford the status quo. In order to address their needs, we cannot be afraid of trying bold ideas. City Hall needs more voices at the table who will challenge orthodoxy and push for new, innovative solutions.
7. The nation is at an extremely low ebb in democratic participation, trust in institutions, and feeling truly connected to a community. I want to give you the chance to make your case to AA Observer readers that you really care about them, and that you are the right person, with the right talents and strategy, to make meaningful changes that will improve their economic lot in life, safeguard the rule of law, make sure that they won’t be left behind, and that you can ensure their inclusion and dignity in Treetown.
Times are hard right now. Believe me, I know. My wife is an AAPS teacher, and I’m both constantly in awe of how hard educators like her and her colleagues work for our community and angry at how much they are struggling.
In one of the wealthiest communities in the state, AAPS teachers have recently suffered through a budget crisis, healthcare costs quadrupling over two years, and they have to constantly fight for basic salary increases that are standard everywhere else. And despite that, my wife and I are incredibly lucky. She is one of the few younger Ann Arbor teachers to own a home in the city. After over a decade of renting, we were able to buy a small, falling apart house that within our first year here had 3 gas leaks and saw nearly every appliance break. It’s costing us everything we have to stay in our home, and we have been putting off having a child because between our house and student loan payments, childcare would bankrupt us.
Sadly, our story is not unique, and that’s the problem. As I said, we’re lucky. Other working people in our city are struggling so much more. Nurses at Michigan Medicine are experiencing burnout and working with unsafe staffing ratios, all the while struggling to afford to live here.
Beyond my two degrees in public policy, years of experience working on legislation in the State House of Representatives, and involvement in local politics, my experiences as a struggling working person in our community, as well as my approach of leading with listening, makes me the right person for the job. I want to make our city into a place where childcare is affordable and accessible so that more working families aren’t pushed out and enrollment in the AAPS starts to tick up instead of decline.
8. Zingerman’s, Ahmos, No Thai, Fleetwood, or Le Dog. Where would you rather go to lunch?
Fleetwood — I’m a sucker for breakfast food, and one of my favorite things to do with my wife is to go get a diner brunch and do a NYT crossword puzzle.