Thirteen community organizations have joined hands to educate voters and engage candidates ahead of the April 8 municipal election. For this election, the Informed Voter Coalition is hosting a series of candidate interviews with those in races for Springfield City Council Zone 4, Springfield City Council General Seat A, Springfield Mayor, Springfield Public Schools Board of Education and Ozark Mayor. The organizations that make up the Informed Voter Coalition include Be Civil, Be Heard; Drury University's Meador Center for Politics and Citizenship; KSMU Ozarks Public Radio; Leadership Springfield; League of Women Voters of Southwest Missouri; Missouri State University's Office of Public Affairs; NAACP Springfield; Ozarks Technical Community College's Social Sciences Department; Rosie; Show-Me Christian County; Springfield Business Journal; Springfield-Greene County Library District; and Springfield News-Leader. Questions for the interviews were submitted by Informed Voter Coalition partner organizations and were not provided to the candidates in advance. The order of the candidate interviews was determined by a random drawing.
Candidate interviews
I'm Andrew Crocker of Be Civil, Be Heard, one of the nonpartisan organizations that make up the Informed Voter Coalition. And today we are interviewing candidates for mayor of Springfield. They are Jeff Schrag and Mary Collette. Each candidate will be interviewed individually and asked the same questions. They will have one minute to introduce themselves and two minutes to respond to each question.
Springfield Mayor
Jeff Schrag
Our first candidate is Jeff Schrag. Thank you very much for joining us.
Schrag: Thank you.
Let's begin by having you introduce yourself and tell us why you have decided to run for office.
Schrag: My name is Jeff Schrag, and I'm a small business owner here in Springfield, Missouri running for mayor. (I) had a life changing experience about six years ago when I got married late in life and instantly became a husband, a stepfather and pretty soon after that, a grandfather. And now I have three grandchildren living in Springfield. You just simply look at the community and life differently. When you wonder, what am I going to leave to those grandchildren? Will they see opportunity in Springfield like I have? I love Springfield, I see tremendous potential in our neighborhood and in our city, and I just want to do my part to ensure that Springfield has a really bright future for them and for everyone else. I feel like we have great resources to lean on, and I look forward to bringing my skills as a small business person and community volunteer to city hall.
If elected, how will you engage in and learn about community wide concerns that might be outside of your own interests?
Schrag: Well, if the campaign is any indication, people seek us out like nobody's business, and I have pledged to myself that I need to make time for everybody. So far, so good. I've been able to spend some time with the different people that have reached out and listened to what they have to say about their thoughts and their concerns. It's been eye opening. It's been wonderful. I've enjoyed many of these conversations. I think the other thing to do besides letting folks reach out to you and then, you know, give them time, is to go places and do different things outside of your pattern. Sometimes we get we, sometimes we become creatures of habit and so I've been working on driving different places, going different places, going to different organizations, and I've enjoyed that very much. I hope, again, if if the campaign is anything like the reality, it won't be an issue with people coming up and giving me their opinions.
Several controversial zoning issues have emerged over the past few years, including the proposed Sunshine and National development and the coffee drive thru at Sunshine and Jefferson. What are your thoughts on developing a comprehensive corridor plan for the city?
Schrag: Well, I think the comprehensive corridor plan is positive. I think the other positive thing is for each of the neighborhoods to work on their own individual plan. Some neighborhoods have done that. There was a push by the City of Springfield pre-COVID to work with individual neighborhoods on neighborhood plans, so they can get ahead of development. I would love to see a system whereby if a developer or builder or business is doing something in a neighborhood where it was zoned residential and they're doing things the neighborhood wants, they get some sort of an expedited process, more of a carrot than a stick through the process. Business will find a way, and if we communicate very openly and honestly what the positives are of certain pieces of property as well as the negatives, I think business will find a way. Communication is the key, listening to folks, trying to get people to sit down and talk through things in the beginning. The beginning, I think, is so important in any of these processes to listen. Sometimes it takes quite a while through the process before people fully understand the arguments of each other, and things that we can do in the beginning, I think are helpful. Now, the final thing I want to say is you mentioned two projects. In the same time those projects have been in front of the city, I don't know how many — 200, 300 projects have been rezoned. So statistically we're doing really well, but there's always going to be a couple of those projects that just don't fit that are square pegs in round holes, and then unfortunately, city council is left to make really tough decisions and really disappoint one group or the other. And that's just that's our system. And we have to embrace that. And I'm ready. I'm up for the task.
Sixty percent of Springfield residents are renters, and finding affordable housing continues to be an issue for many. So what ideas would you bring to the table to ensure every Springfieldian has a safe and affordable place to live?
