Educator and software engineer Jon Link has announced his candidacy for Somerville City Council. He joins startup founder Ben Orenstein and University of Massachusetts undergraduate Wilbert Pineda in bidding for the council’s four at-large positions.
Among current councilors at large Kristen Strezo, Will Mbah, Willie Burnley Jr. and Jake Wilson, Burnley and Wilson have announced their intention to challenge incumbent Katjana Ballantyne in the race for mayor, leaving their council seats open.
Link has lived in Somerville since 2012, renting in Winter Hill and Magoun Square before moving to Prospect Hill in 2019. He lives in Prospect Hill with his wife and two kids, aged 3 and 6.
As councilor, Link says that he wants to support the Somerville school system. “I think that the job is to make sure that the school board is fully empowered and that the schools are fully funded, and I think that means kind of talking relentlessly about, for example, the Winter Hill school and pushing for that to get done.”
Link’s connection to the school system comes from experience as an educator and as a parent of two children in Somerville schools. Link said that one of his children was a student at the Capuano Early Childhood Center in 2023 when the school absorbed all prekindergarten and kindergarten students from the Winter Hill Community Innovation School after its building closed in 2023 due to disrepair.
“I got to see the kind of the chaos that that created,” Link said. “It has been a real eye opener in terms of … the urgency that we’re lacking in some regards.” (An advisory group is tasked with presenting a recommendation for a new or renovated school site to Ballantyne. The recommendation is due by November.)
To Link, the school system doesn’t exist in a vacuum. For students to thrive, they need food security and street safety. “Our kids should be able to walk to school without fear. Our seniors should feel safe crossing the street,” Link says on his campaign website. Link seeks to improve street safety through design – including protected bike lanes, raised crosswalks, curb extensions and hardened turns – as well as limiting speeding.
“Being able to get around with my kids, either on foot or by bike, having them bike around, that’s really important to me,” he said.
Housing is also key to Link. “What I learned when I moved to Somerville was basically, you know, that it was really hard to live here,” Link said. “There’s a real dearth of affordable housing.”
Link spoke in support of the Somerville Community Land Trust, for which he recently began volunteering, and its efforts to build 50 all-affordable apartments at 297 Medford St. Online, he has expressed his support for rent stabilization, transit-oriented upzoning, affordable housing height bonuses and funding the Inspectional Services Department.
In addition to housing, Link said that the city should seek to limit displacement of businesses and the arts. “We used to be home to one of the most densely populated art communities in the country, and that’s no longer the case,” Link said.
He’s also a proponent of “greening up Somerville” through preserving parks, maintaining street trees and continuing the city’s efforts to limit flooding through sewer separation projects.
Link aims to host a campaign kickoff event in May. Ahead of the election, “I’ll be going door to door, knocking, trying to meet as many people as possible,” he said.
Link has worked in international education for several years, specializing in studies of English as a second language. He worked in teaching and administration for two international schools in Greater Boston – Kaplan International and FSL International – before becoming a software engineer for U.K.-based school Stafford House International. He continued in the tech space through engineering roles at advertising company MobileFuse. Link now provides software engineering services freelance and is particularly interested in nonprofit clients.
A stronger
Please consider making a financial contribution to maintain, expand and improve Cambridge Day.
We are now a 501(c)3 nonprofit and all donations are tax deductible.
Please consider a recurring contribution.
