Job Creation, Affordability Are Goals For Annapolis City Council Candidate

ANNAPOLIS, MD — Patch invited all candidates for Annapolis mayor and City Council to complete a candidate questionnaire. We are posting their responses verbatim before the primary election on Tuesday, Sept. 16, and the General Election on Tuesday, Nov. 4.

We will share all of our candidate profiles and election news at this link. More election information is posted here.

Name: Brooks Schandelmeier

Elected Office Sought: Ward 5 Alderman

Political Party: Democrat

Profession: Healthcare Policy, American Hospital Association

Age On Election Day: 35

Website: https://www.brooksforannapolis.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BrooksinWard5

What makes you the most qualified candidate for this position?

I have represented Ward 5 since 2020. Through this time Ward 5 has navigated the pandemic, tornados, and inflation well, with the government providing effective service and representation for the residents. I’ve always been a quick email away to help my constituents get the answers and results they need from Annapolis’ city government.

How will you approach the planned construction of City Dock Park?

As of this time, 8/17/25, we are still on track to receive the FEMA grant since the project was not slated as a BRIC grant, just infrastructure. That said with an increasingly unpredictable federal government not having back up plans is reckless. If we do not receive the FEMA grant we will scale down the project to the resiliency essentials; raise the dock, build the pumps, and build the park. This will create a community space and protect the area from flooding while we figure out future plans to make it a more dynamic space.

How will you address crime in Annapolis?

We need to invest in low-income communities and create opportunities. This means improving transportation, expanding accesses for jobs, providing better recreation for children. By creating opportunities, we stop crimes from taking place. During this term we successfully partnered our reentry program with the IBEW Local 24 to get people involved in apprenticeship programs so that they would be paid to learn and get good paying jobs.

We also need to get bad guys off the street. This council has invested record amounts into our police department to upgrade equipment to protect our community. I am also spearheading launching a drone program to rapidly respond to incidents such as shots fired, where a drone can respond to the scene in 45 seconds that would take an office in a vehicle over a minute and 30 seconds and a helicopter from Anne Arundel County over 15 minutes. This will help us find suspects faster and get violent criminals away from society.

How will you address affordable housing and public housing in Annapolis?

There are not enough homes to meet the needs and budgets of our working families. This scarcity creates competition which leads to wealthier families pushing out less wealthy ones. We can adjust our code to legalize smaller more affordable starter homes that can give our teachers, firefighters, and workers choices on what can meet their needs.

We have seen that the current model of public housing has failed. We cannot shove poverty into a corner and underfund the maintenance of it. It’s why I’m so excited for programs like the Eastport Community Neighborhood Initiative. This will expand mixed income housing options with public private partnerships so that we can build quality affordable housing mixed with market rate units as well so that neighbors can provide opportunities and connections for one another

How do you plan to balance development and historic preservation in the city?

We need to protect our historic buildings, and part of that is making permits to repair and maintain them easier to acquire. However, we cannot close off our downtown and leading economic driver to activity, and not everything in and within a mile of our downtown is historic. Many of the buildings constructed in the 50’s, 60’s or later can be repurposed or redeveloped to meet our needs. Right now only large corporate entities such as Atlas can afford to open a new business in downtown Annapolis due to long permitting uncertainty and burdensome regulations. When tasks such as renovating an internal kitchen needs to be review by the Historic Preservation Commission, that drives out smaller businesses owners. Similarly, when housing is forced to go through long reviews and number of units are frequently cut down, those costs are passed onto buyers and renters, increasing costs. This also makes existing older homes more expensive and leads to more being used as short term rentals since that is often the only way for a family to be able to afford a home in downtown Annapolis.

How should Annapolis respond to the ongoing cuts to federal jobs and grants to local governments?

We need to become more financially self-resilient. Currently nearly 70% of our city is revenue negative. The money we receive from property taxes and fees cannot maintain our infrastructure; we have a $20 million annual deferred maintenance deficit. StrongTowns covered our study in two quick videos that can be accessed here. Video 1(https://www.instagram.com/strong_towns/reel/DJpEEeYh76G/) Video 2(https://www.instagram.com/strong_towns/reel/DKAPQdPJ_Fg/) Folks can also watch the larger presentation here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ax9tL0f-ocA)

To get to a more financially sustainable place without raising taxes or cutting essential services we need to adjust our development pattern to one that is more financially sustainable, moving away from sprawl and into more traditional urbanism. This also will help us promote more affordable homes and more accessible business opportunities for our entrepreneurs.

What else should voters know about you and your platform?

My grandfather first came to Annapolis as part of the Naval Academy class of 1958. He was immediately charmed by this city, how could he not be? Annapolis is where my grandparents fell in love, where my parents went on dates by the waterfront, it’s where I rented my first apartment, met my wife, and bought my first home. I’m grateful for these opportunities. Unfortunately, chances like these are slipping further away for too many families in Ward 5 and Annapolis. I’m running for reelection to extend them. We can build homes that meet the needs and budgets of our working families. We can create good paying jobs. We can lower the cost of childcare. We will do this because we all do better when we create Opportunity for All.

My priority issues are:
Housing, which I got into detail above.

Jobs
A priority during this term was creating good paying jobs. I created our Economic Gardening Program so that we could assist local entrepreneurs with expanding into new markets. I invested $100,000 to create apprenticeships in Annapolis’ maritime industry. In this next term I want to get more families involved in apprenticeships through legislation like prevailing wage so that more families can learn a trade and get into a good paying career.

Childcare
High childcare costs and lack of availability are hurting the future of our families. It’s why during this term I eliminated red tape making it easier to open a day care and hire staff so we can lower wait times and bring costs down. In the next term I want to offer tax credits for home-based day cares and continue expanding opportunities to lower costs for our working parents.