Schrag: I think the best thing we can do as a city is anything we can do to make it easier for someone to obtain a building permit, and easier for someone to obtain a certificate of occupancy. I think we throw too many obstacles at people that want to build new buildings. I'm not talking about the rezoning process, I'm talking about after the piece of property is already zoned, building something new, rehabbing something, renovating, expanding something. I think if we could really look at those processes. I think in some areas we become uncompetitive compared to nearby cities based on the bureaucracy that we have in those very departments. I think that's the number one thing that we can do. The second thing that we can do is, I believe, see what the city can do to support Restore SGF. I like some of the things that they're doing, especially the things where money goes into a revolving pot and it replenishes itself as loans are repaid. And so dollars that go into that, ways the city can assist them in moving the needle in terms of rehabilitation of some of our older properties is really important. I've very recently heard that the cost of rehabbing property in the city proper is actually less than it is sometimes building utilities to outlying places. I love the idea of rebuilding in our core, versus folks having to go out into fields or meadows or whatever and build that into housing stock. So anything we can do to encourage redevelopment, I think those are the best things we can do to add to our housing stock in Springfield.
If elected, what will you do to improve Springfield's public transportation system and ensure that it's accessible to all?
Schrag: So the easy answer is, I don't know. I mean, I hear this a lot, as I've talked to people, that the bus system only operates in a certain direction, that it's on a system that doesn't work for lots of people, that a lot of areas are off because they're not on a bus route. So I don't know the answer to that. I think that it's important for Springfield. We're too big of a city. Let me back up. We're too big of a city to not have some base in public transportation. I wish I knew the funding source. I wish I knew the answers for that, to be honest with you, I don't. But it's something I'm very much willing to work with our partners at City Utilities, who are responsible for the transit system, to see where the city can be an honest partner with them and where the state can be a partner. The federal government or Greene County could be a partner with that.
The city of Springfield's poverty rate is nearly double that of the state of Missouri and the U.S. What's your plan to reduce poverty in our community?
Schrag: We have lots and lots of organizations in Springfield that do incredible work. I've toured various facilities that do incredible work on poverty. Again, I don't know the answer, but anything the city can do to help those entities coordinate things and to remove obstacles for those entities to help them further their mission, I think, is really important. Doing something with transit would help people without vehicles get to work. I think that the crime rate disproportionately impacts people at the bottom of the wage, you know, those lower income earners. And so filling our vacant police spots, utilizing the 1/4-cent sales tax revenue that will start April 1st to improve public safety, I think will help the lives of those people. But I think just always remembering that we have this issue and just see what the city's role is. The city is not a social service entity, but the city can certainly play a role to help those who are social service entities, I personally believe.
If Springfield received a $10 million grant to use in any way council wanted, what would you do with it and why?
Schrag: You know, probably the first thing I would do is I would look at our annexation issues, which have been vexing us for a long time, and one of the reasons that council has been hesitant to add areas is the building of new fire stations. Police are mobile, they move around. Oftentimes these outer areas have really good roads. They already have the infrastructure there, but you've got to often build a new fire station to service them. So I would see if, by building one or two new fire stations with that money, if we couldn't really make some really positive progress with annexation, I cannot tell you how many people in this journey toward mayor have come up to me and said, I would like to vote for you. I cannot vote for you because you won't annex me. And it's ridiculous. I work in the city of Springfield. I live in the city of Springfield yet I cannot vote, I cannot participate. You need to fix that. That's one of the most common complaints I get from people. So if I had 10 million bucks, I think I might look at that.
Jeff Schrag, that concludes our interview. Thank you very much for taking time to talk to us.
Schrag: Thank you very much for the opportunity.
Mary Collette
Joining me now is Mary Colette. Thank you so much for joining us.
Collette: You're welcome.
Would you please introduce yourself and tell us why you decided to run for this position?
Collette: Yes. I'm calling my campaign a grassroots effort to restore the voice to our citizens. I was on city council for eight years from 2001 to 2009, and I have found recently that all of the same reasons and the same issues that I dealt with back then are still very current and very topical. I also feel like in the political environment today, I think it's important for people to participate in their government. And I think that for me, my whole campaign, if I'm not willing to put myself forward, I can't ask other people to do so, and I'm asking people to step forward and be part of their government. And I hope that I — my goal is to make Springfield more social city. And that's kind of at the heart of all of my efforts and which you'll hear a little bit more about now. And of course, later during the campaign prior to your voting for me on April the 8th.
If elected, how will you engage in and learn about community wide concerns that might be outside of your own interests?
Collette: Well, I'd have to say my experience already on city council for eight years, that's 200 council meetings and 400 council luncheons and various meetings. Even though it was back in the early 2000s, it's still very topical. I know how our government works. I know our departments, how they work. The faces have changed, but the jobs have remained the same. I also have been very active in my neighborhood. I have been at city council a number of times dealing on neighborhood issues, and neighborhood issues continue to be at the heart of my campaign, as they were in the early 2000. I think it's very important that we empower our neighborhoods, that we energize our neighborhood parks. And one of my other goals is to work on improving our transit system and perhaps the public private partnerships. I don't know what, but I have had an awful lot of experience in and around our governmental system, and I come prepared and ready to hit the ground running.
