HUDSON – Hudson is gearing up for its 2021 municipal elections on May 10. As voters get set to head to the polls, the Community Advocate has zeroed in on contested races for prominent bodies like Board of Selectmen and School Committee.
The Community Advocate reached out to candidates who filed paperwork to appear on their town’s ballot and asked them to submit a personal statement as well as answers to three specific questions.
See those biographies and read extended questions and answers from Hudson Select Board Candidate Dandrick Gelin here…
And see profiles of other candidates…
PERSONAL BIO
I’m Dandrick Gelin. I’ve lived here since 1997 and graduated from HHS in 2012. I have an Associate’s in Liberal Arts and a Bachelors’s in Political Science. For the last five years, I’ve worked at Cumberland Farms. In that five years, I’ve talked to people and heard their concerns. Our community suffers from gentrification. Its effects lead to the disintegration of our community.
Furthermore, it creates an environment susceptible to numerous social ills. In response, Town Hall has only shrugged its shoulders. That’s why I’m running. I want to reorientate our focus on healing and saving our community.
QUESTION
What do you see as the most important issue(s) facing Hudson today?
The effects of gentrification are plaguing the Town. Longtime residents can’t afford to live here anymore. Town Government has focused on the Business Improvement District so much that they have ignored the rest of Hudson. The roads outside Main St. and South St. are falling apart. Drug addiction plagues the Town, especially my generation. Townies are forced to move out of Town in search of more affordable living. It is sad to see.
Both John Parent and Joe Durant whose terms expire this year, have declined to run for reelection. That will mean that, whichever candidates win this race will arrive at the Select Board as newcomers. What will you bring to the Board?
I plan to bring to the table a different perspective. I will bring a millennial outlook and be a voice for the most impoverished generation since the Great Depression. I plan to voice the point of view of the retail workers who maintain our Town’s store and restaurants and who are more likely to rent their homes than own them. From their experiences, these groups have needs and a vision of how government should serve them. However, as vital as these groups are to the Town economy, they take no part in our decision-making. I will make it my goal to change that.
Is there anything else you want voters to know about you as a candidate?
As Millenials, we are coming to adulthood in the 2020s. We are starting our careers, settling down with spouses, and looking for places to live. Generations before us had the opportunity to live in Hudson and raise their kids here. However, as gentrification plagues our Town and the cost of living goes up, it doesn’t look like many of us will be able to do that. As products of the most diverse generation so far, we look for a government that reflects the population as a whole. We seek out the voices of those disenfranchised to create policy and enforcement based on consensus and truly address the needs of the people as a whole.
