Calls for Increased State Funding, Desegregation, and an End to High-Stakes Testing

Standing outside the Westside Academy at Blodgett in the high-poverty Near Westside, Green mayoral candidate Howie Hawkins said Friday that the next mayor must be a champion for Syracuse schools.

Howie Hawkins, the Green Party candidate for Mayor of Syracuse, will hold a news conference on Friday, October 20 in front of the Westside Academy at Blodgett to discuss his plans for improving Syracuse schools.

Hawkins will explain how he plans to secure equitable and adequate funding of all Syracuse schools, to resist a state takeover and possible privatization of nine so-called “struggling schools” in the city, and to begin desegregating schools in the Syracuse metropolitan region by socioeconomic class, which he says is the most powerful reform to improve educational outcomes for poor, working class, and middle class students alike.

Howie Hawkins, the Green Party candidate for Mayor of Syracuse, called today for a state- and county-funded Marshall Plan to rebuild the city’s high poverty neighborhoods.

The U.S. Marshall Plan rebuilt a devastated Western Europe after World War II. The National Urban League has been calling for a domestic Marshall Plan to rebuild inner cities every year since 1964 in its annual State of Black America reports.

The plan would include a public jobs program in public works and services, with investments in affordable housing, transportation infrastructure, and community services.

Notice of News Conference
When: Friday, October 13
Time: 1:00 pm
Location: Main Gate at State Fairgrounds

Hawkins to Release Marshall Plan to Rebuild Syracuse on Fri. Oct. 13

Howie Hawkins, the Green Party candidate for Mayor of Syracuse, will hold a news conference on Friday October 13 in front of the Main State at the State Fairgrounds to call for a state and county-funded Marshall Plan to rebuild the city, including addressing the problem of segregation in housing and schools. The Marshall Plan was used to rebuild Europe after WWII.

Hawkins’ plan also includes job creation and anti-poverty initiatives.

Hawkins will hold the news conference at the Fairgrounds to highlight how the state and county have poured $120 million in and around State Fairgrounds in last few years while ignoring poverty in the city.

Says Reforms Needed to Prevent State Take Over

Video of News Conference

“I want to be the next mayor of Syracuse, not its last mayor,” Hawkins said Wednesday referring to the city’s fiscal crisis.

Hawkins said that Syracuse must band together with other cities and towns in the state to demand the ability to enact municipal income taxes and to convince the state to increase revenue sharing. Hawkins said broadening the city’s tax base in these ways would enable it to lower property taxes for local residents.

Since much of the city’s budget pays for services for commuters that then take their paychecks and tax payments home at night to surrounding suburbs, reforms are needed to make them pay their fair share, Hawkins said.

Reforms Needed to Save City from Insolvency and State Financial Control Board

What: News Conference
When: Wednesday, October 4, 2017
Time: 1:00 pm
Location: Green Party Headquarters, 2617 South Salina, Syracuse

Howie Hawkins will present his proposals for creating a broader, fairer, and sustainable tax base for Syracuse.

With a recurring structural deficit of $15-20 million and a fund balance projected to be about $20 million at the end of the current budget year, Syracuse is on the brink of insolvency.

The Green Party handed out the statement below at the judicial candidates forum at the Southwest Community Center tonight urging voters not to vote for three judicial candidates who filed Green Party designating petitions: Democrat Frank B. Pelosi for City Court Judge, Republican Loretta R. Kilpatrick for Surrogate's Court Judge, and Republican Michele Pirro Bailey for Family Court Judge.

Greens Call on Sen. DeFrancisco To Be Deciding Vote for Passage

Green Party candidates for city offices said today that the city and school district would save $80 million a year if the New York Health Act is adopted.

The Green Party will release their cost estimates for how much the city, the school district, and the county will save on the health care costs for their public employees if the New York Health Act now pending in the New York state senate is enacted.

Green Party's mayoral candidate, Howie Hawkins, made his candidacy official Thursday. He said he is running for a "Sustainable Syracuse," which he described as "a fiscally, economically, and ecologically sustainable prosperity."

Speaking to reporters and supporters Thursday afternoon at the Event Center on the south side of Syracuse, Hawkins outlined an "action plan" of policies to bring about his Sustainable Syracuse vision.