Several controversial zoning issues have emerged over the past few years, including the proposed Sunshine and National development and the coffee drive thru at Sunshine and Jefferson. What are your thoughts on developing a comprehensive corridor plan for the city?
Collette: I think when, for that to occur, I think neighborhoods need to be given the opportunity to develop their own, their concept of how they would like to see their neighborhoods develop and then have that folded in to any kind of a comprehensive corridor plan. I mean, I have thoughts of my own like that I think that our Grant Avenue corridor needs to be extended all the way to our Dickerson Park Zoo. It's a you know, I think it's really important that when we do consider those corridors that we feature all of the things that make Springfield unique, both culturally and with regard to our heritage and our history, which are very important pieces that I feel like often get left out of the discussion about who we are, what our city is, what it can be. And while there has been an amazing amount of really wonderful work done, and a lot of the projects that are in the works right now are extremely exciting, and I just, I want our citizens to have more input and to hear how they'd like to see those unfold.
Sixty percent of Springfield residents are renters in finding affordable housing continues to be an issue for many. So what ideas would you bring to the table to ensure every Springfieldian has a safe and affordable place to live?
Collette: Well, for starters, I'm extremely excited about the Restore Springfield project, where our historic neighborhoods are getting, they're getting homes restored. I also think it's very important that when we consider affordable housing, that we look to models that aren't intense, as intense as some of the things that we've currently done. There are some models out there in what's called a soft city concept, where we make sure that we, that units, these massive developments are multi-use. There are ways that we can develop the affordable housing where we get people out of their cars, we get people interacting a lot more. And I would like to see us pursue some of the models that are existing. I also want to make very sure that what we don't do is concentrate all of our affordable housing in north Springfield. I know that in the past that has been an issue on a number of fronts, and I believe that north Springfield deserves — it is actually an opportunity for development. There lots of opportunity over there that I'd like to see us pursue.
If elected, what will you do to improve Springfield's public transportation system and ensure that it's accessible to all?
Collette: That is actually one of my main goals. I am looking forward to working with City Utilities to find out what kind of work they've already done. There are models in other communities where they've been very creative with private partnerships and in encouraging entrepreneurship and creative entrepreneurship. I think we're not exploring all the ways that transportation is being used, especially these days with autonomous vehicles and also with, if you look at Uber and Lyft and the things that they've done and look at some of what other other communities have done with their bus systems, things, very simple things like solar panels at bus stops that let you know how far away the bus is and integrating our bus system with smaller buses and smaller, electric buses.
The city of Springfield's poverty rate is nearly double that of the state of Missouri and the U.S. What is your plan to reduce poverty in our community?
Collette: We're not going to reduce poverty unless that is supported at every level of our government. The, our churches do a fabulous job. Our nonprofits do a fabulous job. The models that are being used in other countries. We use what's called a continuum of care. And I believe that the better approach is housing first. But we with the economy the way that it is right now and with the things that are happening right now, I feel like we're going to be we're going to be in dire straits. We already are in many ways. So I don't I don't know how you reduce poverty unless you empower people, get them in homes and get them jobs and get them jobs and homes that are close to grocery stores and affordable to where they can, they can survive. And we do a pretty good job of that, I think, and I think we can do better.
If Springfield received a $10 million grant to use in any way council wanted. What would you do with it and why?
Collette: Well, I think I'd go to Mexico and sit on the beach. No. $10 million. I would look at empowering. I would look at providing incentives and resources to all of our neighborhood organizations and ask what they would like to see in their neighborhoods. I would really like to see. I would like to see that money spent in our neighborhood parks. I think there are opportunities to in enliven and invigorate, reinvigorate our neighborhoods through — we've got to have some focal, more social points, focal points where people meet and greet so when people, when neighbors know their neighbors, you have safe neighborhoods. When you have safe neighborhoods, you have an economic development tool that will attract business faster than just about anything because you have a healthy, happy workforce. So I think those things are all combined, and I'd like to see us be more creative with the approach that we take to economic development and bringing business to Springfield. I said at one point, I have a dream that one day the businesses will pay us to locate here. That's my goal.
Mary Collette, that concludes our interview. Thank you very much for taking time to talk to us.
Collette: Thank you for having me. I so appreciate it.
I've been speaking with Mary Collette, who is a candidate for Springfield mayor. That concludes our interviews with candidates for mayor of Springfield. I'm Andrew Crocker of Be Civil Be Heard. Thank you for joining us.
Additional information
The election is Tuesday, April 8. We hope you continue to research the candidates to see how their values and positions align with yours. On April 8, you're encouraged to exercise your right to vote. If you have questions about where or how to vote or the status of your voter registration, please contact your county clerk's office.
No part of the these interviews, including print, audio and video, may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without the written permission of the copyright holder League of Women Voters of Southwest Missouri.
