Candidates for District 4 discuss how they plan to address issues in Northeast El Paso.

EL PASO, Texas (KVIA)-- All candidates agreed that District 4 is one of the safest neighborhoods in El Paso but areas of improvement include street lighting, roads and lack of law enforcement. I asked all candidates how they plan to address these issues.

Cynthia Boyar Trejo says police officers are in dire need.

"We have a little over 1000 police officers in the city. A third of them are ready to retire. If they retire, we're going to be in really serious trouble. We need to make sure that our law enforcement has the resources they need to do their job and to keep us safe. I've been to the substation in Northeast. They're working with antiquated equipment, old vehicles, and they're short staffed. We need to prioritize making sure that we take care of those that take care of us, by making sure that they have the resources that they need to do their job and do it well," Boyar Trejo said.

Dorothy M. "Sissy" Byrd says traffic is an issue she experience on a daily.

"We need to make sure we get the construction done and completed for all the areas because we have a lot of housing that's being built. And then we're planning on the Amphitheater to be in the Northeast. So we need to address getting funding so that, 54 will be finished," Byrd said.

Wesley Lawrence believes bringing the community together is the first step to a better community.

"I want to bring an office to the district, paid for by my own salary. So we can come together and really form neighborhood coalitions that are focused on addressing things like lighting and crime. You know, one of the things that we need to make sure we're doing is paying our officers a living wage. One of the things I want to do, I mean, the benefits of unions, is to give them a language differential to make sure that we're hiring more officers that understand the wants and needs of our communities, speak the language that our people also speak as well. Because the Northeast does have a Spanish speaking community. We have a the Korean speaking community as well as a German speaking community.So it's important that we have officers that understand our community," Lawrence said.

Incumbent District 4 Rep. Joe Molinar says it is a team effort, everyone must to provide feedback to improve the the community.

"When someone reports to 311, 'hey, the streetlight is out or the traffic signals are not functioning correctly'. That is my job as a city representative to report that, to make sure that is done correctly in a timely manner. We need the community to provide input, feedback on what we're doing, what we're not doing, how well we're doing it, so that we can better ourselves. If I don't know anything about it, how can I take care of it? However, I will tell you, I devote at least one full day out of my work week, 7 days a week to go out in the field in District 4 to spot check what's happening," Molinar said.

For a full list of questions, candidate response and profile visit KVIA voter guide.