Peck best in Dist. A
City Hall experience as Stardig’s chief of staff gives her an edge in succeeding her boss.
District A Councilwoman Brenda Stardig may not be on the Nov. 5 ballot, but the race to replace her has become a referendum on the two-term incumbent’s tenure.
Stardig’s chief of staff, Amy Peck, is running to replace her boss and has become the dart board for her opponents seeking the seat. That’s ironic for Peck, who was herself a Stardig critic when she ran against her in 2009 and 2013. The next year, Stardig hired Peck to run her council office.
“Any other job, you want that experience,” Peck told the editorial board. “You want someone who understands the job, so I don’t know why in this situation experience has somehow become something negative.”
Also running to represent the largely residential district in northwest Houston are Marina Angelica Coryat, a public relations executive; Lois Myers, a Realtor; Mehdi Cherkaoui, an attorney; Iesheia Ayers-Wilson, a school bus driver; and George Harry Zoes, founder and owner of Ruby’s WigSalon.
Peck demonstrated the value of her experience during an editorial board interview that also included Myers, Coryat and Cherkaoui by proposing a plan to reduce flooding that went beyond enforcing current rules and placing more restrictions on development. Peck wants to change how the city allocates Capital Improvement Program funds.
“We’re the largest district in the city by population, but we only receive .59 percent of the CIP funds,” Peck said. She proposed dividing the infrastructure money by spending half to correct the worst problems in the city regardless of location and dividing the rest equally among council districts to address their immediate needs.
“That way we’re not just waiting for another mayor, another administration, to come in and give us money,” she said. “If we know every year we will get about the same amount of money, we can do long-range planning and council members won’t have to vote with the mayor on everything to get the infrastructure funding they need for their district.”
Crime was cited by the candidates as the second-most important issue to District A residents. While they all agreed there needs to be a greater police presence, Peck stressed the need to ease some neighborhoods’ fears about interacting with police. “Police are allocated on the basis of how many calls they receive,” Peck said. “We need people to make those calls.”
Recognizing a problem is half the battle, but completing the mission requires specific plans. Peck’s experience working in District A makes her better qualified to develop successful plans than the other candidates. Peck won’t be a Stardig clone, but she has learned by working for Stardig what does and doesn’t work in each neighborhood. That’s an asset District A needs.