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Ralph’s views on a range of issues reflect his experience as a planner, legislator, father, and grandfather. Below are Ralph’s positions on different issues and challenges that face Salt Lake City.
If you have a question that is not addressed here, please contact Ralph at ralph@ralphbecker.com, and he will get back to you shortly.
Ralph’s HUMAN RIGHTS INITIATIVES
What is Ralph’s view on education?
(Click here to read Ralph’s entire Education Blueprint)
The core of every great city is a well-educated population. A world-class educational system attracts residents and businesses to our community, and it provides our young people with the tools they need to compete in a rapidly advancing, ever-changing world. We owe our children the opportunity, the skills, and the knowledge to stand shoulder to shoulder with the most talented, well-rounded, and learned thinkers on the planet. If we are to make Salt Lake City one of the world’s great cities, we must aim for nothing short of a superior education system.
Establishing Salt Lake City’s educational prowess will occur through a strong partnership with the Salt Lake City School District and a specific focus on public education within Salt Lake City government. Building on the successes of family learning centers, medical clinics in some of our schools, and Youth City programs, Salt Lake City will embrace the diversity in our city and become known for educational excellence.
Salt Lake City must be a place where:
• Every student from every walk of life has the opportunity to envision and realize dreams
• Our teachers have the tools, the resources, and the flexibility to inspire our children to work hard and succeed
• Our school teachers and administrators are held to the very highest standards, ensuring that EVERY Salt Lake City public school provides students with the opportunity to achieve academic excellence
• The city’s policies regarding housing, public safety, transportation, and community development are coordinated with the objectives of the school district to ensure that we are using every available tool to enhance our children’s learning environment
• Our schools become the focal points and gathering places of our neighborhoods for children, lifelong learning, and a variety of community activities and services
• We celebrate and embrace the rich ethnic, racial, and economic diversity of our student population, and we welcome and learn from those who are new to our communities.
To build on our successes, Salt Lake City must connect our education system with city policy, civic life, the business community, the University of Utah, and other higher-education entities. We will do this through a groundbreaking commitment from Salt Lake City government.
What are Ralph’s thoughts about our environment?
(Click here to read Ralph’s Blueprint for a Green City)
My life’s work has been catalyzed by a love of and work for our natural heritage. It began with the first Earth Day in 1970, continued as a National Park Service employee, my graduate education in law and planning, and it drives what I do today in my professional, public, and community service.
I have worked throughout my adult life and tirelessly in the Utah House of Representatives to:
• Protect open space
• Designate and fund biking and hiking trails
• Advocate for sound public lands policies (such as those that deal with wilderness protection, roads, OHV issues, wildlife preservation, and state and local coordination with federal policies)
• Develop an environmentally sensible energy policy
• Work to promote smart growth and balanced transportation policies
• Serve as a voice to counterbalance to Utah’s anti-environmental tendencies
For example, I cosponsored the Quality Growth Act, pushed hard and successfully for designation and funding for trails, and have kept the focus on steady funding for the LeRay McAllister Critical Lands Fund. I have a proven track record that demonstrates my leadership on open space preservation, the promotion of energy efficiency and renewable energy resources (Utah Energy Policy Act), climate change (member of Governor’s Blue Ribbon Advisory Committee on Climate Change), wise water use and in-stream flow protection, addressing community development (Envision Utah Steering Committee, Legacy Highway settlement), and efforts to heighten awareness of these critical environmental issues.
Since 1986 I have taught courses in environmental planning law and policy, public lands, and NEPA at the University of Utah’s College of Architecture and Planning.
I am also proud of my professional accomplishments (through my consulting firm, Bear West) with regard to many of our environmental issues. My firm’s work has included the Wasatch Canyons Master Plan, Salt Lake City’s Watershed Plans, various environmental impact statements and environmental assessments, and the Ogden Valley Plan.
There are some issues that both transcend our municipal boundaries and deeply affect our quality of life and existence. As an elected official to date and as your mayor, I will speak out on the issue of climate change because our city should serve as a model for the region and the country. But we must live that example, and accordingly I will bring a depth of knowledge about environmental issues-everything from green building standards to neighborhood design to renewable energy policy-along with a long-standing commitment to addressing them that no other candidate can begin to match. Working with these issues has been my livelihood for over 30 years, both as a professional planner, teacher, and as a state politician.
