Arlington Candidate Profile: Jacob Deck For Housing Authority

ARLINGTON, MA — The town election is fast approaching on Saturday, March 28, and the Housing Authority is one of the contested races.

Arlington Patch asked candidates to answer questions about their campaigns and will be publishing candidate profiles leading up to election day.

Jacob Deck is running for Arlington Housing Authority.

Age

28
Party Affiliation

Extremely Democratic

Family

Unmarried, no children, but close with parents, brother, and other family in the area.

Education

Bachelor's degree in History and English, Lawrence University, class of 2022. Class of 2016 Arlington High School Graduate

Occupation

Mariner, extremely enthusiastic volunteer.
Previous or current elected office: None, but running concurrently for precinct 13 town meeting.

Campaign website

vote4jacob.com

Why are you seeking elected office?

I spent the past year waking up every morning feeling like I wasn't doing enough to help people. A functional, dynamic housing authority could make an enormous difference in the lives of so many people, so I decided to put my volunteer and sitting-in-on-committee experience to work, roll up my sleeves, and run.

The single most pressing issue facing the housing authority is:

How to keep meeting our obligations to an ever-growing number of Arlingtonians, while getting less and less help from the state and federal governments.

What makes me different from the other candidate:

I believe that the housing authority can and should return to its roots and do more, bigger, and better things than it is doing now, and I'm not afraid to talk to voters about it.

The other issues that define my campaign platform:

The big issue I'm running on is a) expanding the supply of public housing in town and b) transitioning our current public housing developments from dumping grounds for the disadvantaged to fully-integrated parts of the Arlington community. Other cities have shown us that a mixed-income social housing model results in developments that are a) more financially sustainable, b) less stigmatized, and c) less easy to defer decades of maintenance on.

The best advice ever shared with me was:

When you're done with your jobs, look around, see what still needs to be done, and do it.

What else would voters like to know:

Win or lose, I'll keep going to AHA board and tennant's association meetings.

See Also:

Arlington Candidate Profile: Crystal Haynes For School Committee

Arlington Candidate Profile: Shaun Berry For School Committee

Arlington Candidate Profile: Paul Schlichtman For School Committee

Arlington Candidate Profile: Dmitry Vasilyev For School Committee

Arlington Candidate Profile: Mary Winstanley O'Connor For Board Of Assessors