Holyoke City Councilor Kevin Jourdain ready to speak up for 10th term
HOLYOKE – City Councilor at Large Kevin A. Jourdain is running for a 10th term in the Nov. 8 election because he said he enjoys using his booming voice to speak up for people.
“That’s what is my drive to do this, that I think I can make a difference for my neighbors, that they feel they have someone to turn to,” Jourdain, 39, said Monday.
Jourdain has been a councilor since January 1994.
He is one of 11 candidates, including all current incumbents, vying for the eight at large seats. The 15-member council includes seven ward councilors.
When the council sets the property tax rate each December, it’s a staple that Jourdain will argue that while business owners also are struggling, they are better equipped than homeowners to absorb an increase. Homeowners, and especially senior citizens, can’t pay more, he said.
“These folks have nowhere to turn. That’s medication that doesn’t get purchased, that’s food that’s not on the table, and I’m extremely sensitive to that,” Jourdain said.
Jourdain is chairman of the council Redevelopment Committee, which supervised the redistricting of the seven voting wards without wholesale changes. He called for delinquent sewer bills to be collected before rate-payers’ bills are increased and he is on the mayor’s property tax reduction task force.
Jourdain is senior financial analyst at the Sisters of Providence Health System and is a lawyer with an office at 472 Appleton St. He and his wife Shari, a bridal consultant at Macy’s here, have three children.
His reelection announcement is Thursday from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Wherehouse? restaurant on Lyman Street. The suggested donation is $20.
