LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) - The two men vying to succeed longtime Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer shared a stage Tuesday for the first time since winning their party’s nomination in the May 17 primary.
Democrat Craig Greenberg, a businessman who used to run Louisville’s 21c Museum Hotels, and Republican Bill Dieruf, the longtime mayor of the east Louisville suburb Jeffersontown, mostly stuck to well-worn talking points during the forum held by Greater Louisville Inc., the metro chamber of commerce.
Packed house today for @GLIchamber ‘s mayoral forum with D nominee @RunWithCraig and R nominee Bill Dieruf. pic.twitter.com/GmWPgRIeOw
— Chris Otts (@christopherotts) June 14, 2022
Greenberg stressed his campaign pledges to improve the city’s police department, create a foundation-funded universal pre-school program and build 15,000 affordable-housing units, while Dieruf often invoked his 12 years at the helm in Jeffersontown.
While the bulk of the discussion centered on economic development, the city’s surge in gun violence over the last few years nonetheless emerged as the primary theme of the campaign.
“Louisville is imploding right now,” Dieruf said, calling the Saturday night shooting that injured six kids aged 9 to 16 at the Big Four Bridge at Waterfront Park a “horrendous” event.
Dieruf repeated his pledge to bring Jeffersontown Police Chief Rick Sanders, a former U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration official, into a Louisville Metro administration “in some capacity.” Dieruf also called for filling hundreds of vacancies in the Metro police department and a focus on neighborhood-level “community policing.”
Greenberg, who survived a shooting at his campaign office in February, reiterated pledges to make Louisville police better “trained, trusted and transparent,” while deploying other approaches such as “group violence intervention” programs, increasing mental health resources and addressing “the root causes of poverty.”
“We cannot just police our way to safety,” he said.
Asked how to revitalize downtown, where there are many fewer daily office workers because of the rise of remote work, Dieruf suggested LMPD should have smaller geographic divisions and a district focused solely on downtown. He added that Louisville can lure people from larger metro areas.
“We’ve got to attract the people from Chicago, from New York and all the bigger cities because during the pandemic, those people didn’t want to be there. They wanted to be in a community like Louisville. Louisville has everything that they have, being on a smaller scale, (a) more friendlier scale. We are family here,” Dieruf said.
Greenberg pointed to his experience in urban real estate projects and said Metro government should ensure that city-owned property is developed and that surface parking lots downtown are transformed into “vibrant, mixed-use neighborhoods with people living, shopping, working (and) going to fun events.”
When it comes to downtown revitalization, “We don’t need any more studies,” Greenberg said. “We have studied these issues for years; we all know so many great solutions.”
Dieruf and Greenberg will next share a stage on Thursday before the Rotary Club of Louisville.
