Peoria Mayor Rita Ali will preside over the first regular city council meeting over her second term Tuesday, one week after taking her latest oath of office.
Her stated goals for the next four years include addressing a housing crisis, working collaboratively with city leaders and community stakeholders, and continuing to improve Peoria’s quality of life.
Ali recently spoke to WCBU about her second-term priorities and a variety of issues facing the city.
This transcript has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity.
You recently took your oath of office to start your second mayoral term. How will you approach the next four years, and what might you do differently?
Mayor Rita Ali: That’s a great question. I’ll approach it like I have previously, and try to be collaborative as possible, both internally and externally. Collaborative with my colleagues around the horseshoe as well as collaborative with our partners, our stakeholders within the community, whether that’s employers, not for profit organizations, residential organizations and businesses.
So I think that we can leverage resources when we work together. We can expand our ideas, and we can really get more buy-in when we’re collaborative, working on projects in a collaborative way. That’s how I work, and that’s how I’ll continue to work.
Was there anything from the first four years or from the campaign that maybe opened your eyes to some things you may change, though?
Ali: Well, I think I’d like to be even more communicative, both internally and externally. Have more standard meetings internally, I would say – and when I say internally, I mean with staff as well as with council members. There’s standing meetings that are held between the city manager and our council members, and with me, it’s kind of been on an as-needed basis. You talk to people when you need to talk to them, or when you want to talk to them. But I would like to, I think, maybe formalize that a little bit more, so that we’re meeting more regularly and having that regular communication.
You touched on it already, but a common theme expressed during the special swearing in meeting was a desire for collaboration. How will you foster that collaborative spirit toward the betterment of Peoria?
Ali: I think it’s done by really determining what other people’s priorities are and what their interests are, and where we align – where they align with my goals and interests, where they align with our strategic plan, which a lot of that input comes from the public. So I think determining what every individual is interested in for their district or for the city, and personally, and then try to try to make that alignment and then to work together.
I want other people’s goals to succeed as well, and I want them to help me with the things that I find more of a priority.
What do you view as your top goals or the city’s biggest challenges over the next four years?
Ali: Well, housing is a huge one. We have to address it. We have a housing crisis, as far as I’m concerned. I know there’s a national and state crisis as well, but we don’t have enough inventory of homes. If we’re going to try to increase our population, attract more people to our area, we have to have the homes for them to live in, and we have to attract developers. We have to build our capacity for development.
There’s strategies that cities across the country are using; Chicago just introduced one where they’re going to have kind of their own internal real estate nonprofit. But I think we do have to be creative and innovative in attracting that development.
I served on the governor’s task force for middle income housing solutions, and we identified about 27 strategies to increase development for housing for middle income families and individuals. We are lacking that right here in Peoria, we call it “workforce housing,” we are lacking the inventory for that. Last summer, there were about 250 homes for sale in the city of Peoria and only about 12 of them fit that category of being middle income housing. They call it “the missing middle,” is what it’s known as.
So we need housing for the very low income, we need housing for the high end, high wage earners. But we also need it for that missing middle, and we probably needed there the most because it impacts on the other end, the most affordable housing.
Along with the housing crisis, during the swearing in meeting you also mentioned improving Peoria’s quality of life. How will you work to accomplish that?
Ali: Yeah. I really think that we have to continue to work with our education partners to make sure that our individuals that live here, our residents, have the skills that they need to take the jobs that we have available. There is a skills shortage, not just a housing shortage, and so we have to skill up our residents, connect them with the right resources to get the right training so they can fill the job openings. Still today, we have over 2,000 job openings within our healthcare industry, and we need to have the people skilled up to take those jobs.
Otherwise they’re taking from out of town individuals – and we do want to attract out of town individuals – but for the most part, [the positions] don’t get filled. Some of them don’t get filled because we don’t have the skilled up workforce. So that’s a priority as well.
Another common goal that often comes up and never seems to fully go away is addressing violent crime. What do you need to do to continue those efforts and produce more results?
Ali: Right, so you will notice from our stats that we’re making huge progress there. I think there’s been one or two homicides this year, and compared to last year, that number is definitely decreased. Part of that is because of some of the tactics that our police force has introduced, new tactics and new tools that they’re using. The city council has said “yes” to everything, really, that our police have asked for, in terms of the tools and equipment that they need to be more effective.
And it’s working. They are solving crimes faster than ever, historically, and I think the fact that they’re catching criminals faster, especially when it comes to violent crime, that we’re getting some dangerous people off the street. That has helped to reduce our crime, so I think we have to stay the course there.
As far as traffic, that’s a big complaint; we get probably more complaints on traffic than any other crime issue. Police Chief [Eric] Echavarria is building up a traffic division, a strong traffic division to begin to address some of the speeding that’s taking place, some of the racing that’s taking place around our city – because it is dangerous. I see it; I see it riding down certain streets in Peoria, and we do have to crack down on that.
I’ve spoken to City Manager Patrick Urich about this before, but diversity, equity and inclusion [DEI] is among the key aspects of the five-year strategic plan. But we know this is an area that the Trump administration has pushed back against. What is your level of concern that Peoria could see federal grant funding withheld over its various positions?
