PAWTUCKET – The Democratic primary for Pawtucket’s City Council District 1 features a three-way Democratic primary, a rarity in a city where election challengers are often scarce.
Crisolita Figueiredo, who took on 30-year incumbent David Moran six years ago, and Tyler McFeeters, Moran’s neighbor in the Pine Crest neighborhood, are taking aim at the seat.
Council District 1 is in the northeastern part of the city, starting near the Massachusetts line and Newport Avenue and then snaking around District 2 and into part of the general downtown/Broadway area.
The Sept. 9 is a winner-take-all election, with no candidates in November’s general election.
Figueiredo told The Local Insider she’s running on a platform of better schools, safer neighborhoods, and more affordable housing. She says she wants to invest more on the inside of schools, not just the exterior, and invest more in public safety, all while lowering taxes.
To pay for the increases, Figueredo said, she would advocate for an all-out effort to attract new businesses instead of luxury apartment developers. She said the incumbent councilman and the mayor are far too focused on attracting new residents to the city, all while driving existing residents out because of housing costs.
McFeeters said his campaign is simple, and it’s about what people want now more than anything: elected officials who will address their concerns, and do it quickly. All the good initiatives will be there, he said, but if you’re not taking care of the small things in an expeditious manner, it’s time for you to go.
He said he’s not particularly patient when it comes to getting something done, and that will be a very good thing for residents who want answers now.
McFeeters said he’s already putting that mindset into practice, connecting residents of District 1 with the DPW, police, or other city department and often getting answers to issues very quickly. In one case, he said, laughing, he jumped in, with permission, to address a situation with overgrown bushes from a commercial neighbor’s property, and has since contracted a nasty case of poison ivy as a result.
Moran says he sees his campaigns every two years as a job application, and he said his record of advocating for constituents is what has kept him in office so long. The proof is in the pudding, he said, or rather, the evidence of his effectiveness is found in his ability to get re-elected so many times.
Pawtucket is clearly on the rise due in large part to great collaborative work between the council and Mayor Donald Grebien, said Moran.
Figueiredo says she doesn’t believe she actually lost in 2020, which is part of the reason she thinks she can come out victorious this time around.
“The numbers spoke for themselves in the last election,” she said, and now she’s equipped herself with more knowledge. “People are eager for change.”
Figueredo lost the 2020 primary by 95 votes, 567-472. She said the result got her discouraged, but she believes there was “funny business” that went on with the vote. Asked for evidence of that claim, she said it was based on what she was seeing in terms of support on the street, which was not at all reflected in the final result. The gap wasn’t narrow enough for an official challenge, she said, but she knows she didn’t actually lose.
As for Moran, she said, he, after 34 years, and Grebien feel far too entitled to their positions, which is why she’s supporting Adam Greenman for mayor.
Moran said Figueiredo’s assertion about the 2020 election is absurd, particularly if she has no evidence to back it up. He said she sounds an awful lot like Donald Trump. The incumbent said one of the reasons he keeps getting re-elected is because of his honesty and integrity, and that he’s above-board in all that he does. He said just as in 2020, he’s getting very positive feedback, and there aren’t many people who are indicating any desire for something new.
Moran said he would like to be re-elected again, and he’s not telling anyone that they should vote for him, only that he would appreciate their consideration.
The proof of his responsiveness is in his ongoing support, he said, and he puts his faith in the voters. He has a passion for Pawtucket, he added, and has lived in this district his entire life.
Figueiredo said she doesn’t know a lot about McFeeters, though she said he did reach out after her late announcement of her campaign and told her that he had considered hiring her as his campaign manager, given her level of support in the 2020 election, but that he knew he didn’t have the funds to do so. She said she told him if he had asked her, she probably wouldn’t have decided just before the filing deadline to join the race.
McFeeters confirmed the story, saying Figueiredo came closer than anyone to beating Moran, and he was impressed that she kept Moran under 600 votes. McFeeters said when he welcomed her to the race, he did mention how he would have liked to have her on his team.
McFeeters said “political science 101” says that a three-way primary favors the incumbent, but this isn’t a typical primary. He said he started greeting residents on April 1, finding many people hungry for change, and those early visits allowed him to focus now on more quality over quantity in his interactions. He said he’s had “long, meaningful conversations” with the same people now three or four times, and those relationships will help him carry the day.
