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COLORADO SPRINGS, COLO. -- Voters have a little more than a week to decide who will represent them in the new Colorado Springs city council.

There are seven open seats on council: one in district two, one in district three, and five at-large seats.

Two candidates are running for the district three seat and four are running for the district two seat.

Last week at a forum, the mayoral candidates and several of the at-large city council candidates were asked what their funding priorities would be if elected.

Candidates for the two open district seats also answered the same question

After serving as a house representative for eight years Michael Merrifield said he now wants to serve a little closer to home, as a representative for district three.

"The first thing I want to do is restore the trust that we've lost to our leaders in Colorado Springs, and one way to do that is to restore the jobs that we've lost in Colorado Springs," Merrifield, a district three candidate, said.

He added that the city could use the assets it already has such as the trails and open spaces, Pikes Peak, and arts and culture to draw more tourists to the area.

"All those things I think will create a buzz, an excitement about Colorado Springs that will give us an opportunity to increase our income," Merrifield said.

His direct competitor, Lisa Czelatdko, said it's time to take a closer look at the budget and consider a variety of options, including out-sourcing.

"I'm somebody who believes in doing more with a lot less, and again I think it's being conservative, so definitely going over the budget, seeing where we're spending our money," Czelatdko, a district three candidate, said. "I believe in a combination of solutions, so I would look at privatization. I would look inside of our own departments, I would look at out-sourcing and then again just a lot of different options."

The four candidates for district two all said it comes down to spending the money wisely and focusing on the necessities.

"As a fiscal conservative I believe that we should concentrate on core essential services like police, and fire, and then road maintenance, snow removal, basic functions that governments do," Mike Terry, a district two candidate, said.

Terry said city council needs to prioritize what's important.

"From there the next priorities would be quality of life type factors, park maintenance, I think would be included in that, and I believe that that's important because tourism is a major income revenue stream for the city," he said. "Everything else that's nonessential has to be prioritized from top to bottom based on the revenue stream."

District two candidate Angela Dougan said the city should look at other options to take care of the rest.

"We could privatize, or we could out-source," Dougan said. "We could do that, and our budget would be much easier spent and much easier taken care of and much more transparent."

Dougan said she believes the government does some things well, such as core services, and needs to focus on those things.

"That is public safety, streets, infrastructure and bringing a culture of the ability for people to bring in businesses and grow and thrive the ones that are currently here, so I believe strongly that if the government would focus on the core services then we'd be able to do those very very well," Dougan said.

David Jensen, another district two candidate, said in addition to funding core services he wants to see the transportation system improved.

"We don't have a very good bus system right now, and I think we need to have it improved because a lot of people ride the buses, and more would ride it if we had a better system," Jensen said. "Our police department and fire department are two essential parts of our city that we have to make sure are properly funded so they can protect us properly."

Larry Bagley said bottom line, the city needs to remember where the money came from.

"I will remember that it's taxpayer dollars, and somebody had to pay that money for us to do something with," he said. "The first priority I think would be safety issues, making sure that we have police and fire covered."

Ballots are due back April 5, by 7 p.m.