Age: 70.
Address: 1004 First St. N.W.
Family: Married, five grown children, 10 grandchildren.
Work history: Medical director, Rochester Health and Rehab, Beverly Corp.; general practice physician and emergency medical physician during a career of more than 40 years.
Education history: Raised and educated in Milwaukee; bachelor's and medical degrees from Northwestern University.
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Community activities: Vice president of the Kutzky Park Neighborhood Association, appointee to Property Committee of United Way, colonel in the Army Medical Corps (retired reserve). Member of Rochester Area Chamber of Commerce and Association of Military Surgeons of the United States.
Government history: No prior elected experience.
Contact information: Home telephone, 252-0847; e-mail, glenn.faith@charter.net.
Top three issues:
1. Provide stronger leadership on city council.
2. Revitalization of downtown and central city urban neighborhoods.
3. Promote compact, "smart growth" development, including transit.
Candidate's statement:
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"I want stronger leadership on our city council. I believe we tend to drift. We need forward-looking planning. I believe I can lead us in an improved direction."
Five questions of the candidate:
1. Have city spending cuts gone too deep? Yes.
2. Does the Rochester City Council provide effective leadership? No.
3. Are necessary public safety functions adequately funded? No.
4. Has the city taken the right steps to cover the costs associated with urban growth? No.
5. Has Rochester's leadership made the proper commitment to inner-city neighborhoods? No.
By Jeffrey Pieters
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jpieters@postbulletin.com
The problems of Rochester's core neighborhoods are foremost on Glenn Faith's list of concerns.
Crumbling streets, increasing crime rates and a growing sense of malaise afflict neighborhoods such as his own, Kutzky Park, Faith said.
"Two generations since World War II have no recollection of city life and what it can be like," he said. Yet renewal efforts elsewhere, such as in Milwaukee, Chicago and Minneapolis, herald "a return to the center of the city." He hopes to lead such a renaissance here.
"I really want this (council) seat," Faith said. "I'm not too happy about our street conditions downtown. And our street tree policy, there isn't any. Rochester has been deforested.
"I am running because I want a more positive, forceful, directive voice for my ward and my precinct on the city council," Faith said. "I want leadership, and I want direction. ... The elected officials are not driving hard enough for solutions."
Crime and gang-related problems, Faith said, stem from socioeconomic deficiencies, but as far as the city is concerned, he said, the solution lies in zoning. He would seek to downzone parts of Kutzky Park to encourage a return to more single-family and duplex residences.
Faith is a deep thinker who seems to abhor short answers and begins remarks on unfamiliar subjects with a sigh and a murmured, "I need another Ph.D."
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On environmental issues, such as Decorah Edge and the Silver Lake power plant, Faith considers himself on "the Teddy Roosevelt side of environmentalism."
On the power plant, which is faulted for harming local air quality, Faith said, "I'd ban cigarettes inside the city limits before I'd climb on the power plant."
He suggests more frequent use of referendums in public policy-setting and says he would create a "cabinet" of neighborhood leaders to help him form opinions and policies.
