RICHMOND, Va. -- All five mayoral candidates took the stage at the Citizens' Debate Tuesday.
The debate, held at the Virginia Museum of History and Culture (VMHC), was co-sponsored by Richmond First, the VMHC’s John Marshall Center, the Richmond Times-Dispatch, and WTVR CBS 6.
Moderator Greg McQuade and panelists Bob Holsworth, Chris Coates and Reba Hollingsworth asked 11 questions to the candidates — Andreas Addison, Danny Avula, Michelle Mosby, Maurice Neblett, and Harrison Roday.
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Citizens' Debate Recap: Where Richmond's mayoral candidates stand on key issues
The third question of the debate was: What steps will you take to improve transparency in municipal government and ensure that citizens have access to public information?
Maurice Neblett
So in regards to transparency and accountability, that's been my platform since the beginning. So I want to ensure that we have outlets that's going to be utilizing the public network stations we're communicating to residents in the community, but I want to make sure that we have policies that will explicitly have the response time laid out for the requester, and then also make sure that our staff adhere to it within critical methods, right?
So I want to make sure that we have the transparency and accountability measures stemming from the core of the mayor's office, because it's all intertwined. Once we have that set as someone of good character and integrity, I believe that it will radiate throughout the City Hall.
Harrison Roday
Transparency is one part of an equation of a strong administration that gets things done and serves the people of Richmond. And FOIA is clearly within that, the Freedom of Information Act, if we can't be transparent with our residents about what's happening in City Hall, that means there are broader problem. And we know processes need to change. Changing things is hard. It takes time. It's very easy to make lists of things that are wrong, building truly sustainable change that is driven by the folks who show up to do the work every day. That is the kind of leadership that will support the change we need in City Hall. And this goes far beyond information requests important projects like the Mayo Bridge replacement, we need a city hall that is just as responsive as our residents deserve.
Michelle Mosby
First and foremost, we need to go back to again, our vision, our mission and our values. If you look it up today, it talks about accountability, it talks about transparency. So it's making sure that we are executing on what we say, that we do.
And so again, we're not a city that do not have policy. What you've heard from the information Freedom Act was I was trying to do the policy, and so we have to have employees that know that as leadership, we want them to follow the policy. And if the policy is not working for our city, then we need to go back and revisit said policies so that we can work the process, work the policies, and our employees are comfortable enough to know that leadership is standing behind them as they're working the policies.
I believe that leadership has limited our employees, from being straightforward and utilizing the processes and policies that are put in place, and they need leadership that's going to stand with them.
Andreas Addison
In 2015 I won the City of Richmond an award from then Governor McAuliffe. It was for open innovation data. I published the first check registry in the state of Virginia and open transparent assets of an Excel spreadsheet.
What that was, every payment made by a city employee was public record.
Then in 2017 when I was elected, I strengthened that legislation to make sure that we had the proper tools in a modern aspect, the challenge we had was an organization and administration that did not fully implement that outcome.
As council, I can create the best policy in the world, but if it's not met with the administration to deliver on it, it fails. And so what have I done to make this happen in my administration will be one thing? I want you to see your tax dollars at work today, right now, tomorrow morning, if I was mayor, you would see a dashboard that would show all this, all the paving projects we're doing, all the utility projects where the building permits are currently active, where you're seeing your tax dollars being spent and utilized for 911 services.
Danny Avula
Rebuilding trust in local government has to be built on transparency, and getting FOIA right is part of that. So you know, as in my years of leadership at the health department, this is how we did it. We assigned clear points of contact for FOIA requests, from the public, from the media, from whoever was requesting information.
We did annual trainings, not just for those individuals, but for everybody in the agency, so they understood what their pathway to route information to our clear FOIA points of contact.
And then the last part of this is accountability, if there's not accountability by the chief executive to ensure that people are being trained and are executing on the policy, everything falls apart. This has to be the commitment of the next leader of the city.
Learn more about the candidates
We recapped every debate question here:
- Question 1: Why you want to be mayor
- Question 2: Finance department
- Question 3: Government transparency
- Question 4: School system
- Question 5: Real estate tax rate
- Question 6: Government efficiency
- Question 7: Pedestrian safety
- Question 8: Police
- Question 9: VCU
- Question 10: Monument Avenue
- Question 11: City Charter Review Commission
Watch the full debate here or on our YouTube channel.
CBS 6 interviewed each candidate ahead of the debate, which you can find here:
- Harrison Roday (Sept. 9)
- Michelle Mosby (Sept. 10)
- Maurice Neblett (Sept. 11)
- Danny Avula (Sept. 18)
- Andreas Addison (Sept. 23)
For more information on this year’s election — and how to cast your ballot in the City of Richmond or the surrounding areas — visit WTVR’s Virginia Voter’s Guide.
You can check your voter registration here. The last day to register to vote is Oct. 15.
What hopes do you have for Richmond's next mayor? Email the CBS 6 Newsroom and let us know.
Note: WTVR used AI software to transcribe the debate and newsroom staff to edit for clarity.
