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Mayor's record fails to live to up to campaign promises
MANCHESTER - With city crime rates on the rise, 19 city schools in need of improvement, and proposals of drastic cuts to essential services and personnel on the table, Mayor Frank Guinta today kicked off his campaign for Congress.
In 2005, Guinta ran for mayor on the promise of lowering Manchester's crime rate, reducing taxes and improving the quality of education in city schools. But time has shown that Guinta's campaign rhetoric does not match his record.
"At a time when layoffs and drastic cuts are being proposed in our schools and on our streets, Frank Guinta has shown he'll check out when the going gets tough. The people of Manchester know all too well his personal ambitions have always come before the needs of our city," said New Hampshire Democratic Party Chairman Raymond Buckley. "While city teachers and police are working to uphold our communities in the face of possible layoffs, Frank Guinta has set his sights on his next job. He is running away from the challenges of City Hall and that is not a quality worthy of a promotion."
During Guinta's tenure as mayor, Manchester's crime rate has spiked. According to figures submitted to the Division of State Police by the Manchester Police Department, in just one year assaults increased by 18 percent while burglaries went up 6 percent. Over the last four years, the city also saw sharp increases in the number of shootings and stabbings and a surge in prostitution and drug abuse. Instead of providing resources to stem the rise in crime, Guinta called for over $600,000 in cuts to the police force. Guinta's proposed cuts drew criticism from the police department's deputy chief who told Manchester aldermen that his proposal would strip the department of 11 essential officers.
According to reports in the Union Leader released during Guinta's first year in office, Manchester residents felt that crime had risen to the same levels as in the early to mid-1990s. The newspaper also editorialized that the city was short 52 of the 254 police officers needed to adequately protect and patrol Manchester.
While on the campaign trail, Guinta repeatedly told the public that the first thing he would do as mayor is cut taxes, but only a month after winning the election he abandoned his no-new-taxes message and told the Union Leader, "some property owners, unfortunately, are going to see much higher assessments". Over the last four years, Guinta's campaign rhetoric proved empty as property owners saw their taxes increase and the value of their homes decrease due to weakened schools and higher crime rates.
Guinta's record on education isn't any better. As a candidate, he slammed the then-mayor over the condition of the city's three high schools. But under his watch, the number of failing schools doubled.
In his first year in office, ten city schools were labeled "in need of improvement" by the New Hampshire Department of Education. In his second year, that number leaped to 16 schools and rose again the following year to 19.
Instead of providing resources to improve education as he promised when he ran for office, Guinta shortchanged students by proposing weeklong furloughs for city teachers. WMUR reported that the President of Manchester's Education Association criticized Guinta's approach to education, saying that removing teachers from the classroom for weeks at a time would be a disservice to students and that Guinta's proposal would actually cost the city $750,000 to hire substitute teachers.
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