I ran video on the whole meeting. A Dayton Public Schools intern in my office will transfer the video, title it, compress it and upload it for you to watch on YouTube. Why do I mention that? Because in the speeches of the “endorsed Dems” they talked about the importance of internships- and I’m probably the only one who has provided one among all the candidates.

Tonight we met at Huffman Place, in the Huffman Historic District. It’s an old school that’s been wonderfully re-purposed into senior housing. Unfortunately, thanks to the influence of the construction and demolition firms in the State of Ohio, they made it a condition of building new schools that we tear down all the old ones. We won’t see any other amazing transformations like this thanks to money in politics.

Interesting new information- Jeff Mims proposed to annex Trotwood and Jefferson Township and one other community, we’ll get the quote right from the video.
A.J. Wagner has, as Mayor Leitzell predicted, plans for new laws to solve our problems, and also as Leitzell predicted, Nan Whaley has sat on a lot of committees, formed committees and been a committee. Wagner also suggested we do away with civil service board testing for police and fire, and no longer require the hiring from our city-run police and fire academies (like most jurisdictions in the state)- he even went as far as to suggest the radical idea of filling a spot the moment it comes available by hiring, OMG, someone who.’s already qualified to do the job. Currently, the only people we’re able to hire like that is the Chief, and we’ve even told one or two that they can’t carry a gun because, despite years of police experience, they didn’t go to our academy. A.J. scored major points with me on that. Nan, on the other hand talked about how she had been endorsed by the last 120 firemen in the city- the IAFF, where we are at critically low staffing every single day.

This was my first time to hear David K. Greer in action in front of voters. He’s going to need to tell us a little bit more and engage when given the opportunity. I already know I can have a conversation with him and work with him, from our cooperation on www.independentdayton.com

I’ll try to post copies of all the candidates’ literature on-line for you to review. As always, mine is the only one that takes more than a minute to read.

I popped out my wheel of fortune solution to making candidates’ nights more interesting- it has 18 different topics to discuss, so voters don’t have to hear a canned speech about the candidates. I was the only one to use it. I’m also going to have to preface every candidates’ night about my public speaking voice- I’m not shy, and the Army taught me to use a command voice when speaking to groups, it comes off as angry and rough. But, then again- everyone hears what I’m saying, which can’t be said of Mr. Wagner.

Apparently, Mr. Wagner fancies himself as a marketeer and negotiator. He believes he can sit down and negotiate with major corporations to come here and do business. I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that idea. I thought that’s why we have a city manager? It’s one of the fundamental misconceptions about what the Mayor and the City Commission are supposed to do.

The questions of job creation show the biggest difference in approaches to the problems. You’ll have to watch the video to see.

Next scheduled candidates’ night is next Monday at the Kroc Center, hosted by the McCook field neighborhood association. Time to be determined. Look for video on Wednesday.

One last thing: I always cringe when I hear “I was born in Dayton” or “I was raised here” come out of a candidate’s mouth. We’re not electing your parents. They made that happen, not you.