Concrete political rules are over, says McFeeters, and “old-school rules no longer apply.” When he ran for School Committee in 2022, “negativity was like an IV,” but “it’s the total opposite this time,” he said, and people are just not tolerating any kind of smearing of opponents. This race has reflected that trend toward civility, McFeeters said.
McFeeters said he’s enjoying being the go-between for residents and their city government, saying the men and woman of city departments such as police and DPW are the real heroes. Getting issues fixed is all to their credit, he said, but he’s happy to be helping to remove the red tape that many people are tired of. So many residents, McFeeters said, have told him that when they reach out to Moran, they haven’t gotten the same results.
On an initiative he would like to tackle head-on, McFeeters said that’s an easy one. He said he would like to work with the representative in the Attleboro district just over the line to directly address traffic patterns, stop signs, truck traffic, and speeding, all perennial issues in the area between Newport Avenue and the Massachusetts line.
Where he works at the Pastore Center, said McFeeters, stop signs have red flashing lights, and he wants to see more of that in District 1. He said he spoke with Grebien about some of what he wants to do, and residents really deserve answers.
“It’s a bad setup,” he said.
As for Figueiredo saying she wants to lower taxes, McFeeters said he can’t promise anyone that will happen, but “I can tell you one thing, you’re going to get what you pay for.” He called himself a social Democrat who believes people deserve results for their tax money.
Speaking shortly after a meet-and-greet event with supporter and Secretary of State Gregg Amore, McFeeters said he also believes in advocating for affordable housing and lower costs. He said recent confirmation from Grebien that Curtis School will remain open was a big deal for his family and the district.
Figueiredo said her youngest daughter attends Goff Middle School, and the interior conditions of the school are frustrating. She appreciates that the city is building new schools, she said, but more focus needs to go to the interior, including mold in locker rooms.
Educators aren’t appreciated enough, she said, and they should be getting better resources and tools to be able to do their job.
One consistent theme she’s hearing, said Figueiredo, is that people can’t afford their homes and the rising cost of items, which is why it’s so important to push for new businesses in the city and the downtown area to offset the burden on homeowners.
Speaking of things she doesn’t believe, said Figueiredo, the Police Department’s crime numbers are not accurate. She said homes and vehicles on Grand Avenue were broken into multiple times, and officers simply responded that there wasn’t much they could do. A neighbor had a break-in of their Tesla, she said, and it’s been months since they heard anything from police.
Figueiredo said she recently got her master’s degree in public administration and started a nonprofit organization, Harbor of Hope Foundation, to help people in numerous ways. She said she wanted to build herself up to better serve her community, which she’s lived in for 29 years.
Figueiredo said she started thinking about running about three days before the deadline, and her family supported it. She made her final decision on declaration deadline day. The summer heat has made it difficult to get people to come along for door-to-door knocking, she said, but she’s been doing it on her own.
Moran, she said, too often says it’s someone else’s responsibility when a constituent calls him, and people rarely see him around. She said he also falls asleep during meetings. She said he is also too aligned with Grebien.
Moran rejected those statements, saying he’s proven his independence from the mayor again and again over the years, sometimes backing him and other times opposing him.
“The mayor does what he needs to, and there are times we’ve gotten along and times not,” he said, but when you step back and look at what Grebien has accomplished and his overall body of work, he’s done a great job. The incumbent “worked his tush off” to try to save the PawSox deal, Hasbro was always going to leave, and Memorial Hospital’s closure also couldn’t be avoided, he said.
“He certainly lives and breathes the city of Pawtucket,” and the mayor is never resting on his laurels, said Moran.
Figueiredo, Greenman, and their supporters are “picking straws and grabbing at things to see if it works,” Moran added.
Figueiredo’s comments about investing a lot more money in education or safety are “pie-in-the-sky” suggestions meant to “throw things at the wall and see what sticks,” said Moran. She said she seems to envision a “perfect utopia situation” where significant money can just be added to a line item without raising taxes.
“You can’t have it all,” he said.
Moran said he doesn’t know Figueiredo, but he does find it ironic that in all the years she lived in the area, he never once received a phone call from her. If things have been so bad, he said, he would think she would have made at least one phone call to let him know about her dissatisfaction.
