Working with Council colleagues, staff and volunteers, here are ten goals I hope to help accomplish on behalf of the citizens of Hyattsville during my current term in office:

		Make City Services More Efficient: We need to eliminate Hyattsville's structural deficit and provide for projected increases in the cost of providing services and replacing infrastructure in the years ahead.  Every means must be used to provide better services at lower cost.
		Repair our Infrastructure: Our decaying roads and sidewalks reduce our quality of life and weaken our tax base, creating a vicious cycle.  The City must complete its Pavement Management Program within the next five years.
		Control the Tax Burden: Hyattsville's relatively high property tax rate combines with rising assessments to create hardships for many residents and a deterrent to new investment in the City.  Every effort must be made to avoid raising taxes further.
		Expand the Tax Base: Hyattsville relies too much on taxing single-family homeowners to meet its revenue requirements.  We need to expand the number of single-family homeowners, reduce the development of new multifamily rental housing, revitalize our commercial corridors, and annex productive commercial properties into the City.
		Provide for Public Safety: The fortunes of the City are closely tied to the actual and perceived safety of our citizenry from crime.  We need to maintain neighborhood patrols, community policing and a focus on reducing the causes of serious crime -- including eliminating nuisance properties, targeting drug activity, and rehabilitating run-down multifamily housing.
		Facilitate Community-Focused Development: New development in the City must provide positive benefits for City residents while minimizing negative impacts on neighborhoods.  The affected public must have full knowledge of and input on proposed projects, and the City government must use all of its tools to ensure that the bar is raised on development standards in Hyattsville.
		Develop Needed Public Amenities: Hyattsville needs to continue to fill in the gaps to meet citizens' needs and expectations of community amenities.  These include new or improved parks and recreational facilities; pedestrian and biker routes; shopping and dining; schools (public and private); community centers; cultural attractions such as galleries, performance spaces and museums; youth activities; and historic resources.
		Improve our Neighborhoods: Quality of life begins where we live.  Neighborhood services such as trash and leaf pickup, park maintenance, parking enforcement, leaf removal, street cleaning, pothole repair, streetlight installation and maintenance, sidewalk connectivity, public landscaping, traffic calming and code enforcement must be improved.
		Protect and Enhance our Environment:  A growing population and new development mean it is even more important to practice better stewardship of the environmental resources that we still have.  The City must restore its diminishing tree canopy; reform sanitation practices that worsen the litter problem; foster better storm-water management methods; provide for protection of remaining open space and development of new green spaces; and work to re-naturalize the riparian zones of our stream valleys.
		Improve Public Awareness of the City: Hyattsville still suffers because of negative stereotypes held by many who influence the destiny of our community.  Marketing and communications efforts must be developed that help build social capital within the city and a positive "brand" for the City in the wider region.