LIMA — After spending multiple terms on Lima City Council, 6th Ward Councilman Derry Glenn believes he has what it takes to better serve Lima as its chief executive.
Born and raised in Lima, Glenn, 54, retired from Allen Correctional Institution at age 50, after receiving a bachelor’s degree from Central State University. Since then, Glenn earned a doctorate in theology from the School of the Spirit Bible Institute in Lima.
Glenn last ran unsuccessfully for mayor eight years ago. Now he’s asking Lima voters to support him going into Tuesday’s primary election for Lima mayor, with the top two vote-getters advancing to November’s general election.
“I have created so many programs (since then),” he said. “I’ve gone around and learned what it takes to make the city grow. My experience on city council has given me the chance to do a lot of things in the community.”
Crime
Glenn sees crime rates rising, and that is a source of concern. While he sees value of the community oriented policing initiative revived in 2015, Glenn would like to see that program grown upon to where several neighborhoods had their own police precincts to help residents have a closer connection with the Lima Police Department.
“It would be the same way as our COP officers,” Glenn said. “We’d have three officers, not just one — three on first, second and third shifts.
“Let’s use Catalpa. When we would put a precinct there, those officers would report to that area every day. That would be their job. It will help us out because you’d see the same three patrolling that area. It would bring better relationships and knowledge of what’s going on in the neighborhoods, like where the drug houses are.”
Glenn sees a continual presence in the neighborhoods by police as a key element in cutting down on crime and building better relationships between law enforcement and the minority community. Along with being more deliberate in hiring minority police officers, another step Glenn believes could be helpful in minority relations with law enforcement is the revival of the Citizens Review Board, which started in 2008 to give residents a sounding board in matters of perceived law enforcement overreach.
“It’s been sitting in the Safety Services Committee,” he said. “It is important in that it can bring a better relationship with the police department. It had been put in place, but everybody quit because it had no teeth in there. I’ll keep pushing for it.”
Glenn wants to see the 10-member board revived with the authority to conduct independent screenings of incidents with police and have more clearly defined authority to address any of these issues.
Housing
Glenn sees a lack of investment in Lima’s neighborhoods as a problem, with the housing quality in Lima suffering for it.
“Crime can come from poor housing,” he said. “Most of the crime comes when they see boarded up houses and people not taking care of their neighborhoods.”
To help bring the city’s housing situation back to a more sustainable level, Glenn is calling for a $500,000 per year investment from the city’s general fund to help homeowners make needed repairs to their houses, whether it be roofing or other structural work.
“Let’s rebuild these neighborhoods,” he said. “If you’ve lived in your house 10 years or more — and just bring proof that you’ve lived in your house 10 years or more — we’ll work on fixing your house, like with the roofing or the siding, and there will be no red tape about it. It will get people confident in their homes again.”
Glenn noted this would be done through a city commission looking for low bids from contractors to help repair these houses.
Another issue when it comes to housing in Lima, according to Glenn, is landlords who are unable or unwilling to maintain their rental properties.
“We want to put a nice, three-week training together, and this is what they would have to go through before they could rent in the city of Lima, and we would explain everything to them,” Glenn said. “If they have five or six rental properties in the neighborhoods, they will maintain them.”
Glenn also proposed levying fees for landlords to pay if they are not maintaining their properties.
Economic development
Attracting businesses with good-paying jobs is key to Lima’s revival, Glenn said. While Mayor David Berger is touting large numbers of jobs currently available in the region, Glenn questions the quality of those jobs.
“The jobs are $10 per hour with no benefits,” he said. “How many of them are temp(orary) jobs?”
Ideas Glenn proposed to spur economic development include giving Lima-based companies the first chance to bid on city projects and reducing regulatory burdens for incoming businesses. Glenn also asserted that maintaining positive relationships and a shared economic vision with surrounding townships will be an essential element in attracting more robust jobs to the area.
“Lima does not have a lot of land available,” he said. “We need good relationships with the townships so we can create more economic development in these areas. I’ll put together an economic team with good folks to go out and sell Lima and bring these jobs to Lima.”
Encouraging training opportunities for Lima’s young people will also help spur economic growth, Glenn said.
“We’ve got to work on training our folks through the unions,” he said. “That is not being pushed right now.”
Glenn does not believe that seeing positive economic change in Lima will be difficult or lengthy if done correctly.
“I can guarantee we can do it in two years,” he said. “In two years, you will definitely see something there.”
.neFileBlock {
margin-bottom: 20px;
}
.neFileBlock p {
margin: 0px 0px 0px 0px;
}
.neFileBlock .neFile {
border-bottom: 1px dotted #aaa;
padding-bottom: 5px;
padding-top: 10px;
}
.neFileBlock .neCaption {
font-size: 85%;
}
