Moises Sanchez, Thomas Billingsley, Liz McKinney, Billy Ceskavich, Lorna Kerwin (Matt Phifer)
“Too much crime. I try to get away from it in New York City and it happens everywhere.”
(Moises Sanchez, 36, of Syracuse, manager of the Atrium Garage, unaffiliated with a political party)
“More community involvement — you know, we have street violence, violence in the black community. I’m more concerned with that. It’s not a police issue or a political issue. It’s a social issue. Those are the things I’d rather think about and deal with rather than anything political.”
(Thomas Billingsley, 56, of Syracuse, sales clerk at Street Game, unaffiliated with a political party)
“And children around here don’t have nowhere to play. Hopefully in the future they’ll have an area nearby where parents can bring their children to like playgrounds and stuff.”
(Liz McKinney, 57, of Syracuse, unemployed, unaffiliated with a political party)
“Last year I was in a service-learning class where I helped volunteer at the Westcott Community Center tutoring students, and much of the public education system seems to be failing people. I worked with students in the fifth grade who had, like, second-grade literacy rates and that’s just really unacceptable. I know that Syracuse is not unique in that the entire country deals with problems with education where we’re not living up to certain standards. And I realize that it’s hard to improve, but I just wish I could see the public education system serving the city residents better.”
(Billy Ceskavich, 19, of Syracuse, Syracuse University sophomore majoring in political science, Democrat)
“I don’t know what the county and city can do to draw more industry in to create more of a tax base and that would help either maintain taxes where they are or lower the taxes. Because as it stands now, the individual — as it is, you know — you have your property tax and your school tax and all of that is going up. We need to be able to do something to draw industry.”
(Lorna Kerwin, 58, of Pompey, sixth-grade teacher, Morrisville-Eaton Central School District, Republican)
(Matt Phifer is a senior with dual majors in broadcast and digital journalism and political science.)
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