What is Ralph’s point of view concerning diversity?
Diversity enriches our city in all aspects and should be encouraged and celebrated.
We are fortunate to live in a society that has diversity and ideals of justice and equality at the forefront of our goals. We must strive to overcome prejudice and resistance to achieving this most admirable dream, which, in the end, benefits all citizens.
In the schools of Salt Lake City, the majority of students are minorities. Our schools should continue to work to break down cultural barriers, bring families into our school system through family learning centers, and encourage activities that foster mixing in our student bodies.
Diversity should be acknowledged and reflected in our laws.
Salt Lake City’s ordinances determining benefits with equal treatment for city employees who have families of all kinds is a positive step in the right direction that can be a model for municipalities across Utah.
The passage, finally, of hate crimes legislation under Senator Suazo and Representative Litvack shows that our community will not tolerate crimes for which the motivation is the color of a person’s skin, sexual orientation, or religious preference.
I will continue to be a strong voice for encouraging diversity, tolerance and respect at all times for people in our community without regard to religion, race, color, sexual orientation, gender, status with regard to public assistance, nationality, marital status, age, or disability.
To read Ralph’s Universal Human Rights Initiatives, click here.
What does Ralph think we can or should do to improve our
air quality?
Air quality is an overriding concern. As I watch my granddaughter grow up here I, too, worry about the effects of the nasty inversions and pollutants in the air. I’m encouraged by the new grassroots efforts by Physicians for a Healthy Environment and Moms 4 Clean Air that will add energy to our efforts to address poor air quality.
I’ve spent a good part my career (more than 30 years) working on environmental issues, including air quality and the Clean Air Act. I’m a planner and lawyer, teach environmental planning law and policy at the University of Utah, I have been a state legislator for over 11 years, and I have had an environmental and planning consulting firm in SLC for more than 20 years. To improve our air quality, we need to work within the context of federal and state law-a challenging proposition these days. My professional and public service careers lead me to the conclusion that there is no single solution to this difficult problem. It will take a concerted effort from all of the municipalities in the valley and region to bring about positive changes.
As mayor, I will accomplish this in two ways. First, I will make sure that our city takes the lead and serves as a model in comprehensively reducing the amount of pollutants that are put into the air. Among other things, this means:
• Making it easy and convenient for residents to walk, bike or take transit throughout the city
• Finding ways to ensure that housing in the city (near where most people work) is affordable so that driving is less necessary
• Having zoning laws that carefully permit commercial and public centers in neighborhoods that complement residential areas
• Providing incentives to builders, homeowners, and business owners to retrofit their structures so that they use fuels efficiently and/or use renewable and clean-burning fuels.
Second, I will forge working relationships with other municipalities and with the state so that we avoid the “tragedy of the commons.” By working with state and municipal leaders, instead of against them, I expect a new era of intergovernmental cooperation here along the Wasatch Front that will address mass transit, sustainable building standards, land-use planning, and other issues that inherently stretch beyond our city’s boundaries. Salt Lake City cannot do it alone, and I have developed mutually respectful relationships over many years with regional and state leaders.
I will also make sure that our business leaders are on board as well. A clean city is key to a strong and stable workforce. Our continued economic prosperity is dependent upon having a city and region with clean and healthy air.
What are Ralph’s thoughts about downtown Salt Lake City?
(Click here to read Ralph’s Blueprint for Gathering Places)
Downtown Salt Lake City should be a statewide, regional, and international destination for trade and tourism.
It should be densely populated with a rich mix of retail, financial, cultural, recreational, and residential opportunities that attracts area residents, tourists, and employees alike.
Concerns and issues include:
• A lack of sustainable standards for new construction downtown
• Liquor laws that are difficult for tourists and locals alike to understand and that at times seem arbitrary and harmful to local businesses
• The effect of major downtown construction and renovation on existing businesses
• Whether or not a sky bridge linking two halves of the new mall segments is in the best interest of the existing and future Main Street businesses
Specific initiatives that I would champion:
• Emphasize that downtown is a “neighborhood,” and that it exists in relation to the city’s other neighborhoods in terms of infrastructure (housing, transportation, etc.)
