Darryl Wright wears a lot of hats in Westbrook. He is president of the Chamber of Commerce, a member of various boards and civic organizations, and now he is looking to serve as the Ward 4 representative on the City Council.

“I’ve participated in many committees and put a lot into this town, said Wright, R-Webster Street. “And I feel that my experience could be better used as a city councilor.”

As chamber president, Wright said he has had discussions with members of the business community. Based on those discussions, he thinks the key to developing downtown is to find ways to attract more foot traffic to Main Street. He said he would like to see more developments that feature retail space on the first floor with a mix of office and residential spaces above. He thinks those sorts of developments would increase foot traffic and bring even more businesses in.

Putting a focus on attracting new businesses as opposed to new residential development would help ease the property tax burden on residents, Wright said. He said it is vital the city look to bring in new businesses because businesses pay more taxes and use less city services than residential development does.

Wright said he would like to see the city continue to try and save money by pursuing additional ways to share services with the schools. “We’ve got to try to cut down on duplication as much as possible,” he said.

Wright said he would work with the council and the administration to get a handle on spending and control tax increases and stretch every dollar by identifying what things the city absolutely needs and what things could be classified merely as “wants.”

He said when coming up with the budget, the council needs to ask, “do we really absolutely need this for the city right now? Or is this something we’d like to have? And if we would like to have it, we need to work real hard and get rid of the things we don’t necessarily need before we can have our wants,” he said.

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