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LaQueen A. Battle, a newcomer to local elections, is the only candidate to take on a dual race in Cambridge’s 2025 elections — campaigning for a seat on both the City Council and the School Committee with a promise to “make a voice for the community.”
Battle is up against nearly twenty other candidates in each race, vying for a seat to influence the city’s hot-button issues. For Battle, transparency and resource connection take priority.
“The community is dealing with resources lacking from the federal government,” Battle said. “I wanted to be a stand-in still to make sure that people are out there, getting the resources that they need, and making sure there is accountability and trust.”
Battle, a six-year Cambridge resident, said she wanted to ensure Cambridge’s resources remain accessible because of her own engagement with city-funded programs. She cited her experience with the city’s Community Assistance Response and Engagement team, an alternative police response that dispatches social workers to certain emergency calls.
“There is a CARE team that is available to help out those who are low income and that are going through difficult situations like myself,” she said. “I was able to get services from the CARE team, which I still need to implement right now in my own personal life.”
Battle said that, ultimately, the “little bitty things” prompted her to launch her campaigns. She referenced the temporary closures of the Gold Star Mothers Park and Valente branch of the Cambridge Public Library in East Cambridge. The city closed off access to the park after finding contaminated soil in August. The library has been closed due to water damage since June, with plans to reopen this month.
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With housing and bicycle lanes top-of-mind for Cambridge voters, Battle hopes to drive affordability on all fronts, but has yet to back specific policies.
If elected, Battle says she would advocate for a program to make bicycles more affordable for low-income residents and “give them free bicycle access.” Battle is endorsed by Cambridge Bicycle Safety, a super PAC that supports candidates who back their plan to construct a network of bike lanes by next year.
Battle has not explicitly voiced an opinion on the city’s contentious upzoning efforts, but said she wants to increase affordable housing if elected.
“That is something that’s very personal to me — that everybody should be afforded affordable housing. That’s not always the case,” Battle said.
Battle said that boosting the city’s economy was also a core tenet of her Council campaign.
“Cambridge used to be the hub, but it’s not the hub anymore, and I think that that is something that we could improve upon and bring it back to what it used to be,” she said, referencing the loss of businesses post-Covid.
Her run for School Committee hinges on a different point — de facto segregation in Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, the city’s only public high school. CRLS students, faculty, and alumni have reported that students of color are rarely represented in the school’s academically rigorous courses.
Battle says she hopes to tackle the issue by “continuing to support ESL programs, as well as mandating that students get the resources that they need, whether they're in AP classes or regular classes.”
“There’'s over 20, 30, 40, different cultures and languages just in the city alone, so making sure that people get the resources that they need,” she added.
It’s unclear if Battle could hold positions on both municipal boards if elected. Frantz Pierre ran for a seat on both boards last year and was told, if elected to both, he would have to ask the State Ethics Commission and city’s Law Department. He was not elected to either seat.
Still, Battle hopes that, on either board, she can lower barriers to accessing city resources and increase support for underrepresented residents.
“I’m running to make a difference. I’m running to make a change, and I'm willing to be the change that people need,” she said.
—Staff writer Dionise Guerra-Carrillo can be reached at dionise.guerracarrillo@thecrimson.com.
