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First Name
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1. Since Katrina, New Orleans has lost tens of thousands of Black residents, with neighborhoods transformed by gentrification, short-term rentals, and rising costs.
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What specific policies would you enact to prevent displacement, restore access to neighborhoods for legacy residents, and expand permanently affordable housing across the city?
Please explain your position and what steps your administration would take.
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3. Blighted, city-owned, and speculative properties sit vacant while people sleep on the streets. How would you expand the use of publicly owned land and buildings—including vacant lots—for permanent supportive housing and community-controlled development?
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4. Mental Health and Addiction Services: Beyond emergency response, what is your plan to expand voluntary, community-based mental health and addiction treatment services across the city? Describe specific initiatives (e.g. syringe-exchange or harm-reduction programs, recovery housing, mobile outreach, drop-in support centers) and how you will partner with grassroots organizations and people with lived experience.
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5. Gun Control: In 2024, the US Surgeon General stated that gun violence was a public health crisis and should be treated as such. What policies and programs would you pursue as Mayor to address this serious public health crisis in New Orleans?
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6. Community-Based Violence Prevention: New Orleans neighborhoods have developed violence interruption teams, youth outreach, and other community-led public safety efforts to reduce reliance on policing. What is your plan to expand and support year-round, community-led public safety initiatives? Please provide an example of a program, policy, or budget change you would advocate for to make neighborhoods safer while centering community leadership.
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7. This summer in Baltimore, “instead of leaning solely on law enforcement, the Mayor’s office [in Baltimore] took a more creative, community-rooted approach—repurposing city assets, redirecting funds, and rallying partners around a central question: What would it take to make summer safer and more fulfilling for our youth?” The answer resulted in “42 neighborhood-based youth camps . . . 29 funded literacy programs . . . Weekend rec center hours extended to 11 PM . . . Free public pool access . . . Pop-up events and block parties . . . Open school sites.” The results have been 1) lowest homicide rate in over 50 years; 2) 23% decrease in homicides; 3) 20% drop in nonfatal shootings; and 4) 62% overall decline in key violent crime categories.1 If elected as Mayor, will you make a commitment now to make it a priority to create similar summer 2026 programming available to New Orleans’ youth as what has been in Baltimore?
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YES
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8. If yes, please explain how you intend to implement such programming. If your answer is no,what is your vision for building youth-focused, community-led diversion programs that support healing and prevent incarceration? How will you invest in mentorship, education, and job pathways for justice-involved or high-risk youth?
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9. State Intervention vs. Local Autonomy: In recent years Governor Landry and the state legislature have proposed measures that undermine New Orleans’ democratic institutions (from policing mandates to education and utility oversight), raising concerns about a “takeover.” Will you commit to defending New Orleans’ home rule charter and resisting state overreach in city policy?
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YES
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10. Explain how you will protect local control over criminal justice, education, and other policies, and how you will involve community voices in opposing harmful state preemption.
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11. Surveillance and Police Technology: Recent reports revealed NOPD secretly ran a network of over 200 surveillance cameras with live facial recognition (“Project NOLA”) without public oversight. Do you support the pending ordinance to allow surveillance technology (facial recognition, predictive algorithms, “real-time crime centers,” etc.)?
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YES
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Explain your position. If you support any use, detail the safeguards and oversight you’d implement.
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12. Charter Amendment on Second Chances: This fall, New Orleanians will vote on a charter amendment to make people with conviction histories a protected class. Do you support this amendment to prevent discrimination in housing, employment, and city services?
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YES
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What other actions would you take to ensure equity and second chances for formerly incarcerated people?
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13. Equity and Inclusion: New Orleans has an extremely high rate of families impacted by felony convictions, from the War on Drugs (1970s) to massive prison expansion (1990s), and throughout the massive impacts of hurricanes, poverty, toxic pollution, and lack of health care. With over Because 90% of incarcerated people beingare men, women have been holding families together, whileand children havehave experienced widespread disruptions and disappearances of fathers, uncles, and grandfathers from their lives. Do you believe city government has an obligation to restore people back into our community?
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YES
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14. If yes, what programs, funding, and/or agencies will you use to achieve these results? If no, please explain how you would handle the issue of disrupted families and the systemic poverty it produces.
