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Public-private partnerships with local businesses and community forums are some solutions District 5 candidates say can bring jobs to the county and resources to the county school system.

Candidates Nakia Ngwala and Pat Thornton are running to unseat County Council Vice Chair Andrea Harrison (D-Dist. 5) of Springdale. District 5 includes Bladensburg, Edmonston, Fairmount Heights, Landover and Springdale.

Primary elections are Tuesday and the general election is Nov. 2.

Harrison did not respond by press time.

Thornton said there should be public-private partnerships with developers who come into the community so both residents and developers benefit. With the Bellehaven Plaza Shopping Center, planned to be built next to Springdale's Charles H. Flowers High School, Thornton said a deal between developers and the community could be formed to include a promise to pay for school uniforms or computers, for example.

She said if elected she would like to hire a grant analyst with experience in public-private partnerships to seek more funding for District 5 communities.

"The community has to sign off on these shopping centers when they come in," Thornton said. "These civic associations have to sign off. At the point where you have enough power to leverage, you include some things that that school may need."

Thornton added that there should be an expanded relationship between the County Council and the Prince George's County Board of Education and that the poor performance of the school system as a whole warrants change.

"With 62 percent of our budget being allocated to the schools, we need to have more influence than we do," Thornton said. "I don't want to usurp their authority. I just want to make it a more equitable arrangement such that we have some sort of advisory capacity with the distribution of those funds."

Ngwala also wants to have a closer relationship between the County Council and the Board of Education. She said she has talked with residents who had disappointing experiences with the Prince George's County School System and opted to place their children in private school, while there are others who never made the school system an option.

"Since that negative perception is out there, they don't even consider Prince George's County," Ngwala said. "They don't even consider our school system at all."

Ngwala said she wants to reverse that perception by expanding early childhood education, such as universal pre-kindergarten for all county 4-year-olds, regardless of income. Ngwala co-founded the Prince George's County Preschool for All Committee in 2009 with Prince George's County Public Schools pre-K supervisor Diane Bonanni upon learning the Maryland General Assembly was seeking each Maryland county's input on the future of universal pre-kindergarten.

Ngwala also wants to partner with other County Council members to hold community forums that spread the word about county employment opportunities such as at the Woodmore Towne Centre in Glenarden, a mixed-use retail project set to open this fall. She also plans to frequently update her section of the Prince George's County Government website and create e-mail lists since she said there were many residents who did not know who their elected officials were as she door knocked throughout District 5.

"I'm also an informer," Ngwala said. "If there's anything I feel that's going to benefit the community, I'll take action right away."

nmcgill@gazette.net