With less than three weeks until the April 9 election, the city’s mayoral candidates shared their views at a Student Association-hosted debate.

The Student Association hosted the mayoral candidates debate on Wednesday, with less than three weeks until the election on April 9.

The event was held at 6 p.m. Wednesday night in the Holmes Student Center’s Capital Room. This debate served as a medium in which students could voice their concerns in regard to interactions between the campus and the city. Junior physics major Ricky Smith saw a disconnect between the city of DeKalb and the university and came prepared to hear the candidates’ answers.

“One of my biggest issues that I hope is discussed is the relationship between the university and the city,” Smith said. “As far as communication goes totally across the board, at this point they don’t really work together as well as they should.”

Smith was happy when the first set of questions posed to the candidates focused on this lack of communication. All of the candidates supported measures that would increase interactions between the university and the city and consequently better inform students about what the community has to offer.

“So much of the city of DeKalb and NIU really need each other,” said mayoral candidate Mike Verbic. “My initiative is once elected, I’m going to create a DeKalb leadership council…. This will involve leadership position from the city, board of trustees from NIU, other administrators, and also student leadership positions where we have public meetings twice a year.”

Students were also concerned about how DeKalb’s fiscal policies could affect them.

“I’m interested in the raw direction that is going to be taken,” said Sean Rodgers, senior political science major. “I’m interested in mostly seeing the fiscal policies.”

The answers to the students’ financial questions included how to stimulate businesses around campus as well as reducing rent for off-campus students. One particularly heated topic that stemmed from this was the issue of public safety and its place in the budget.

“Particular issues facing the next city council will primarily be public safety,” said Bill Finucane, second ward alderman candidate. “There’s enough issues in town and certain parts of town, and it’s not located in just the student area. There are several other pockets in town where those issues need to be addressed. All of that has to be done while somehow maintaining a balanced budget.”

Of particular concern to the candidates was the students’ lack of knowledge about the surrounding community.

“To be honest I don’t really know much about the city of DeKalb,” said Jack Timber, sophomore corporate communications major. “I’d like to know what they want to do with the city of DeKalb and what they want to change it from.”

Several times the mayoral candidates cited the student body’s misunderstanding of where exactly downtown DeKalb was as well as the establishments that are available.

“Engagement and involvement is one of the most important things because a lot of the students don’t even realize how much the elections will affect them,” said Lauren Jones, senior communications major.

DeKalb mayors serve four-year terms.