“Thank you Irvine! Time for a Breath of Fresh Air! New Leadership, New Ideas!”
Campaign Platform
Dear Friends and Neighbors,
Irvine is a good city, however,
there is definitely room for improvement. For example, Irvine's ranking on Money Magazine's "Best Places to
Live" list dropped from No. 6 in 2012 to No. 14 in 2014. The main reasons
for this are the traffic problems and housing prices.
I would be
honored to have your vote. I am running for the Mayor of Irvine to make Irvine
better. In one sentence, my campaign platform
is one vision with three focuses. My vision for Irvine is for Irvine to really
become a first class city while still maintaining its unique features
such as the safest city in the
nation, many parks and green spaces, nice architecture, family ranch feeling,
etc. My focuses are traffic, managed growth and education.
As your
mayor, I will:
1. Place Irvine and Irvine residents'
interests first, as well as respect and promote cultural diversity. I have the courage to fight for you to ensure
your interests are protected.
2. Use a comprehensive and holistic
approach to alleviate the traffic
problems that have plagued Irvine for the past decade.
3. Re-evaluate and revamp the Irvine Master Plan to meet the needs of
Irvine's current population and create smart and sustainable growth.
4. Use Irvine's strategic location at the
Pacific Rim, and fully take advantage of the opportunities created by the
current historical development trend and face any potential challenges with
wisdom.
5. Make Irvine a more business friendly
city by attracting high quality investment and human resources to Irvine, and create
more high-paying jobs.
6. Support small businesses.
7. Ensure fiscal responsibility.
8. Ensure no new taxes are applied
without voters’ approval.
9. Continue to keep Irvine safe.
10. Support green buildings and sustainable
development.
11. Preserve Irvine's environment.
12. Promote a healthier lifestyle.
13. Improve education by working with your school board representatives to start the process
of class sizes reduction, increase
the number of APAAS classes to meet
Irvine residents' demands, and improve the libraries.
14. Support senior services.
15. Improve Irvine's overall competitive
edge.
Let me elaborate on some of the
aforementioned key points:
During the 1960s, my fellow architect,
William Pereira, proposed the idea of incorporating Irvine as a new city, created
the Master Plan for Irvine, and introduced
his vision of a city and university (UCI) growing together. This plan has been successful for a long
time. However, after 50 years, the current population of Irvine has grown to
about 250,000. We have to re-evaluate and revamp the City of Irvine's Master
Plan to meet the needs of the current and projected population. As an architect
with extensive training in urban and regional planning, master planning,
architecture, and landscape architecture, I am a perfect fit to lead this
effort.
The city has also outgrown its infrastructure's capacities. This is one main reason
for the traffic congestion we have experienced over the past decade. The Irvine
city government realizes this problem, as have previous governments; as a
result, they have been trying to develop a solution. However, their solutions
are passive, piece-meal, and limited to only making physical improvements. It
is a good start but can be improved. As your mayor, I'll lead the effort by
adopting a comprehensive and holistic approach to alleviating the traffic problems. For example, in
addition to widening roads and synchronizing traffic signals, we can adjust the
city's Master Plan to distribute the traffic generating businesses more
reasonably and reduce the sources of the traffic congestion; we can also ask
Irvine businesses to provide the option of flexible working hours for their
employees. Measures like these will greatly alleviate the traffic congestion
and improve the quality of life for Irvine residents.
Over the past 100 years, European
immigration to the East Coast has largely fueled the development of the United
States. Immigrants have brought investments, skills, and cultural influences to
the East Coast and have helped to create some successful cities, such as Boston
and Washington, D.C. During the next 100
years, the development of the United States will be largely fueled by the Asians immigrants to the
West Coast. The City of Irvine cannot shut its door completely and ignore this
historical development trend. As your mayor, I'll use Irvine's strategic
location at the Pacific Rim, and fully take advantage of the opportunities
created by the current historical development trend and face any potential
challenges with wisdom; further, I will
draw on the city’s cultural diversity to improve Irvine.
I'll make Irvine a more business
friendly city by attracting high quality investment and human resources to
Irvine. This will create high paying jobs for the 21st century,
thus increasing the average household income and property value.
People compete with each other,
companies compete, and cities compete with each other too. Irvine should not
lose to other cities in this global economic and the related competition.
Most people bought a home in Irvine
because of its good schools. However, the class sizes for Irvine schools are
too large. For example, a class often has 33 students for 4th to 6th grades.
With a larger class, it is hard for the teachers to pay adequate attention to
each student. The main reason for larger class sizes is because of the limited
state funding for education. As your mayor, I will work with your school board
representatives to start the process of class
size reduction, work to increase the number of APAAS classes to meet Irvine residents' demands, and improve the
libraries. I will work with other mayors as we go to Sacramento to request more
funding for our schools and also work with private firms, residents and IPSF to
start to raise money toward this goal. I will also have the city staff evaluate
the Irvine city ordinance to require all new schools to be planned and designed
to have the capacity to reduce class sizes, instead of continuing to add
portables whenever we need to add a classroom.
I would be honored to have your vote.
Join me in restoring the Irvine government to "government of the people,
by the people, for the people." Please vote for me and ask all your
friends and relatives to vote for me. Together, we can make Irvine a better
city for YOU! May God bless America! May God bless Irvine!
Please feel free to contact me if you
have any concern. You can reach me at info@GangChenUSA.com
P.S. -- If you have not registered to
vote, do it now. Your vote and your voice are very important!
See GangChenUSA.com for
the latest updates.
E-mail: info@GangChenUSA.com
Paid for by Gang Chen for Mayor 2016, FPPC#
1379051
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