BRYAN, Texas — Kyle Schumann, an Aggie and Army veteran, decided to run for the District 5 race on the Bryan City Council in the November 2022 midterm elections.
Schumann is running against Marca Ewers-Shurtleff and AJ Renold.
We interviewed Schumann at Polite Coffee in Bryan where he said that he wants to have more people feel heard from their local government.
Question:
"On a more personal level, are there any quotes, mottos, or beliefs you try to live by?"
Answer:
"So my campaign motto is firmly-grounded, forward-thinking, family man."
Question:
"A lot of alliteration."
Answer:
"Those words in one of those orders. If someone's not sitting there and thinking outside the box, you just say status quo and status quo leads to failure. I got one little girl myself. We're trying to have more. Hopefully one day, God will bless us with more. If not, we'll look to adopt one or two as well. I've been a member of the military, been a member of the Corps of Cadets at A&M. You know big, hardy, mess-with-you kind of family business has always been a huge part of my life. So that's why I want to be more involved in the city."
Question:
"You told me you've never run for public office before, so why now?"
Answer:
"One of the things that really made me decide to do it was citizens of my area weren't getting a very good voice in what was happening and we weren't getting a lot of information when the City came to us about putting the water tower in."
Question:
"Mentioning the water tower, do you think that is the most pressing issue for our area?"
Answer:
"It's not the most pressing issue, but it made me realize that the citizens of Bryan don't necessarily get a very good dialogue from the city. We can talk with the City all day long, but the City doesn't do a very good job of communicating back to us."
Question:
"You said the City Council didn't let you know about it until after-the-fact?"
Answer:
"Very few people got the notice that it was going to be rezoned or up for rezoning. A gentleman across the street had no idea it was going in because he lives in the county. So he got no notice. So he's having a 200 foot water tower put in his front yard and he wasn't notified until they got it passed and he got notified saying it was the future home of the water tower."
Question:
"Since there's going to be a fairly new council after the election, do you believe that you and the other council members could increase the transparency between the City and the citizens?'
Answer:
"I definitely hope so. It's going to be my number one goal is to make sure the laws get updated to be more forthright with the citizenry."
Question:
"Are there some shortcomings you'd want to see solved by the end of your term?"
Answer:
"There are definitely some things that need to be improved on. There are some roads that need to be redone, sidewalks that need to be laid, but you also want to see growth as well."
Question:
"Is this biggest point you're trying to drive home is that complacency is the biggest enemy?"
Answer:
"We don't want to start shrinking. When you start shrinking it's very hard to battle back from that. So you have to have that good mixture of growing within your means and within your limits but at the same time not shrinking."
Question:
"Would you press it on your other councilmembers to side with you if you believe in {an} issue strong enough?"
Answer:
"That's what politics is supposed to be is representing the citizens and doing what's best for your area and that's the beauty of local politics is that you have the opportunity to be a voice for your neighbors."
If you'd like to learn more about Schumann, you can visit his campaign page here.