Dozens of people shuffled into the Toquet Hall Teen Center in downtown Westport on Tuesday Oct. 14 to watch the three men running for 1st Selectman of Westport address questions on leadership and character from Westport’s youth. Democrat Kevin Christie, Independent David Rosenwaks and Republican Don O Day sat on the right of the stage while moderators Staples Student and Westport Youth Commission(WYC) co chair Jake Shefro 26‘, WYC member from Greens Farms Academy Jack Thompson 27‘ and 06880 owner Dan Woog.
“There’s also gonna be an opportunity for them to meet the candidates personally at the event,” Jake Shero ‘’26 said
Most of the event was the three candidates responding to pre written questions asked by the moderators, these questions included everything from basic getting to know them questions to specific policy ideals. But in the spirit of the conference many of the questions involved youth issues and youth leadership.
Over the course of the event each candidate gave their ideas of what leadership is and how important good leadership, both young and old, is to local government. This included both ideals of leadership, honest and open dialogue, decisiveness, and standing by your decision, but also specific actions that if elected each candidate would do to promote leadership within the community.
“It’s imperative that everyone’s voices are heard” said David Rosenwaks independent candidate for first selectman
Ideas like bringing back “brown bag lunches” where people can directly speak with their representative as well as more events like this one where all members of the community get a chance to directly engage with local government. But more than just adding more avenues for community engagement all three candidates highlighted the importance of not just making more spaces for students to be heard but also listening when they do speak.
“[The event will provide] the opportunity for students to ask candidates their own questions,” Shero said.
Putting this into practice the last roughly 20 minutes of the event were direct questions from the audience, giving everyone a chance to ask their pressing answers. These included important questions on the Hamlet project, sustainability goals and communicating what the government is doing more clearly with the residents.
In the end the event set a great precedent for what good local leadership should act like, clearly communicating and engaging with the public and at the end it was clear that hopes that events like this will become commonplace around Westport.
“The opinions of everyone in town matter and I want to serve everyone ages 1 to 100 in the community because we all count and Westport is here for all of us,” David Rosenwak said.
