Gregg Moree, 58, was born and raised in Cambridge and attended Cambridge Rindge and Latin School. His cites his uncle Joe Sakey – former director of the Cambridge Public Library – for his mentorship in teaching Moree people are “only truly rich when you have given everything away and only truly noble when you serve others.” He is a carpenter who, inspired in part by the lack of good training and jobs for local tradespeople, has run for council in every election since 2007.

Compiled from the candidate’s words in publicly available sources

Alignment

Moree is not running on a slate or campaigning with any other candidates.

Top three priorities:

Education. He believes there should be more youth apprenticeship and internship programs, including some resulting from mandatory signed contracts between the city and the companies it hosts.
Jobs and equal pay. Moree supports boosting the minimum wage to $15 an hour, as well as “equal pay for all; … enforcing city ordinances on city jobs; and linking construction jobs for Cambridge workers to permits and project approval.”
Housing. Moree wants to use programs such as co-housing to make living in Cambridge more affordable and respectable.

Compiled from the candidate’s words in publicly available sources

Ward 6 Democrats endorsement?

The Ward 6 Democrats endorsed nine council candidates this year, choosing only from among registered Democrats and saying it “sought to recommend candidates who would bring the vision, skills and experience most needed to govern Cambridge at this time, regardless of slate affiliation.”

Score from A Better Cambridge:

The residents group A Better Cambridge rated 19 out of 22 candidates for City Council (all who responded to a comprehensive questionnaire) measuring their level of agreement with the group’s “smart growth” platform of development- and transit-focused priorities and goals. In the words of the group, “higher-rated candidates demonstrate a strong understanding of the complex housing and development challenges facing Cambridge [and] are best prepared to make Cambridge a more affordable and livable city for all residents, especially low-income families.” There is a maximum score of 45 points.

Cambridge Residents Alliance endorsement?

The Cambridge Residents Alliance endorsed five council candidates this year. The residents group is focused on development and housing affordability issues and opposes projects it feels will gentrify neighborhoods or add to traffic and transit congestion. Its endorsed candidates were those it felt would “allow real planning”; refused campaign donations from “large developers”; and vowed to work for a citywide development master plan that prevented “overdevelopment and displacement.”

While two years ago the knock on Moree was temperament – his energy level at debates seemed more like anger than passion – a source of unease this time is a lack of familiarity with topics of concern to other residents and a seeming inability to grasp and engage with unfamiliar concepts. He opted to pass on a forum question of whether Cambridge infrastructure such as roads, bridges and sewage systems were adequate, and when asked about language immersion programs in the schools he endorsed an English-only approach that would leave students looking ignorant on a global stage and ignores data showing children learn better in general when studying a second language. Initially, it took a long time and a lot of audience engagement until he was prepared to answer.

His signature idea of asking for federal aid to help build more affordable housing in Cambridge seems doomed to fail, considering the city’s enormous wealth compared with other communities and the difficulty encountered by the Cambridge Housing Authority in finding government help for existing units amid tightening U.S. budgets.