• Promote nightlife downtown and the fact that downtown is Utah’s cultural hub
• Bring local artists back to downtown with an emphasis on small/medium-scale arts
• Evaluate and revise the RDA process to speed it up and give it guidance
• Integrate existing arts groups into festival planning and to help encourage the promotion of downtown’s nightlife
• Work closely with Salt Lake County to concentrate and develop cultural facilities downtown
What are some ideas Ralph has about transportation
in Salt Lake City?
Transportation choices affect our daily lives, from how quickly we get to work or back home again, to traffic congestion, to where there are convenient bus and light rail stops, to the safety of bike lanes, to how we get around town or from one town to the next, to how clean our air is. These choices also can directly affect business and commerce entities, and even the amount of exercise we get in a day. The Wasatch Front has become more and more congested with traffic over the years, and we need a comprehensive regional transportation plan.
The following points are things to consider:
• We need to provide transportation choices for Salt Lake City residents (automobiles, light rail, buses, improved and safer bicycle lanes, enlarged and safer pedestrian-friendly zones) to promote livability and to reduce congestion, reduce air pollution, and reduce the use of fossil fuels.
• I support sustainable transportation solutions, such as Complete Streets, which take into account all modes of transportation.
• Salt Lake City should be enhanced as the regional and state hub by emphasizing mobility into and out of the city and accessibility to a variety of transportation choices within the city.
• I support a regional transit program.
• There should be good regional access to downtown Salt Lake City.
• There should be frequent, inexpensive, and proximate access to public transit into and out of Salt Lake City, as well as between the city’s neighborhoods and business districts.
• The walking environment should be enhanced so that residents can leave cars behind as often as possible or park in one convenient place to access many destinations on foot.
• We need to create safer streets for bicyclists and pedestrians throughout the city.
• I will pursue increased funding to implement the Bicycle Master Plan.
• Existing bicycle lanes and facilities should have regular and more frequent maintenance to clear debris from them.
• Traffic signal timing should be improved for greater efficiency throughout the city.
• I will improve the working relationship between the mayor’s office and transportation providers such as UDOT, UTA and the Utah State Legislature.
• Promote sustainable ways to reduce automobile congestion, such as encouraging carpooling and using public transportation, telecommuting, walking, riding bicycles, and staggering work start and end times in large employers such as Research Park and the University of Utah.
What are Ralph’s plans for preserving neighborhoods?
(Click here to read Ralph’s Blueprint for Neighborhoods)
Almost 30 years ago, my neighbors rose up against a destructive force in the Avenues neighborhood – the replacement of original homes with large, out-of-scale multi-family dwellings – and saved an historic neighborhood in Salt Lake City. Today that neighborhood is home to a diverse range of housing and is a wonderful place to live.
We have, however, a problem: Salt Lake City’s Planning Division has been decimated by departures and leadership vacuums. Across the city we have paid the price with disturbing interpretations of our ordinances, a failure to make timely decisions about applications for development, and increasing neighborhood conflicts because City ordinances have not kept pace with changing times and circumstances. As a professional planner and former member of the Salt Lake City Planning Commission in the early nineties, we recognized our staff and decision making as the best in the State and we worked consistently to listen to everyone and make changes that would reflect our residents’ intent for the future of the city. (During that era, we completely rewrote the City Zoning Ordinance, adopted procedures for ethical, inclusive decision making by Planning Commission, and our professional staff prepared thorough, comprehensive reports on all issues before us.)
We should have learned our lesson about the value of neighborhoods decades ago. It is time to restore strong land-use decisions to Salt Lake City because our neighborhoods, residents, and city fabric are suffering.
As mayor, this will be a first order of business for the sake of all of us in the City. I will initiate a comprehensive review of staff, land use ordinances, and overall planning policies. I will also push for a muscular sustainability ordinance.
As the candidate who has a professional background in these issues, and a proven track record of working with community councils, landowners, and businesses to make neighborhoods better, I am eager to make the changes necessary to get our Planning Division back on track.
What is Ralph’s approach to dealing with poverty in
Salt Lake City?
