Reeves looks back, forward

A column by Mayor Kenneth E. Reeves

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to write in The Alewife. For the past 18 years I have been a city coucillor for the city of Cambridge, and for the past 18 months, have served as your mayor.

This is the third time I have been elected by the City Council to be mayor of Cambridge, and this term has been the most rewarding for me.

As Chairperson of the school committee I have worked very hard to improve our school system.

My main goal was to create a sound educational setting for all of our residents, with a high quality education that boasts a rigorous curriculum to challenge each student to perform at the highest level.

Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School has greatly improved since my chairmanship of the school committee.

This was one of my top priorities and will continue to be so for the next six months of my term.

I also co-chaired a new citywide crime task force with City Manager Bob Healy, in which we deal directly with the causes of crime and violence in our city and study ways to intervene with our youth in crisis.

We search for new jobs, both entry-level jobs and good jobs, in hopes that employment will enable our young males to feel included in the community and will give them the empowering confidence to take care of their responsibilities as well as those of their families.

Throughout my term, I avidly worked with the city manager and the other counselors to keep our tax rate at one of the lowest in the state.

We have tried very hard not to burden our property owners, and continue to pay special attention to our senior citizens who may own houses that have greatly increased in value over the years.