I think more green space is always good, but there’s already three parks within walking distance of downtown, so that feels like a hard sell. Maybe there’s open land or abandoned property in the more urban sections of the city that could be turned into community gardens and/or parks though, I just don’t know the spots that need it most. I’d like better variety in the restaurants, but there’s not really much control the city has over stuff like that.

I would like to see Stamford set up its own utilities. We all hate Eversource, so why not have a public power company to maintain the lines & hold down generation costs? While we’re at it, Optimum also sucks some serious shit, particularly downtown. It’s okay now that I’m in Westover, but downtown I only had the option of cable, and it was practically unusable. A municipal ISP would be great, or even just some laws to put the screws to them about upgrading their old cable whenever they decide to run fiber to the new luxury apartments.

What else…a public bank would also be cool. When cities can service their own debts, it often creates impressive efficiencies. North Dakota of all places has a public bank for the entire state, and it’s basically the only part of their government that’s worth a damn. Let them service low-cost businesses loans/mortgages & accept depositors, and we might also get some local growth.

Oooh! Here’s a thought: ban foreign ownership and corporate ownership of single-family homes. You want a house? Gotta be an actual person. Limit landlords to one rental property a piece. If you want to make rental money, you gotta go big & dense. Require all new developments to set aside some percentage of units as affordable housing, with none of that separate entrances bullshit so the bourgeoisie can avoid looking at their neighbors.

I’m warming up to this! Ranked Choice or Approval voting would be cool. I don’t hate Simmons, but I wouldn’t mind if city elections were more open to third-party challenges. I think we’re all pretty tired of the red vs. blue thing, and if it works here we can point to it at the state level and be like “See? Not so hard, is it?”

What else what else what else…that’s all for now. I do reserve the right to come back and inflict more of my ideas on you all though.