Since the end of the recession at the beginning of this decade, Salt Lake City has enjoyed some of the strongest economic growth in the nation. With unemployment rates below 3 percent and a job creation rate above 4 percent for several years running, it appears that nearly everyone in our city ought to be flourishing. Yet the poverty rate in the city and in the county has grown from 15 percent in 2000 to an estimated 17 percent in 2007. In the Salt Lake School District, more than 3 out of every 4 kids qualify for free and reduced meals, an increase of about 9 percent since 2000. What this means is that although the economy is doing well, many people are being left behind. Although many new jobs are being created in Utah, only one out of four is high-paying. On average, wages in Utah continue to lag far below the national average, even as the costs of housing and healthcare have ballooned. This puts enormous pressure on first-time homebuyers and small businesses, which are being squeezed out of the marketplace. The fact is, a large and growing share of our gainfully employed population is struggling every day to be able to afford a place to live and put food on the table.
Poverty and income instability have a profound effect on our community and overall quality of life. A ”Great American City” should play a lead role in developing solutions that will shore up our safety net, foster financial stability, and ultimately find ways to increase family assets as a way of building a stronger community. But as with any great leadership, this begins by listening. No one understands the needs of local communities like those who live and work in them, and finding solutions will mean sitting down with neighborhood residents and community leaders to understand needs at the neighborhood level. Accordingly, the Becker Administration will address poverty in the following ways:
1. I will convene a task force to explore the ways in which Salt Lake City can strengthen its commitment to the health and well-being of its most vulnerable citizens. Our city has great resources: a strong and civic-minded business community, academic expertise, a thriving nonprofit community, and committed citizens. They should be brought together and tasked with finding solutions that work to strengthen all members of our community.
2. I will work with the Salt Lake School District to create more “community schools.” Elementary schools are natural gathering places for the community, located throughout the city, including all of our struggling and developing neighborhoods. As such, they can be put to use beyond the traditional 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. school day. Community schools add enrichment activities and social services to a strong educational curriculum to improve student achievement by enhancing and augmenting the options for nearby families and communities to succeed and thrive.
3. I will develop “Centers for Working Families.” Recently, there has been an explosion of public and private resources to help low-income families advance up the job ladder and improve their financial literacy, for example, by learning to avoid debt traps, open bank accounts, and access important low-income supports like the Earned Income Tax Credit and food stamps. The “Center for Working Families” model brings together these programs in one convenient location, such as in community schools, family resource centers or other community locations.
4. I will explore strategies to increase housing affordability. One such strategy would be to work with local organizations to find ways to acquire residential land to be held in trust. Buyers and builders would then only be responsible for the cost of construction, and the home could be sold or re-sold at the market value of just the home without the cost of the land, which is the greatest source of housing price inflation. In addition, I will work to expand the bonding capacity of the Utah Housing Corporation. Although this is primarily a legislative issue, the city can support efforts to expand the Corporation’s ability to offer low-interest loans and down-payment assistance.
5. I will support ordinances to limit payday lending and predatory lending establishments. Young people just starting out living on their own or low-income wage earners are sometimes tempted to get a payday advance loan just to have enough money to get through the month until the next payday, but the often exorbitant lending rates from this type of business can lead to a vicious cycle of borrowing and a futile attempt by borrowers to stay out of poverty or to “get ahead.” More and more cities across the nation have enacted ordinances regulating such predatory lending establishments in order to protect at-risk populations, helping to make neighborhoods and cities stronger and more prosperous.
A wide variety of circumstances can lead to poverty and constant struggles to provide for one’s family. Salt Lake City has many organizations already working with our at-risk populations to ensure that all its citizens have the ability to become and do their best. As a thriving city in the Intermountain West with a host of established resources, we can do even better. As mayor, I will work hard to ensure that all citizens have opportunities to succeed. This will be an important step in my commitment to make Salt Lake City a Great American City.
What is Ralph’s approach to decision-making?
As an owner of a Salt Lake City environmental consulting firm (Bear West) for more than 20 years, and as a former director of a Utah state agency (the Governor’s Office of Planning and Budget, under Governor Scott M. Matheson), I’ve had the opportunity to manage and care for employees, meet bottom lines, and stake my reputation and my family’s economic welfare on my skills and abilities.
When I worked for Governor Matheson in the early 1980s, I learned, developed, and honed my skills regarding my basic approach to management in government. He kept it simple for those of us who worked for him: Accountability and loyalty were his bywords. Over the years, I’ve learned that a leader should develop the direction for an organization, communicate it clearly, hire the best people available, and give them the leeway and support so they can do their jobs well. That will be my approach as mayor of a city government with 3,000 employees.
