This is the first of a two-part series on the eight candidates for City Council. The first four candidates, alphabetically, will appear today. Profiles of the next four candidates will appear Tuesday.

BANGOR – Eight City Council candidates are pounding the pavement this week in the final days of one of the more crowded races in recent memory for three seats on the council.

Annie Allen is no stranger to the campaign trail. She is looking to claim one of the three open seats on the nine-member council.

A University of Maine employee, Allen, 50, said in a recent interview that the departure of her two children to southern Maine and New Hampshire in part prompted her effort to help create an economic climate in which Bangor retains its youth.

“We have to continue to look at developing high-tech jobs and making Bangor a competitor while keeping it the community it is,” Allen said. “You have to have an infrastructure that allows some accessibility to go back and forth so they don’t feel so confined.”

Allen, who as a Democrat lost her 1998 bid for the state Legislature, said she was optimistic the next council could work to attract the large businesses that can reduce the tax rate and stop the outward migration to the lower-taxed suburbs.

“We’re caught. We’re growing, but we haven’t brought in the businesses that keep the tax rate down,” Allen said, who said the city would be wise to define itself as a rural center rather than try to emulate Portland, which enjoys ties to the Boston market. “But we’re starting.”

Allen counted among her priorities improving the waterfront and enhancing air service from Bangor.

With a keen sense of humor, James Elmore is quick to remind a roomful of senior citizens that he’s the only bald candidate.

But Elmore, 58, is even quicker to stress his 20 years of experience in municipal government as a way of distinguishing himself from the rest of the crowded field.

“I do bring that to the table,” said Elmore, who served as the city assessor in Old Town before working independently for the towns of Lincolnville and Clinton. “There are situations where I don’t have to come in asking a lot of questions.”

Elmore said he would support a local-option sales tax as a means of financing regional projects and reducing the city’s reliance on the property tax, the revenues from which, he said, were being put to good use in Bangor.

“The taxes, while they’re not cheap, they’re buying an awful lot of service,” who praised the city’s schools, parks and police and fire departments. “A dollar spent in Bangor buys a lot more than a dollar spent in an outlying town.”

Elmore also said the city must continue its progress in reviving the downtown and looking for wise projects in which to invest.

“Proponents of investment are always making promises, but not all those promises pay out,” Elmore said. “It is a risk, but you’ve got to have the courage to seek progress.”

If former President Bush hadn’t made his famous “no new taxes” pledge taboo for virtually any candidate for any office, Donald “Tripp” Lewis might use it for his council run.

“We need to have people on the council looking at spending from the person-on-the-street perspective,” said Lewis, 38, an operations manager at NYLE Corp., a Brewer-based company that manufactures kiln-drying systems for lumber.

Lewis, who as a Republican lost his bid for the Legislature last year, said his run for the council was to provide a new perspective on the board, which at times has lost touch with the average resident, he said.

“We need to listen to those of us who don’t live in the big houses,” Lewis said. “We need to take the opinions of everyone.”

Lewis, a member of the city’s board of appeals, said that if elected to the council he would limit new spending and look to hold the tax rate steady. He opposes a city-backed plan for a local option sales tax to fund a new Bangor Auditorium.

“The last thing Bangor needs is another tax,” said Lewis, who called the plan “the dumbest idea for people who live here.”

On the difference between himself and the other candidates:

“I actually have opinions, ideas,” he said. “I’m not afraid to challenge what’s going on the city now. Build on the good stuff we have and don’t hide the stuff that’s bad.”

For David Nealley, Bangor needs to mean business.

“If we’re going to keep our property taxes in check, we’re going to have to diversify the tax base, and that means more business,” said Nealley, 40, the past president of Snow & Nealley, a local company that sells its garden tools and axes worldwide. “Without a strong pro-business and pro-development attitude, the city’s going to have a tough time moving forward.”

Nealley, a financial consultant whose father and great-great-grandfather served on the council, said the city should be diligent in its efforts to lobby the state to also adopt a more pro-development attitude that could help buoy small business throughout the entire region.

“There are some great assets this city has and if tapped into properly, Bangor can resurrect itself,” said Nealley, who cited the city’s solid infrastructure – including its airport and the potential for a Bass Park conference center – as an incentive for development. “We need to be progressive.”

Nealley said, if elected, he would work to extend the same incentives to small local businesses as those given to larger businesses moving into the city.

“We need to look in our own back yard,” said Nealley, who praised the current council for creating the momentum for development. “We need to look to the businesses that have already made a commitment to this community.”