10/16/2023
I am running for reelection to the Newburyport City Council because Newburyport needs to continue moving forward. Great communities don’t settle for the status quo; they need to adapt and innovate, take care of the basics, respect the past while getting ready for the future. I’m asking for your vote in the upcoming election to help us move Newburyport forward together.
I grew up in the town of Bridgewater, 30 miles south of Boston. I'm a product of the public schools. My dad was a public school teacher. My mother worked for a flower shop and later in life became a social worker. I went to college in Worcester at Clark University. I've been working with and on behalf of homeless people since my mid 20s. I currently work at the Pine Street Inn in Boston.
I met my future wife who was living in Newburyport (and I was renting a dumpy apartment in Jamaica Plain) and I moved here and we married in 2002. Within a few years, Susanne and I were joined by our daughters Anna and Lucy.
In 2007, concerned about issues including funding for our public schools (30 teachers and staff had been laid off) and the political logjam about what to do with Newburyport’s Waterfront, I ran for City Council and won the honor of serving as the Ward 4 Councillor for two terms. In 2011, I ran and won for City Council At Large.
After 2017, I took a break from the City Council for two terms.
In 2021, I ran for Council At-Large again. After a challenging and competitive race (kidding…there were only 5 candidates for 5 seats), I currently serve as Chair of the Planning and Development Committee.
Over the years, the issues that I've been involved in are numerous, some of them boilerplate standard municipal issues and others that were either noteworthy for their divisiveness and/or their importance. As one of 11 Councillors, no one Councillor is solely responsible for either positive acclaim or negative blame on any particular matter. It's a collective team effort. Sometimes we succeed together and sometimes we fail together.
Here are issues that I helped to move forward:
I supported a local option meals tax early in my tenure in 2010, a slight increase over the 6.25% state meals tax, which allowed us to bring in several hundred thousand dollars a year that has gone towards improving streets and sidewalks and downtown infrastructure. https://www.newburyportnews.com/news/local_news/council-oks-local-meals-tax-option/article_50c736ae-68c4-5319-9aef-a20970344585.html
I supported the improvements to the Nock/Molin Schools, building the new Bresnahan School, and creating the Senior Community Center. https://www.newburyportnews.com/news/local_news/cameron-favors-school-projects-new-senior-center/article_8c8cefe0-b5c1-5d98-8dd1-43a88c3cc4c2.html
I supported the implementation of paid parking in 2011, which allowed us to better manage our available parking capacity. Back then, parking was free and (virtually) no one parked on the dirt lots along the Waterfront, and instead competed for the spaces in the Green St. lot. The cost of parking for residents and employees has remained minimal to modest and tourists bring in most of the revenue. The additional revenue has also assisted the city budget. https://www.newburyportnews.com/news/local_news/paid-parking-plan-passes-final-hurdle/article_293e0aaf-dfc6-563a-b980-69076ebe209e.html
I was one of the sponsors for off leash dog parks at three locations, a very heated community discussion over many months. https://www.newburyportnews.com/news/local_news/dogs-win-right-to-roam-off-leash/article_5c529ca3-569a-5d5e-b982-816aa1fd8215.html
I was a strong supporter of the Smart Growth Overlay District near the commuter rail station which passed in 2015 and has resulted in strengthening that area by allowing residential construction with many affordable units within those developments. https://www.newburyportnews.com/news/local_news/smart-growth-zone-passes/article_25caad1a-4086-5990-a74e-aa4f6885d149.html
Other issues of importance have been streets and sidewalks, historic preservation, the Rail Trail, the Harbormaster Facility, and the original reasons I ran: school funding and the waterfront. Our schools are excellent and we are making important progress towards an expanded Market Landing Park, which has been in the works for 20 years.
That is all old news. What is ahead?
Many people are struggling in Newburyport and the City Council needs to be responsive to our residents’ legitimate needs.
The high cost of housing has a major impact on seniors with fixed incomes and younger people trying to stay in Newburyport after graduating from high school and college, as well as young families wanting to move into our community. We need to do a better job to contain costs, including property taxes, expand senior exemptions, as well as make it easier to develop housing for all income levels and all different types, rentals as well as homeownership. I support senior affordable housing at the Brown School. I want us looking at our zoning to deter the ease with which developers take a modest house built in the 1950s or 60s in the West End or Joppa and turn it into a $2+M ‘McMansion’ that will never be affordable to middle class families.
Many of our young people are struggling. After Covid and with the impacts of excessive social media, it can be tough to be a kid today. We need to complete a Newburyport Youth Services (NYS) Center at 57 Low Street. I fully support Mayor Reardon on this. We have an incredibly effective NYS that utilizes state grants, foundation dollars, program fees to supplement what the City of Newburyport is able to provide from our property tax base and general fund. Because Youth Services is by its very nature an in-person model, they need a central location. The City looked at many other alternatives and this is a great site, one we were able to purchase at reasonable cost, we can utilize the existing building, it's right across from one of our schools, it's the best location for families from Plum Island to the West End, and any issues about wetlands has been thoroughly evaluated. And finally, we can afford it at a reasonable cost.
The Council needs to move forward on several stalled or stalling projects that have been a concern for many years. The Bartlet Mall’s condition and deferred maintenance have been a topic of discussion since at least 1998, while the Lower Atkinson Common-Pioneer Fields have presented dangerous parking conditions for years. Market Square has been flooding during torrential rains for decades, and the Brown School continues to decay. The Reardon administration has detailed, comprehensive, and realistic fundable plans for each of these projects. The Council has shown the ability to do this with other projects, including supporting long-overdue street and sidewalk repairs that citizens have demanded for years. For each of these outstanding projects, the Council needs to take the last steps and sign off on the incredible work that City staff, boards and commissions, volunteers, and regular citizens have done to get these projects shovel-ready.
There so much more we have to do from climate resilience to making Newburyport more bikeable and walkable to supporting a strong local economy.
In 2023, the At-Large Council race is a competitive one with 8 candidates for 5 positions. I strongly encourage you to do your homework, contact the candidates, and make an informed decision about who best lines up with your values and your issues.
Don't rely on signs (although I can make a case that mine are pretty darn good looking), but look at their experience, their temperament, and their positions.
Again, I’m asking for your vote in the upcoming election to help us move Newburyport forward together.
NEWBURYPORT — After serving for two terms as councilor for Ward 4, Ed Cameron is running for the City Council as an at-large candidate.
