Latest / Between the Headlines: Columbus / Grant Controversy and Fiery Feuds Lead to the Primaries

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Grant Controversy and Fiery Feuds Lead to the Primaries · Between the Headlines: Columbus

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: From the Opinion Page of the Commercial Dispatch.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: This is Between the Headlines.
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: Hi, this is Peter Imes, publisher of the Commercial Dispatch.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: The goal of the Dispatch's Opinion Page has always been to encourage discussion on what's important to our community.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: That's the approach we'll take with Between the Headlines.
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: Your host each week will be Dispatch Managing Editor, zach Player, and local businessman and chair of the Lowndes Republican Party, david Chisholm.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: Zach and David will discuss, and sometimes debate, columbus and Lowndes County news.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: They'll also invite guests on the show from time to time.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: We're excited about it.
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: If you have any tips or suggestions, feel free to email us at tips at cdispatchcom.
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: And now Between the Headlines.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: I'm Zach and I am David, and welcome today to our podcast, where we're going to focus on issues with Columbus and Lowndes County politics oh man, oh man, I cannot wait oh yeah as well as some of the broader things that affect us locally and specifically, today we're going to be talking about the situation with the city's grant writer, we're going to be talking about a beef that Leroy Brooks and Joseph Mickens played out on Facebook, and we're going to be taking a look at each of the city election races and giving our impressions on who may have the edge in those races as of right now.
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: I can't wait and before we begin, I would like to tip my hat to you, zach.
• 1:36
  Speaker 3: Thank you for thinking about me.
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: Thank you for bringing me on here.
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: I look forward to this.
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: Also, thank you to Peter, our great publisher.
• 1:44
  Speaker 3: I think this is going to be a good thing for the dispatch and it's definitely going to be a good thing for the city of Columbus and the county of Lowndes as we get into these issues and as we start getting people to talk about the things that matter.
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: And now a brief word from our sponsors.
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• 2:39
  Speaker 3: Again, that is 662-352-1560.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: Now let's start the show.
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: Our first topic today is obviously city elections have started.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: The city election season is well underway.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: We've got our candidates finalized and the first casualty of the city election season in Columbus appears to be the city's grant writer.
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: Wild Right and it's developing.
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: It is developing, so we don't have all the details All right.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: So the slow-moving train wreck started last Thursday at the work session when Susan Wilder, the city grant's writer.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: She presented a grant opportunity to the city grants writer.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: She presented a grant opportunity to the city council but presented it alongside Darren Leach, who's running for mayor.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: At that time there was now the grant.
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: As I understand it, it would be a planning grant that would help the city come up with.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: We're going to give you, potentially give you $250,000.
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: You can bring in community partners and you can plan how you want to make your city greener.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: They've now applied for the planning grant.
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: But this is a zero percent.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: Match yes, zero, match $250,000.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: They come up with a plan for making the city greener solar panels on city buildings.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: Like I said, none of it's been finalized yet because they're just applying for a planning grant.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: Here's the rub they don't really discuss it.
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: At the work session Thursday they hear the presentation from Susan and from Darren Leach, who is an independent running for mayor.
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: Fast forward to Tuesday where the council meets.
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: Ms Wilder goes up again to present the grant, explains the whole thing.
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: The council, they eventually vote 4-2 to reject the application for the grant.
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: So the city council says by a 4-2 vote no, susan, we're not going to apply for this grant.
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: This free grant.
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: Well, this, yeah, this grant with no match required from the city Fast forward to Wednesday, the day after the council meeting.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: Keith makes two unsuccessful attempts to veto that decision.
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: It just there were some technical issues in the law and in Robert's Rules of Order that kept him from vetoing it.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: So he directs Ms Wilder to apply for the grant anyway, against the council, against the council's wishes.
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: This morning this would be Thursday morning the city council calls a special meeting.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: They vote three to two to say okay, we support the grant.
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: It's already sent anyway.
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: Mickens is running that meeting.
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: Vice Mayor Joseph Mickens is running that meeting.
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: Gaskin is not present.
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: He does not show up, okay.
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: So Mickens says I support going ahead and, you know, going for this grant since it's already gone.
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: Might as well, might as well.
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: You can't unsend the email, that's correct.
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: So three to two they say okay, we support the grant application.
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: Since it's already gone, ward 5 Councilman Stephen Jones, also running for mayor, and Ward 4 Councilman Pierre Beard vote against it.
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: Then they have a fairly lengthy executive session where they're very clearly dressing down Miss Wilder, who is in the room.
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: She comes out of the room crying After the executive session lets out.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: The vote that's announced from that executive session is that the HR director and the chief operations officer for the city are.
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: Now they have to come up with recommendations for an employee in the administration department, which clearly was Ms Wilder, and bring those recommendations for her job performance to the council at its next meeting.
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: So obviously they're trying to ding her for insubordination against the council.
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: And so now the question is well, did Keith put her in an ugly situation, or you know?
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: You, look at this, it's almost a no-brainer.
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: Here we have a 0% match.
• 7:04
  Speaker 3: Okay, it's almost a no-brainer.
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: Here we have a zero percent match.
