Neighbors Project is a 501(c)3 so we can in no way endorse or indicate a preference for any particular candidates. But we can help you learn more about the people vying for your votes by sharing the responses we're getting to the survey we sent out to all aldermanic candidates in the city. As part of an ongoing series, we'll post the uncensored responses of each survey as we receive them. Find out what ward you're in here.
Candidate: Peter Zelchenko
Ward: 43
Political party/affiliation:
1. As Alderman, will you seek the input of new community organizations to ensure newer residents in your ward are represented in major decisions and projects?
Yes. See attached. [Publisher's note: the attachment is reproduced at the bottom of this survey.]
2. As Alderman, will you create, advertise and use a neighborhood listserv or increase the participation of an existing one?
Yes. See attached.
3. As alderman, will you actively maintain a ward blog that reports on discussion and decisions at neighborhood meetings and City Council, as well as other important news?
Yes. See attached.
4. Based on a scale of 1 to 5 (with 1 being the least important and 5 being the most important), rank how important you believe the following issues are to your constituents:
- Ensuring an adequate supply of quality homes and apartments available at a range of price for new and existing residents:
- Ranking - 5
- Rating - 5
- Create more local businesses and jobs:
- Ranking - 3
- Rating - 5
- Improving the quality of local schools:
- Ranking - 1
- Rating - 3 (see attached)
- Improving public space by reducing car use and increasing getting around by walking, public transit and bicycling in your ward:
- Ranking - 4
- Rating - 5
- Monitoring the quality of new developments (both residential and commercial) in the ward:
- Ranking - 2
- Rating - 5
5. Do you say hi to your neighbors?
Yes. I always consider it a duty to go above and beyond the normal courtesies of saying hello. I will chase after them if they've dropped something, or call the number I find, or even go to their home or workplace and personally deliver something I find, even if it is miles away. I have helped neighbors get to the hospital and done many other things. I do this every day and put aside my own life to do so.
{Pub's note: We have reproduced the attachment. Please note that Neighbors Project does not endorse or condone any comments that may be interpreted as libel in the following statement.}
"I have been an innovator in communication most of my life and recently have extended it into the political sphere (1995-2007). I have published local newspapers, advised new newspapers, organized the community on public input concerns, and exhorted public officials (sometimes quite stridently) to call for better public input. I have complained that certain neighborhood organizations are powerd by two or three people at the top and even their membership is not representaive of their area. I have had discussions with Prof. Dick Simpson about reviving the Ward Assembly he developed and implemented for this very community when he was alderman here. I intend to reconvene his ward assemblt when I take office. I also piloted, in 2004, a very successful public monthly newsletter for Ald. Manny Flores. I forced him to keep it spin-free and not to tout his accomplishments in it, to keep it journalisticall neutral. He eventually opted not to do this, but I at least demonstrated the praxis to him clearly and residents of the community were very happy to see the product and very sad to see it go. I intend to provide it here in the 43rd Ward at my own expense.
"As to technology, I am an expert in it. No other candidate in the entire city has the background that I have in high technology. And so I can say with authority that too gratuitously applying technology is a dangerous and very costly mistake. I believe a community forum on the Web, in the form of a blog or listserv, or perhaps a BBS format, may be appropriate. But it is not the ultimate nor is it the most efficiently and fairly distributed medium for public communication. That cannot be done better than with a printed monthly news sheet (with feedback from the community included) and with teh Ward Assembly I mentioned above. Electronic means are a very useful tool: I have five Web sites already for the campaign (a blog, a detailed Web site about myself and my campaign, a street-cleaning notification system I developed for the constituents, a voter registration and security check system, and a canvass contact database front end). Yet the best medium is print, if it is used intelligently and in an environmentally consicous way. Again, I am the main innovator in the city in this regard.
"ON 'Improving the quality of local public schools': Lincoln Park's schools are already among the best in the city, for reasons related to gentrification, school choice, and privatization of schools. I feel that our community has a duty as the most privileged citizens to fight for the rest of the city for the best schools we can get for all children, not just the special or privileged or well connected. I believe that an alderman has a duty to lead the public to morally superior conclusions, and this is one of them in my opinion. I believe that most Lincoln Park residents feel the same way or can be convinced to feel the same way."
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