From the Dennis Carlone campaign, Oct. 3: Dennis Carlone, a candidate for City Council, said the interest alone on the city’s $142 million in free cash could go a long way toward increasing affordable housing and improving transportation.

“Officials might be cheering,” Carlone said, “but our residents should be very concerned over their exuberance at the record-setting amounts of cash being held on to by city administrators. The interest on this amount of cash alone could help us build new affordable housing, and it could also go toward the early design fees that will help us start upgrading the red line.” He went on:

It’s great that we’re keeping tax rates down – but others are paying dearly. Those who can no longer afford to live in Cambridge – they pay. What is the social impact of losing our neighborhoods? The impacts of our congested streets? Wait. We’re bragging about our free cash but we can’t enforce light and noise ordinances? Some of this money should be going towards fixing our largest problems, not to just mitigating the tax rate for those wealthy enough to be able to live here.

Carlone also advocates taking measures to prepare the red line to handle much greater numbers, as city transportation officials predict they will need to accommodate another 100,000 commuters in the coming years. “Cambridge prides itself on its diversity, and as a relatively wealthy city we should be doing more to maintain our diverse richness,” he said.