Madison's four mayoral candidates gathered to debate their agendas for the city Thursday night at the Madison Concourse Hotel in front of a group of young professionals and voters.
The 2007 candidates are current Madison Mayor Dave Cieszlewicz, running for his first re-election; Peter Munoz, Cuban AcmigrAc and executive director of Centro Hispanico; Ray Allen, local businessman and school board veteran and Will Sandstrom, retired biochemist and anti-crime advocate.
The forum came just 11 days before the mayoral primary, which will slim the race down to two candidates before the final vote April 3.
Crime, business growth and development and the city budget were three of the main issues addressed at the forum.
The debate raged on for much of the evening with the mayor facing close scrutiny from all three opponents.
Sandstrom's criticisms focused on the mayor's agenda on fighting organized crime, while Munoz focused on reclaiming financial responsibility.
According to Munoz, Cieslewicz has ""eroded the reserve fund by 32 percent, while basic services erode.""
Allen also questioned Cieslewicz's current policies. He reiterated his main campaign slogan throughout the night—that Madison needs a mayor who will think about the long term future of the city and not cost taxpayers more money.
""You want to lay out a city that maintains green space and utilizes its public infrastructure in the most effective way,"" he said in an interview last week.
Still, Cieslewicz discussed the highlights from his first mayoral term.
""I think were making a great deal of progress on a number of fronts,"" he said in an interview last week.
At the forum he pointed to increasing the size of Madison's police department, building a long-awaited swimming pool and requiring developers to build more low-income housing. Cieslewicz also returned to the issue of homelessness repeatedly.
Local attorney Sherman Hackbarth served as host and moderator of the forum. He graduated from UW-Madison Law School in 2005.
""[We were] inspired by wanting to learn more about the candidates,"" Hackbarth said.