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: Okay, these are our tax dollars, and my opinion is, these dollars would be really well spent right here in our hometown in the Golden Triangle.
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: Why would anyone vote no against that?
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: Well, David let's go back to the beginning of the story.
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: Who co-presented with Susan during the work session.
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: The candidate Darren Leach.
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: That's correct.
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: So you've got Leach presenting with Susan Wilder.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: So he goes forward to the city council with Susan and does this.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: Then they reject it on Tuesday.
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: So a couple of things here for me.
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: They say it's not political, they say it doesn't have anything to do with the election.
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: But I thought their chosen profession was politics at this point.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: Well, there's that, and if this is a situation where let's just look at the issue practically, they got a pretty good explanation of what was going on Thursday at the work session.
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: They didn't have a whole lot of discussion at that work session and they could have asked those questions while they had Susan and Darren sitting right in front of them or standing right in front of them.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: They could have asked the questions Instead the following Tuesday.
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: They you know all the deadlines tomorrow.
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: Well, we didn't know about this.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: We didn't.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: You know, the city attorney hasn't looked at this and it seems to me that if they were going to do that in good faith and it wasn't meant to be political, they would have.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: You know, thursday, friday, saturday, sunday, monday.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: They had five days to where they could have worked with Jeff, worked with Susan, worked with Darren, trying to get a better feel, for you know, what this grant application was and what it was going to require of the city and the things that they were all of a sudden very upset about, very nervous about at the council meeting.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: They had five days that they could have.
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: They also had five days to plan on how to shoot it down.
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: Right, they certainly did.
• 9:10
  Speaker 3: The absolute kicker is we don't have to accept the money.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: And even if you do, it's a planning grant, so you're not actually getting any of this stuff.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: It's creating a plan.
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: Money straight into our economy.
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: Exactly, it's creating a plan Money straight into our economy.
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: Exactly.
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: But why should this be a political issue?
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: Why should it be a political issue If you go back and look at when they opened the shelter earlier this winter, darren Leach, partners with the Homeless Coalition, partners with the Homeless Coalition and they, in a day, have this temporary homeless shelter, temporary warning shelter for the homeless out at Genesis Church.
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: They did spring that on the council and they had to sit there and eat it, because what were they going to do?
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: They were going to say, no, we're not going to have a temporary shelter because this guy's running for mayor, we're not going to give him temporary shelter.
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: Because this guy's running for mayor, we're not going to give him that political capital.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: They didn't do that.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: What they did was they said, okay, well, we support this and we'll even match it with some donations.
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: But this time they saw Darren coming.
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: So that was a political misstep on Darren's part.
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: But then you get into the scapegoating, susan Wilder.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: You've got the council doing it first by voting down, rejecting the opportunity to even apply for this grant.
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: But let's stop there for a second and talk about.
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: The council did decide four to two were not applying for this grant.
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: So now we move to the second problem it's very clear that there is a 4-2 vote telling Susan Wilder and as a city council we are deciding we are not applying for this grant.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: The next day, mayor Keith Gaskin says yes, we are.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: You know, I did it myself.
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: I didn't actually have Susan submit the application.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: I submitted the application myself because I didn't want the council to harass Susan.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: Well, they did, of course.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: They harassed her pretty heavily, harassed her to tears, and for what?
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: And so my question to you, david, is why is Keith now telling his grant writer or himself defying an order of the council, a vote of the council?
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: That was done in public, no video.
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: The grant writing office is hers and the council told her to do a specific thing.
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: So David did Keith's scapegoat retain.
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: I cannot speak for Keith Gaskin, but what I can tell you is it never should have really come to this.
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: If I were in that position, I never would have brought it before the city council.
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: You know they're going to play games with it and in the end we potentially lose $250,000 as a result of it.
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: As a result of it the most peculiar thing about this in the aftermath of it, one of the councilmen Stephen Jones, I believe said that applying for this grant only to reject it later could only hurt the city's chances of landing other grants.
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: I highly doubt that the same bureaucrat gets more than one application from the same city.
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: I guess we'll get our listeners to comment on this.
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: I look forward to hearing, because it just blows my mind.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: Well, and moving on to our next topic, this is not the first time that the election season got heated.
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: In fact, two people who aren't even running against each other started in on each other on Facebook over this past weekend.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: They did so.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: You've got Leroy Brooks, district 5 County Supervisor, who is running for mayor, as a Democrat, and then you've got Joseph Mickens, who is trying to be reelected as the War II councilman, also as a Democrat.
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: They got in a bit of a spat A couple of videos on Facebook, some memes, a weird claim of assault in a public place that hasn't been substantiated.
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: So what do you think of it so far, david?
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: Well, to break it down for our listeners, it's kind of a three-part saga, if you will.
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: First, we've got Leroy's video where he claims that Mickens accosted him, threatened him, threatened him, yeah, etc.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: Etc.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: And in response we got the meme.
• 13:49
  Speaker 3: We'll get to that in a minute and lastly the video that joe mickens took at probst park I believe it was.
