Ward 14 challenger Santana gives mixed responses to Digital Justice questions

The Digital Justice Campaign has received a mixed response to its four questions from a second candidate for Cleveland’s Ward 14 Council seat — challenger Jasmin Santana.

Santana is running against incumbent Brian Cummins, one of two current Council Members who have endorsed all four Digital Justice proposals.

Unlike Cummins — who began his response with “I support all four of the proposed actions” — Santana hedges on most of her answers to the Campaign’s questions. She “strongly supports” funding for existing neighborhood technology programs but no makes no commitment to an amount, or to expansion of those programs; expresses privacy concerns about public wifi; says a city-owned fiber network “is a step in the right direction” but with a list of concerns regarding cost and labor issues; and makes no commitment on a Cabinet-level digital inclusion position.

This chart (warning: it’s big) is a side-by-side comparison of Cummins’ and Santana’s responses to the Digital Justice questions. The chart’s second and third columns summarize the two candidates’ “bottom line” responses as we understand them; but the next two columns quote their answers word-for-word, so readers can judge for themselves.

Whatever you may think of their answers, it’s good to have at least one race — out of the eighteen City Hall contests on Tuesday’s ballot — where both candidates have stood up to be counted on these issues.