Providing Access to Affordable Housing
Having access to quality affordable housing is an issue that is near to my heart. Throughout my childhood, my family dealt with lack of housing, evictions, and even homelessness. As a State Representative, I have made housing a top priority -- especially with the creation of the Housing Eviction Limitation & Prevention Package (HELP Package). This includes five pieces of legislation that eliminate discrimination in housing based on a past criminal conviction, remove barriors that eviction records create to future housing, provide legal services to tenants, and hold landlords responsible for damage to property demed hazardous to the health or safety of the tenant.
As County Executive, I will continue my fight for affordable housing and tenant rights; while prioritizing policies that promote new and community based homeownership. Affordable housing means, and shall continue to mean, that no family should pay more than ⅓ of their pre-tax income on housing.
Fighting for a Living wage
We must start with a floor of $15 an hour, ensuring no employee is paid less than that. We must index that to inflation. And we must ensure every position pays a competitive, living wage, so that we can compete for the best employees. We need a stronger County ordinance and we have a lot of work to do in Madison to make this happen.
Ensuring Access to Mental Health Care
As County Executive, I will make sure that all residents have access to mental health care. This means having these resources available in neighborhoods across Milwaukee County, not just at a few centralized locations.
As someone who grew up in a house with family members dealing with mental health issues, I know first-hand that in times of crisis, it’s not always possible to travel to a facility. Having these resources available in the community will make it much more likely that residents will seek out the help they need.
It is also important that we educate our children on mental health and self-care, this will help alleviate some of the mental health care that is needed after they become adults. I would encourage Milwaukee County school districts to integrate mental health education into their curriculum and would work with the school districts to make Milwaukee County mental health resources available to the schools.
Expanding Reproductive Health Services
A woman’s right to choose is a decision that I fundamentally believe no man, including myself, should have any right to impede on. Even though this right is essential to a woman’s health and economic security, as of 2014, 90% of counties in the United States did not have a single clinic that could provide these services. Systematic barriers continue to make it extremely difficult for low-income women and women of color to gain the access necessary for reproductive care. Ensuring that women have complete autonomy and possession of their bodies, their lives, and their healthcare is exactly the policy and practice that I will bring to this office.
Providing Security for our Seniors
The largest and most successful generation to date is retiring. It is incumbent on policymakers across the city, county, and state to ensure a safe, successful, and fulfilling retirement. Far too many of our greatest generation are finding themselves either working through retirement age, or being forced out of their job without a safety net.
As County Executive, I will endeavor to provide the best care, support, and assistance to those residents who have made Milwaukee County their home in their golden years. I want to make Milwaukee County the premier retirement county in the Midwest -- while always ensuring that senior citizens in our most vulnerable communities are taken care of.