Jivan Sobrinho-Wheeler
2021 Candidate for Cambridge City Council

Home address:
187 Brookline St. #3
Cambridge, MA 02139

Contact information:
Tel:
website: www.votejivan.com
e-mail: jivan@votejivan.com
Facebook: facebook.com/JivanForCambridge/
Twitter: twitter.com/votejivan
Instagram: instagram.com/votejivan

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I’m serving my 1st term on the City Council, where I’ve been Chair of the Transportation & Public Utilities Committee and Co-Chair of the Housing Committee. Before starting on the Council, I worked at a land policy think in Cambridge called the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, where I supported conservation projects around the world and helped people find the tools they need to build sustainable communities. I’m the son of a woman who grew up on a farm in Iowa and a man who grew up in the Portuguese colony of Goa in India. As a result, I speak Portuguese, am conversational in Spanish, and have eaten a lot of sweet corn with butter.

Like two-thirds of Cambridge residents but far fewer of our elected Councilors, I’m a renter. As someone who has dealt with rent increases and the cost of homeownership being out of reach in Cambridge, I’ve brought this urgency to my work on the City Council. I’ve co-sponsored and collaborated on measures to create hundreds of new affordable homes in Cambridge and implement strong new tenant protections. And in my spare time, I’ve volunteered on organizing campaigns to support tenants who face eviction, steep increases in rent, and unsafe living conditions.

We need a Green New Deal for Cambridge to address climate change, economic inequality, and racial inequities at the same time. I’ve been the lead sponsor on an updated Cycling Safety Ordinance that is creating new bike and bus lanes citywide, convened a Transportation Committee on expanded municipal sidewalk snow removal, and pushed forward plans to implement a municipal broadband alternative to Comcast’s monopoly on internet in the city.

The pandemic has dominated so much of these past two years, and I’m glad to have had the opportunity to push for free COVID testing for all residents and equity in recovery assistance. I’ve also worked on speeding the City’s rollout of universal Pre-K and starting a Cambridge Community Land Trust to create more permanently affordable housing and homeownership opportunities.

We face pressing challenges around housing, climate, and equity in Cambridge. And there are policies we can implement now to make a big difference. I’ve sought to bring this urgency to the City Council, and I'm asking for your #1 vote to continue to do so as your Councilor.

Learn more about my campaign via my website, Twitter, or Instagram.

Endorsements:
Our campaign has been endorsed by:

• Greater Boston Labor Council
• Cambridge Residents Alliance
• A Better Cambridge
• Our Revolution Cambridge
• Democratic Socialists of America
• Sunrise Cambridge (Cambridge Chapter of the Sunrise Movement)
• Sierra Club Massachusetts
• 32BJ SEIU (Service Employees International Union)
• IBEW Local 103 (International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers)
• Harvard Democrats
• Greater Boston Young Democrats
• Run For Something
• New American Leaders Action Fund
• State Rep. Mike Connolly
• State Rep. Erika Uyterhoeven
• Somerville City Councilor Ben Ewen-Campen
• Vatsady Sivongxay (2017 City Council Candidate)
• Gwen Volmar (2017 City Council Candidate)

Top Priorities

• Housing Justice
• Public Transit, Safe Street Infrastructure, and Reducing Traffic
• Tackling and Preparing for Climate Change
• Economic & Racial Justice and Education Equity

Housing Justice
I'm pushing to bring the urgency our city government has too often been lacking to Cambridge's housing crisis. I volunteer as a tenant organizer and like 2/3 of Cambridge residents, I'm a renter. But tenants are significantly underrepresented on the City Council.

Our city planning processes should be guided by a simple principle: planning and development in Cambridge should benefit our residents and communities—both longtime Cantabrigians and more recent arrivals. Our planning, zoning, and development processes must serve our communities—especially working and middle-class residents that have been traditionally underrepresented in city planning processes, and not just be windfalls for asset management companies, wealthy property owners, or corporate landlords and real-estate developers.

Tenant Protections

• Creating Just Cause eviction requirements & Right to Counsel.
• Ending tenant-paid broker's fees to rent an apartment, which add thousands of dollars to the cost of finding a place to live in Cambridge.
• Establish Rent Control for the 21st century to stop displacement caused by huge year-to-year rent increases.
• Enacting a Condo Conversion ordinance with eviction protections, opportunity to purchase, and relocations assistance.
• Create a Tenant Right to Purchase & Real Estate Transfer Fee to curb speculation.

Working with homeowners on affordability

• Provide assistance programs and financing models for aging homeowners who want to keep their housing affordable for future generations of Cantabrigians in partnership with housing non-profits.

Housing innovation and principles:

• Establish a Cambridge Community Land Trust to create permanently affordable housing and expanded homeownership opportunities
• End red-lining era exclusionary zoning that prevents the creation of triple-deckers, duplexes, and other apartments in large parts of Cambridge
• Stop selling & leasing public land to private developers and instead invest in our public spaces
• Require corporate developers to negotiate Community Benefits Agreements with residents on large projects to ensure community input and investment in public transit, affordable housing, and green spaces
• Create an Office of Housing Stability to serve as a one-stop shop for housing assistance and make public the neighborhood-level eviction and displacement data the city currently isn't tracking to help us effectively target our policies.

A Green New Deal for Cambridge
While Congress is dragging its feet on passing the Green New Deal, sponsored by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Ed Markey, we can implement a Cambridge Green New Deal that is just as ambitious in tackling climate change and economic inequality at the local level. This Cambridge Green New Deal will include:

• Make public transit fare-free for Cambridge residents, starting with buses—following models developed by Boston, Lawrence, and other cities.
• Create bus-priority lanes to reduce commute times.
• Commit to the full Cambridge Bicycle Plan with 20+ miles of protected bike lanes, including on Mass Ave, Hampshire, and Mt Auburn Streets.
• Develop a public local micro-transit service for elderly & disabled residents and work with the MBTA to fix The Ride.
• Reverse the rapid decline of our tree canopy and fund re-plantings
• Develop an improved stormwater management system through the implementation of green infrastructure to supplement or replace our aging gray infrastructure.
• Remediate and restore Jerry's Pond in North Cambridge
• Create a Cambridge Clean Energy Initiative to fund grants for energy efficiency projects, solar panel installation, local food production and green infrastructure

Economic and Racial Justice and Education Equity
Like many cities, Cambridge is on the front lines of rapidly increasing economic inequality. Our community also still has much to do to address racial and gender equity gaps in our city. Let's invest in programs that will make Cambridge fairer for everyone:

• A Cambridge Promise for tuition-free public higher education for all CRLS graduates, including college, trade school, and union apprenticeships, financed by increased PILOT contributions from Harvard & MIT.
• City-wide municipal broadband to provide an alternative to the Comcast monopoly on internet in Cambridge.
• Universal Pre-Kindergarten at Cambridge Public Schools and expanded after-school and childcare options.

Additionally, we can make sure our government represents all of us by:

• Allowing Cambridge residents to directly elect their own Mayor and ending the strong-City Manager/weak Council form of government.
• Establishing publicly financed municipal elections and working to support efforts for public financing state-wide.
• Offering expanded, permanent early-voting in municipal elections to ensure everyone has their voice heard.

CCTV candidate video (2021)     2021 MCNA Candidate Forum (Sobrinho-Wheeler)

2019 Candidate Page     CCTV candidate video (2019)