Marquardt hopes to look to the universities for better planning in city council, mimicking the academic process of making long-term plans.

“I want to make two, five, ten, twenty five, fifty year plans,” says Marquardt. “It takes time and patience, but I think we can do it.”

In the long-term, Marquardt emphasizes the need for the Cambridge City Council to set aside money for liabilities, such as pension for retirees. Currently, the city promises pension to its citizens even though it does not have the money to provide the money immediately.

Cambridge currently has $624 million in unfunded liabilities, which, according to Marquardt, will rise to $1.8 billion by 2039. Marquardt believes that the city needs to set aside $22 million each year.

“I don’t want to saddle the future generations with our debts,” he said.

Also mindful of the current economic climate, Marquardt is campaigning for more affordable housing, noting that the middle class is increasingly being pushed out of Cambridge due to rising costs, engendering a polarized class environment.

“Losing the middle class families is bad for the fabric of Cambridge,” says Marquardt.

Marquardt points to relations with the universities in Cambridge as one possible way to alleviate the pressures on the middle class in Cambridge. According to Marquardt, graduate students living two or three to an apartment can drive the rent up to a cost that middle class families cannot afford. He believes if the universities offered more graduate housing, the middle class families might be able to afford to live in Cambridge.

Terwilliger recalls another candidate for City Council calling Marquardt “the nicest man running.” “He has the respect of his peers, and that’s how you get things done,” she says.