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15. ICE Cooperation & Sanctuary Values: New Orleans has historically been a welcoming city for immigrants, including policies that limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. In recent months, masked federal agents have been targeting immigrants across America, detaining citizens and non-citizens, and deporting people without due process, including sending people to oppressive regimes and countries to which they have no connection. As mayor, will you stand in support of New Orleans’ sanctuary policies that have been attacked at the state and federal level?
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YES
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Please explain your position and outline any specific actions you would take to protect immigrant communities from detention and deportation.
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16. Global Issues: The mayor often serves as our global ambassador regarding tourism and trade. As a city so dependent upon tourism, outsiders typically seek places that assure them with a welcoming spirit. New Orleans is home to a diverse community—including Palestinians, Muslims, and Latinos—who face various forms of oppression and exclusion across America. If elected, would you use the office to welcome people from all parts of the world?
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YES
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If elected, how will your administration reflect global human rights values, and engage with local communities impacted by international injustice?
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17. Equitable Infrastructure & Climate Jobs Program: New Orleans faces overlapping challenges of neglected infrastructure, rising heat, flood risk, and lack of dignified employment—especially for formerly incarcerated people. Would you support the creation of a publicly funded Green-Corps—a permanent, community-based jobs program focused on environmental justice, infrastructure equity, and neighborhood beautification? This program could employ New Orleanians to address drainage problems, illegal dumping, tree and wetlands planting, rain garden installation, blight removal, and more—prioritizing jobs for residents in under-resourced communities and those impacted by the criminal legal system.
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YES
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Please explain how you would support or design such a program to be community-led, equitably staffed, and aligned with broader goals of climate resilience, neighborhood revitalization, and second chances for returning residents.
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18. Street Repairs and Construction Delays: Across the city, residents are frustrated by crumbling roads, potholes, and construction projects that drag on for months—sometimes leaving streets torn up without progress. What is your plan to prioritize street maintenance, hold contractors accountable to reasonable timelines, and ensure public works projects are completed efficiently, equitably, and with greater community transparency? How will you ensure that neighborhoods outside of tourist corridors aren’t left behind in infrastructure upgrades?
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19. Orleans Justice Center Funding: The Sheriff has repeatedly come to City Council to request funding for necessary repairs and maintenance needed for the Orleans Justice Center (OJC) constructed by prior Sheriff Marlin Gusman. As Mayor, how will you ensure the jail receives the required funding to make sure the facility's needed repairs and maintenance are timely done?
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20. Medical Care for Orleans Justice Center Residents: The City is ultimately responsible for the medical care received by residents at the Orleans Justice Center. As Mayor, how will you ensure that the the contractor providing medical services is meeting the medical needs of all OJC residents? Would you advocate for a public oversight board that includes voices of OJC residents to regularly monitor the contractor providing medical services at OJC?
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21. Parks Budget: The prior City Council amended the City’s Budget serveral times in order to allocate sufficient funding to build the Phase III, alleged mental health facility at OJC. These amendments included defunding money allocated for parks throughout the City. As Mayor, will you guarantee that you will veto budget amendments and ordinances that defund our City’s parks?
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22. Expungements and Pardons: Criminal convictions remain a huge barrier for individuals seeking employment, housing and education opportunities. The cost of expungements remains a barrier for many individuals seeking to seal their criminal history from third parties. If elected mayor, what kind of policies and programming will you pursue to help New Orleanians clear their records? Would you consider extending the marijuana pardon program to other municipal offenses?
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23. Decriminalization: The City of New Orleans has decriminalized the possession of marijuana. If elected mayor, would you push to decriminalize the possession of other drugs, and consider a similar pardon program as the one that exists for marijuana possession.
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YES
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24. Mental Health Crisis Responders: As Mayor, will you commit to reallocating some police funding to specifically be spent on creating a mental health crisis unit for incidents that need de-escalation and mental health intervention rather than arrest and incarceration?
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YES
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25. Greenhouse Gas Reductions: As Mayor, explain what programming and policies you intend to implement to reduce the City’s overall greenhouse gas emissions?
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26. As the federal government continues to gut FEMA and NOAA, what policies and programs will you implement to insure that New Orleanians will have adequate information about the severity of future storms so that residents can make appropriate decisions about voluntary evacuation?
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In 50 words or less, what would you most like voters to know about you and your candidacy? Use this space to highlight the values, vision, or lived experience that shape your leadership and what you hope to bring as Mayor.
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