Martha Bixby

Questions and Answers

Question 1: After 40+ years of Prop 2 ½, a very limited ability to pass overrides, steep increases in expenses such as employee benefits and utilities, and a relatively small commercial tax base, Newton faces fiscal challenges not encountered by our peer communities, making it increasingly difficult to adequately fund our schools and other city services. What are your ideas for raising revenues or otherwise addressing Newton’s fiscal challenges?

We need to take a few steps as a city to gain trust and find responsible ways to identify new funding sources. These include: -Increasing understanding of and trust in how residents’ tax dollars are spent; -Helping residents understand where tax dollars are going and what trade-off and decisions are made; -Highlighting programs that give us great “bang for our buck”; -Finding ways to be even more fiscally responsible; -Increasing revenue including through smart and responsible new development, potential future overrides, attracting commercial that could succeed here, and other opportunities.

Question 2: What, specifically, can the City Council do to ensure that lower income residents, young families, and long-term residents looking to downsize, can afford housing in Newton?

Lots of opportunities here, including but not limited to: Support a variety of housing options and opportunities for more multifamily; Remove parking minimums - let the market decide if parking is needed; Facilitate fully affordable such as West Newton Armory; Create welcoming environment for projects such as Family Aid.

Question 3: What is Newton doing to address climate change, how effective are these efforts, and what else could/should we be doing?

The City must work on multiple fronts, since various environmental actions will be available or of interest to individual residents and families at different times. Having the City put infrastructure in place such as BERDO, bike lanes, electric vehicle charging, composting programs, and more, all allow residents to take the actions that work for them at the time that works for them. -Support walking, biking, public transportation & allow for housing options near green transit; -Protect our parks and open spaces; -Reduce carbon emissions and support clean energy sources; -Incentivize low-and-zero waste alternatives and composting.

Question 4: Government transparency refers to the obligation of a government to proactively share information related to the management of public resources and decision-making; it’s indispensable to accountability and to an informed electorate. A recent initiative conducted by Newton’s LWV identified significant deficiencies in Newton’s local government transparency and specifically with respect to the City’s website. How do you think improved transparency could benefit our city? What improvements would you advocate for to the City website or transparency in general?

As a first priority, we must focus on making some of our major documents available in alternatives to PDFs - into something much more searchable and user-friendly. These include budget documents and ordinances. The fact that our ordinances are in PDFs with no central search function makes it very difficult for residents to determine what rules and guidelines apply to them. Finding ways to make budget information “searchable and sortable” as recommended by LWVN is crucial to increasing fiscal transparency and the public’s engagement with the budget process.