Billions of dollars have been spent to reinvigorate an urban core that will soon be home to six hotels, yet small businesses struggle to stay open. The libraries, among our most treasured public resources, bend under the strain of serving an unsustainable range of functions for residents–from housing to health care; conditions that have worsened while city revenue has gone “bonkers.” Dayton is facing its highest unemployment rate since Mayor Mims took office so we know this investment does not provide jobs for working people in Dayton.
Over the last decade, rates of infant and maternal mortality for Black families have risen while community demands to replace Good Samaritan Hospital in majority-Black areas have been obstructed. Instead of an emergency room and birthing center, Good Sam was replaced with an urgent care and some treadmills. Local residents lag behind the rest of Ohio and the country in nearly every physical and behavioral health category, according to a 2025 Montgomery County Community Health Assessment. This model of economic development has failed to improve health outcomes in our community.
As the price of policing has skyrocketed, from $98 million in 2014 to $150 million in 2024, our city has gotten less safe and was recently ranked seventh in the nation for murders per capita. Surveillance technology does not protect us and does not deter crime but it does waste limited resources we could spend on things that work, like community-based public safety interventions. Even Chief Kamran Afzal knows that the department’s efforts are “not going to change the underlying conditions.” The mayor’s initiative to address gun violence has so far failed to launch, however well intentioned. We must hold City Hall accountable to ensure that this program amounts to more than an election-year marketing campaign.
We are simply not directing resources in a way that serves the health and safety of residents. The lack of tangible results is a scandal for the Mims/Dickstein administration and should be front-and-center to voters as they weigh the candidates for mayor. This evidence should force all of us to rethink our approach to urban renewal because the top-down, trickle-out model is not working. The city needs leadership that understands these dilemmas from the grassroots perspective and nurtures solutions that rise up.
Currently, we do not have the leadership we need in City Hall as we brace for the future. This election is too important to bet on the status quo. For these reasons and many others, we are proud to support Shenise Turner-Sloss for Mayor of Dayton.
Destiny Brown is a resident of the Wolf Creek neighborhood in Dayton.
Joel R. Pruce is a resident of the Historic South Park neighborhood in Dayton.