As a government employee, I developed many wonderful relationships that I continue to work hard to maintain. As the current Democratic Leader in the Utah House of Representatives, which is a position elected by one’s party and which is a position in the Utah Legislature that I have held for the last few years, I am responsible for staff and for working with and supporting my colleagues to formulate and present positions to advance the goals of our party. As minority leader, this often means meeting regularly with the House majority leader and the speaker of the House to discuss agreements and try to reach a consensus on controversial issues.
In the over 20 years during which I have co-owned a local business, I’ve endeavored to find the most accomplished and well-qualified people for our planning and environmental services company, provide a rich working environment (though not necessarily the most lucrative), serve our customers and clients with care, and achieve success for our clients and for ourselves. We have never had to fire or lay off an employee.
To this day, I continue to stay in touch with current and past colleagues from my business as well as from my connections in politics from a period of time spanning decades of work.
A large part of management, particularly in public service, is how we make decisions. By practicing being a manager in business and/or in public service for 30 years, I’ve taken the approach that the best solutions come by:
• Engaging in discussions with those affected and interested
• Identifying issues, aspirations, and objectives
• Collecting and analyzing relevant information
• Adopting standards and principles for guiding decisions
• Evaluating a reasonable range of alternatives and options
• Selecting a preferred approach and devising the best way to implement the approach with assigned roles and responsibilities
• Empowering an accomplishment of the determined direction upon adoption
I’ve worked nationally with an organization (the Policy Consensus Initiative) whose mission is to promote the best governance practices in state government, and I have enjoyed a tremendous learning experience by serving for many years on their board, which consists of the bi-partisan, nationwide membership of governors, state legislators, leaders of national and regional organizations, managers of state dispute-resolution offices, and business and academic leaders.
My commitment to Salt Lake City residents and to city employees, if I become mayor, is to put my management approach and years of experience to work for the present and future welfare of our fair metropolis. Within city government we will have an open, transparent, accessible, well-run, public service-oriented organization in which city employees will be treated fairly and with respect so that they can do their jobs well and thrive as they work together for the benefit of all our citizens. With my unique and valuable connections and decades of experience in other areas of government at the state level, we will be able to forge ahead to help make our city one of the finest in the country. We will engage our residents and interests beyond city boundaries. Together, we can make Salt Lake City a Great American City.
What are Ralph’s thoughts on immigration and undocumented residents?
Immigration reform is one of the more complicated issues our nation and our cities face. This is an issue to which I have responded periodically both as a legislator and as a candidate for mayor. While I don’t consider my positions to be about a particular agenda, I do have an articulated stance on certain principles of the immigration reform issue and a legislative track record that reflects that stance. One important thing I’ve learned about illegal immigration—a knee-jerk reaction is often misguided.
We need to enforce our laws. And, we need enforceable laws. Our federal laws, where this issue is largely addressed pursuant to the U.S. Constitution, are badly broken, and that makes it extremely difficult for local law enforcement entities and states to intelligently address immigration issues. We need strong national borders; we also need to reflect the realities of global economic markets today and of human nature.
In looking at immigration issues and seeking where a “fix” is possible, I’ve concluded that pointing fingers in any one direction is pointless, and I have learned that well-meaning people can disagree vehemently. I believe we need to approach illegal immigration with compassion and common sense. For example, the vast majority of undocumented immigrants are law-abiding, tax-paying individuals who want a better life for themselves and their families, and while that does not excuse their breaking the law, it does inform how, as mayor, I will deal with the legitimate concerns that are raised by this complex issue.
I strongly believe that it is not the mayor’s job, nor that of the city’s employees such as the police, to enforce federal immigration laws. Doing so creates an untenable situation where people do not trust the police or other emergency service providers, and that leads only to more crime, more victims, and a greater financial burden on all of us in the city. As mayor, I will advocate for comprehensive changes in immigration laws for a fair and justifiable system—one that makes sense for all of us. I doubt that such an approach constitutes the creation of a “safe haven” here in Salt Lake City, but it does mean that all people in our city will be treated with dignity and respect.
I continue to hope and expect that our federal Congress will deal rationally and comprehensively with immigration policy. It won’t be easy, but if they arrive at a more workable federal policy, it will be easier for state and local officials to carry out our responsibilities.