Ali: Well, I’m quite concerned. You know, diversity is our strength; we know that. We know it’s not a bad thing. We know that equity is a good thing. Some of those messages that are being sent are false, and we know that. We know that we have to try to appreciate all people, and try to lift everyone up from where they’re starting at and that’s really what equity is. If you think about the terminology equity is about fairness, and you think about the opposite of that, and that’s unfairness. Well, that’s not what we want.
So we have to find ways, I think, to massage some things a little bit, but still to do the right thing. We have to continue to do the right thing, otherwise we’re going to lose all of our hard work and efforts that we’ve made to try to improve race relations, improve the quality of life for all of our residents. We have to invest in, I think, those initiatives that are helping to close disparity gaps.
But if it comes to a point where the commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion comes at the cost of federal grant funding, how do you balance that effort?
Ali: I think you just have to figure out how to balance it, and what you’re willing to stop doing and what you’re willing to put on pause.
I’m really proud of Harvard University, to be quite frank with you. I’m very proud of that educational institution that says, “these are our values,” and “we’re not going to” – despite their great loss – “we’re not going to walk away from what we know is valuable to us and part of our identity and part of our mission.” So I’m proud of them for that.
A common anecdotal criticism, which came up at times during the campaign, is that Peoria is not business friendly – or not as business friendly as it should be. Do you think there’s any truth to that, and how can the city change that perception?
Ali: Well, I think that some people have some bad experiences because maybe there was something that happened where they didn’t get an approval for a permit fast enough, where they got a denial for something. It’s been kind of a case-by-case scenario where if someone or a business didn’t have a good experience, then they blame the whole system, the whole city, for not being business friendly. But many times, it’s a case by case situation and there are some sometimes good reasons that the things happened.
But for the most part, just like a new business that’s moving to Peoria – I think it’s called Honey Baked Ham. Their quote was that “Peoria is an extremely business friendly market.” And I know other businesses they have those positive experiences, and they don’t have that same perception. So in some ways, I think that there can be some truth to it based upon individual experiences, but to just say a blanket Peoria is or the city is not business friendly is not true. It’s a perception.
With that perception still hanging around though, in combating that, what do you need to do to encourage more business development in Peoria?
Ali: Yes, so we need to tell the good things that Peoria is doing; we need to sell the positives about Peoria. We need to internally continue to work through our processes to be more customer and business friendly. There’s things that we can improve, without a doubt.
We have to work on customer friendliness and business friendliness. But again, we are working on those things and we are tweaking on a regular basis. So we have to continue to do that. We also have to continue to listen. When somebody is saying, “Peoria is not business friendly,” I say, “why and where? Why do you say that, and where can we improve?” And we take that message back and try to improve.
We know the city has started the process of seeking developers for the PNC Bank Building and related properties, and the one-way/two-way conversion of Adams and Jefferson is ongoing. What more should the city do in its effort to revitalize downtown?
Ali: Yeah, I’m excited about downtown and where things are going, and these new projects are going to help that. Peoria, for the third year in a row, was named one of the 100 most livable cities in the country; we’re one of the most affordable municipalities in the country. So there’s a lot of good things going on with Peoria, and we have to continue to tell the story and we have to continue to invest in our infrastructure downtown.
We’re working on a Main Street project; we’re hoping to get released at least some of that allocation. There’s a $25 million allocation for infrastructure improvements at Main Street. We’re hoping, working with our state representatives, to get at least some of that money released so we can start working on the project.
But that’s what we need; we need more infrastructure. We need a Main Street that is thriving with businesses, and help those existing businesses but attract new businesses to downtown Peoria. We also need more housing.
You mention the Main Street funding, waiting for that to get released. Have you gotten any indication of if and when the state may release funding for the proposed Riverfront revitalization project? How do you see the prospects for seeing that plan realized?
Ali: Yes, so a number of those projects were sponsored by [State Rep.] Jehan Gordon-Booth, both the Riverfront as well as Main Street. I spoke to her this morning, and she’s been meeting with the state department that really kind of controls those funds, Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity [DCEO]. She’s trying to work with them to get funding released for her various projects, and those are two of those projects.
There’s a backlog with the state, in terms of all the allocations that were made, and then there wasn’t enough money to deliver. So they’re trying to play catch-up, and we want Peoria to be part of that catch-up. So we’ve been waiting a good number of years for both the Main Street funds, as well as Riverfront.
Riverfront funding is allocated at $15 million; the project itself is probably twice that amount. But that’s more than seed money, I would say, if we can get those funds released to begin the development.
So at that point, once the state funds are released, is that when you begin the process of doing fundraising for the rest of the cost of that project?
Ali: Yes, and I don’t think we really have to wait. Knowing that it is slated to be released, I think that we have to begin to talk about a fundraising strategy, especially the Riverfront – well, Main Street as well, but especially the Riverfront. That will be one that I think that we can get buy-in, in terms of individual as well as business funding support.
So you remain optimistic, though, that the Riverfront plan as it’s been presented will come to fruition?
Ali: I am, I am very optimistic. It’s a great plan. It’s an award winning plan. It won a state award. I mean it has – you look at the elements, kayaking, sports, places just to kind of sit and be entertained. It’s a beautiful Riverfront plan and my goal, and our goal, is to make sure it comes to fruition.
