Danville Mayoral Candidate Donald Crews Answers to Community Questionnaire

These questions were created by Danville community members during the Democracy in Danville event on March 4^th at the Danville Public Library.

1. What are your short term and long term strategic plans for Danville?

The first short term goal we must achieve to be successful is to set an overall mission for the direction of our city. This would include improving our community awareness and ongoing communication flow with our citizens. Being at Illinois Public Media’s Democracy in Danville event and seeing the divide between our government and its people, proves our leadership is out of touch with its purpose. By engaging the public and getting ideas straight from our citizens, we will gain a much more broad spectrum of our true problems.

We must also start addressing the crime and safety concerns in our city from a different angle. I am proposing the use of technology to increase notification, apprehension and response from our public safety departments. By utilizing technology we don't become entangled in another budget/pension mess. This system has been shown to reduce crime and with faster response times it has shown to increase the chances of apprehension.

We must also immediately start working on a new demolition program that works with neighborhoods that are revitalizing. This program would initiate with cleaning up the blight in whole areas instead of scattering our resources across the entire city.  We must also begin to identify and take action on improving the conditions of our existing structures that are not demo worthy.

Long term goals would consist of promoting & marketing the City of Danville so we can attract more business and stabilize the population. We must also work on providing a clean and safe city in the long run for continued growth opportunities. We certainly need to work on more positive revenue sources and planning for long term financial stability. Also we must strive to make our local government effective and expand the ability to form partnerships with neighboring municipalities.

For our city to be viewed well from the outside we have to fund our infrastructure fully. Our streets, sidewalks and alleyways are in desperate need of repairs throughout our city. Our youth must also be involved in reworking our city and must have programs available so that we can keep them from turning to crime or other negative behavior. In order to move into the future we must explore smart technology to save money and become as efficient as possible. Some of the short term goals will continue too also be long term objectives within our city.

2. Sell someone in 3 minutes why they should live in (or come back to) Danville.

Danville has been home to some of the top actors, athletes and military heros in the world. Those people set the path for the future and proved that dreams are reachable even in small town Danville. From our award winning parks and waterways, to our one of a kind events, Danville will continue to grow and welcome those that enjoy relaxed city life. With new faces representing our city, we now have the passion and partnerships needed to expand our commitment to small business in our community. Citizens we too can make our dreams of a thriving economy, a safe place for families and a city that propels future leaders to success. So join us in making the City of Danville an experience of history, exploration and relaxation.

3. How will you regularly engage your community? How will you keep lines of communication open?

I will keep the community engaged by involving them in the decision making, involving them in the solution and allowing them to see that their ideas and their concerns are being addressed. We all think of traditional lines of communication when it comes to local government, but I want to add some changes. I would propose traveling meetings so we extend that problem solving approach to ALL neighborhoods in our city. I would also propose the use of more technology to allow busy residents to express their problems and not just leaving a message for a return call that may or may not happen. We can use video conferencing (FaceTime, Facebook Video) to reach residents with a limited time span but that truly care and want to see positive Danville progress. By continually placing ourselves into the community we can keep that information flow open and constant.

4.What personal experiences have prepared you for office?

My experience in local and state government gives me the added knowledge of a working system that truly listened to the people.  My education and experience in the law enforcement community gives me the background to solve problems and work together to accomplish goals within our city. I currently work on the streets everyday speaking to citizens about their concerns and solutions. By working with current departments within our city, I have the best knowledge of how operations work and how our city is ran in real life, not just on paper. I have also worked with adults & youth in solving problems and helping them transition into successful members in our communities. I am not a career politician who has been in office for multiple years or helped create the unfortunate situation our city is in today. It is time our city started fresh with new ideas and fresh faces to get this economy jumping again.

5. How would you help improve the relationship between the police and the community (particularly minority groups in the community)?

We must continue to break that barrier within each group. Both the citizens and the police have common goals and want the best for their community. We must have our departments on the street level walking, talking and building relationships with the citizens of Danville. Each neighborhood would be assigned a police officer contact point to allow each officer/citizen to have a go to for issues, problems and solutions. We would also like to see more citizens and their children become involved in the auxiliary and jr police academy. By being involved within the department as a volunteer, it allows the citizens to see the work that's done in our city. Also by altering the traditional community policing model, we believe officers can better understand their community and in turn increase communication.

6. How will you create community partnerships to engage the youth?

In order for a community partnership to be successful we would encourage local businesses and schools to come together in rewarding our youth for the positives they do within our community. They would also divert those negative encounters to supporters within organizations that can help reduce and change these kids lives. By continually showing these youth that we will not give up on them, I believe we can change a lot of the negative behavior to productivity and stability. In Danville we have many programs that would be great to work together in achieving multiple layers of structure. Most importantly we need to talk to the kids and see what they want in the community, what they need to grow and what makes them passionate about helping bring change to the City of Danville.

7. What new ways can city resources be allocated to serve youth?

We have multiple empty buildings or spaces within the city that could be used to earn rewards or teach a skill to the youth. When the youth are engaged they become more active in their community and develop new interests and future opportunities. The reward based system could serve several functions and reduce some of the problems our city faces daily. At the [Democracy in Danville event] it was suggested to allow the civic center to be used by our youth and sponsorships that would allow this at no cost to the family. When you institute a reward-based system for positives in the community, you get interest in doing good things and helping others. We can also hold events for youth at one or all of our city parks. Rather it be an outdoor movie or a music recording session, this allows the kids to see that we care about their lives and their future.

8. What ideas/plans do you have to address the violence in the community?

We must implement newer technology to address the violence in our community. We must also increase the police/citizen relationship to gain that information it takes to hold those accountable for their crimes. My proposal includes placing gun fire detectors in a test 6 miles radius. This system allows instant notification to dispatch, police officers directly and the community. With

Danville coming off of its highest murder rate ever, this system could help save lives and hold those offenders accountable. We can also utilize cameras with this system that can be viewed by responding officers to better coordinate apprehension and citizen safety.

We also need to assist neighborhoods in creating and maintaining neighborhood groups. This allows neighbors to work with police to combat areas of increased violence. We have to make sure our youth have positive ways to utilize their free time and opportunities within our city. We need better communication with our schools and more partnerships in being proactive in the lives of our kids.

9. How will you use code enforcement to improve the condition and affordability of property in the community?

As a code inspector with the city, I can personally inform the citizens that over 3000 cases are opened each year on properties not in compliance. With the current administration's proposal to eliminate AT LEAST 1 of the 4 positions in the code enforcement department this would be almost impossible to achieve. If elected mayor I have the knowledge and ability to use our code enforcement department to not only improve the functionality of the department but become more cost efficient. By bringing our whole team to areas that continually show decline we can make our presence known within that specific neighborhood.

With partnerships we can place dumpsters in central locations for areas with the highest amount of illegal dumping and reduce the amount of trash around our city. I have also proposed setting aside 25% of code enforcement fines to create a citizen fund. Citizens can apply annually to this fund and receive up to $250 to fix active code violations on their property. By having a direction for our citizens we can help them improve their homes and also increase the vested interest in maintaining their neighborhoods.

10. How will you attract good jobs to the community?

We must have new faces in our local government in order to draw in those potential businesses. Speaking with dozens of previous business owners and investors, right now our current city government is seen as anti business. No one will relocate or start a new business in our town without getting rid of this negative image. I would immediately start a marketing plan for our city. I would also reach out to those business owners to inform them that the city is interested in working with them every step of the process. We must work with DACC manufacturing, technology and other areas to achieve that pool of local candidates to show Danville has the quality work force for their businesses. We must market our city for the future and that time is now.