Middlebrooks touts support for schools, police in 2020 reelection bid

Casey Middlebrooks believes the Hoover City Council that was elected four years ago has made great strides, and he’s hoping voters will return him to Council Place 6 for another four years.

He is facing a challenge from James “J.D.” Deer in the Aug. 25 city election.

Middlebrooks said the council followed through on a promise from several members to increase funding for Hoover public schools, boosting the system’s general allocation from $2.5 million a year to $5 million a year, in addition to fully funding the cost of school resource officers in every Hoover school.

Another campaign promise he made was to increase transparency in government and community engagement. Now, all City Council meetings are livestreamed and available for review online afterward. Middlebrooks also shares council agendas and information packets online in advance of meetings on multiple community Facebook pages.

The 43-year-old Ross Bridge resident said the current council has faced a lot of difficult matters over the past four years. “I think we’ve handled that pretty well with a lot of grace and learned a lot from it,” he said.

But there is much more work to be done, Middlebrooks said.

TECHNOLOGY INFRASTRUCTURE, INCLUSION

His goals for the next term include expanding the city’s technology infrastructure, continuing efforts to be a more inclusive community regarding diversity, addressing the economic impact of COVID-19, revamping trash and recycling services, and lobbying the Legislature to create a more level playing field between online businesses and brick-and-mortar retailers.

Middlebrooks wants the city to continue partnering with private companies such as Verizon or AT&T to expand and decentralize the city’s fiber network. He also would like to bridge the “digital divide” by adding free Wi-Fi at city parks.

Middlebrooks said he wants the City Council to continue increasing the diversity of city boards to make them more inclusive of minorities and people from eastern Hoover. As the council’s liaison to the Hoover Library Board, two appointments he recommended were Greystone resident Ruth Cole and Lake Cyrus resident Cherinita Reese, who is Black.

Their residency and race were not the sole reasons they were chosen, he said. Both are leaders in the city and well qualified, but city boards also need to be representative of the city at large, he said.

Middlebrooks, who has a son with a disability, is also an advocate for the disabled and frequently seeks to make sure city services and infrastructure accommodate people of all abilities.

Waste services, such as garbage and recycling pickup, are one of the areas where the city receives the most complaints, so Middlebrooks said he wants to find more efficient and cost-effective ways of providing those services.

He helped start the Jefferson County City Councilor Roundtable, and one of the first projects the group undertook was to address problems with recycling. They launched a campaign to inform people about what items can and cannot be recycled in today’s market and have been researching alternative waste removal services.

Vestavia Hills recently chose to contract with a company that offers an option to sort trash from recyclables so residents don’t have to do so, and Hoover likely will consider that option as well, Middlebrooks said.

He thinks trucks with automated garbage can lifts would be more cost-efficient and likely would do a better job of putting garbage cans back where residents left them instead of blocking driveways or roads, he said. But those decisions will be made by the next City Council as Santek’s contract expires, he said.

TAX INCREASES, POLICE FUNDING

Middlebrooks said he stands by his vote two years ago to raise sales, use and lease taxes and to create a $2 nightly room fee for lodging facilities. Hoover residents demand and deserve a certain level of city services in order to have a better quality of life, and these tax increases were necessary to provide that, he said.

These tax increases were needed to be able to add personnel in the police and fire departments and replace aging fire trucks, he said.

Hoover also was having a tough time recruiting and retaining top talent, especially in the Police Department, and these tax increases were needed to support pay increases for city employees to make Hoover a more attractive place to work, Middlebrooks said.

He said he was among the council members who negotiated the $2 nightly room fee for lodging facilities instead of a lodging tax increase, which hoteliers found more objectionable.

“We worked with them to do what is best for our businesses and our community,” he said.

There have been calls for “defunding” the Police Department or reallocating resources away from police to pay for other social services, but Middlebrooks said he would continue to show 100% support and funding for police.

The culture of the Hoover Police Department is not what some people are saying it is, Middlebrooks said. “It just simply is not true.”

That said, the department can continue to grow and address any weaknesses, and the accreditation process the department is going through now is the first step toward that end, he said.

BIO

Middlebrooks has been a librarian at Spain Park High School since 2010. Before that, he was the librarian at Midfield High School for three years and a clerk at the Hoover Public Library from 1996 to 2007. He was the city’s 1998-99 Employee of the Year.

He obtained a bachelor’s degree in justice sciences from the University of Alabama at Birmingham and then a master’s degree in library and information science from the University of Alabama and a doctorate in leadership in educational administration from Capella University.

He and his wife, Ebru, have two 11-year-old sons who will be sixth graders at Berry Middle School this year. They have lived in Ross Bridge since 2014, and Middlebrooks also lived in Hoover from 1996 to 2000.

For more information about Middlebrooks’ campaign, go to councilmancasey.com or Councilman Casey Middlebrooks on Facebook.

See a complete list of candidates running for Hoover mayor and City Council here.