Green Party candidate Julie Roberts is our choice to represent District 2 on the Monroe County Council. She is the most knowledgeable and the best prepared of the three candidates in the election.

She may also be the most candid of all those running for any of the council seats due to her straight-out call for a quarter-percent increase in the County Option Income Tax, and her frustration that some candidates are beating around the political bush in regard to the tax increase.

Roberts would use the additional income to hire more staff at the jail, which she says would help alleviate its problems, as well as pay for a juvenile facility and provide more funding for ambulance service. At this point she is undecided as to the value of a work release center that some support as the solution to the problem of jail overcrowding.

Roberts sees the council as a check and balance to the commissioners and she is troubled by what she termed the council's "distraction at the moment." Roberts is unhappy with manner in which members of the community and the council currently present issues and she claims a "huge sucking sound" comes from the lack of leadership on the council.

Opposing Roberts for the District 2 seat are Democrat Bill Hayden and Republican Trent Jones.

Hayden, a retired schoolteacher, pretty much toes the line of what have become known as green Democrats in regard to growth, living-wage jobs, tax abatements and the like. Real estate appraiser Jones says the council needs to become more business friendly and to make the county a more affordable place to live to reduce the amount of home foreclosures and the number of people who move to neighboring counties where the cost of living is less.

Each candidate has a different take on the county's $50,000 support of the Bloomington Economic Development Corp. Jones believes it is a good investment. Hayden opposes it and would end the funding. Roberts is opposed to continued funding unless the BEDC were to open up its board membership to representatives of community groups. Jones' position makes the most sense to us, but we trust Roberts will work with the BEDC to support her position.