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: We got to break this down, but before we do, I just have to how appropriate and how saddening it is that our very first episode of this podcast has none other than a urination contest between the likes of our sitting vice mayor, gentleman from Ward 2, joe Mickens, and in the other corner, the sitting supervisor the longest standing supervisor, I will add, the candidate for Mayor, leroy Brooks.
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: Okay, looking at this, both of these leaders, I think, are in the wrong here, and I dare say to you, zach, that every single home in Lowndes County lost $50 in value as a result of this exchange.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: Well, I don't know about that, but it is certainly so.
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: All of this supposedly happened at a parks plan presentation at Trotter Convention Center.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: I was there.
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: So I was there at this meeting.
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: We were sitting beside each other and this was a meeting for the city and the county their feasibility study for parks and how they can work together in the future.
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: It was a really good meeting.
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: We get a few days later, mr Brooks drops a video where he says that you know, mickens threatened him at this meeting because he was mad about Leroy putting candidates up against him.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: Leroy says he did not put those candidates up against him but that he will not support Mickens and doesn't think Mickens should win.
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: Then you have the meme drop where Mickens compares Leroy Brooks to the character Stephen in Django in Chains, which is a villain character, a black villain character in that movie.
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: That is sort of the plot of it is slavery-based.
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: And then you have Mickens going to Probst Park and making a claim that at the Trotter, at the parks meeting, that Leroy grabs his arm, curses him out and the sheriff and another county official had to escort him out of the trotter.
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: So you know.
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: Boy, oh boy, yeah, so you know since then we've let bygones be bygones.
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: We're not going to press any charges.
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: We've kind of Mickens has kind of walked back the version of the story where you know it was as bad as he had first said it was.
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: Well, it's a lot to unpack.
• 16:44
  Speaker 3: But first you look at Leroy's video.
• 16:47
  Speaker 3: Leroy claims that Mickens accosted him.
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: Okay, accosted when I hear that word, I think of a bum, you know, just someone coming up to you asking for something.
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: But then he says he threatened him.
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: Now that heightens the situation.
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: Threatened is a vague word.
• 17:04
  Speaker 3: Did he threaten?
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: To do what?
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: To embarrass him, To change the direction of his nose by means of physical contact.
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: And then, interestingly, he also says it was almost a disruption.
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: Not a disruption, but almost a disruption.
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: Therefore, maybe not really a disruption, Therefore not a big deal.
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: It's very, very strange.
• 17:30
  Speaker 3: And then we have the meme.
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: That was a nasty meme and I didn't understand it at first.
• 17:39
  Speaker 3: Our listeners can look it up if they want to, but basically I had to go in there.
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: I've not seen this film.
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: I had to use Google Lens to kind of AI this thing to break it apart.
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: And Stephen is not a good character.
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: I mean, this was cutthroat, In fact I looked it up.
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: Samuel Jackson said of his character on Yahoo Entertainment, quote Stephen is the most reprehensible Negro in cinematic history, end quote.
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: So this was calibrated, this was cold.
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: And listen, I like both of these guys.
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: I'm going to call a ball when it's a ball.
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: This was clearly beneath the office of a council member.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: Well, and it also it brings race to the forefront of the campaign as a voting strategy, as a, you know, as a voting impetus, and you know, and I think that the campaign shouldn't be about that and this clearly was meant to incite black voters, specifically black voters, against voting for Leroy Brooks.
• 19:06
  Speaker 3: You mentioned race.
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: Why would you bring up Harry Sanders?
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: He brings up Harry Sanders and he bemoans he's trying to align Leroy's mayoral campaign with Harry Sanders, and Harry Sanders has a pretty nasty past in statements that he's made about race To our paper.
• 19:30
  Speaker 3: Well, there's no question, but to me it looks like he almost begrudges the I kid you, not $4,000 that he says that Harry Sanders donated to the campaign of Leroy Brooks, and so I'm looking at it.
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: Which I mean?
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: Then that'll come out in the wash when we get the campaign finance.
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: Well, the law is clear, he is within his rights to do that.
• 19:53
  Speaker 3: And so, basically, mickens is throwing the book at Leroy everything he has.
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: And look, I'm not here to say you should do this or you should do that.
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: But if I were in this position, if someone quote, unquote assaulted me, I would either file charges or just shut up about it.
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: Right Be done with it, and he didn't either he didn't, either.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: He didn't file charges and he talked a lot about it and it's something that I feel like you know I'm not in the mind of Joseph Mickens, but I feel like it was a poor play on his part and he probably regrets it on some level and I think it made him look a lot sillier than it did Leroy in this case.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: But it also showed the sort of gutter war where we're going to go into race.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: We are going to.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: You know this is Mickens very clearly with the meme in particular, he's very clearly labeling Leroy as an Uncle Tom or trying to, and he's trying to get that to stick and you know it's.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: It's kind of like.
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: It's kind of like what they say about juries in a courtroom One lawyer says something outlandish, the other lawyer objects and then the judge sustains the objection and looks at the jury and says you can't remember that?
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: You can't act like that was said but it's there, but it's already been said it's there, it's already been said and you can't.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: And, to be clear, mickens has endorsed Jones Stephen Jones to be mayor, not Leroy Brooks.
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: So they're at odds with one.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: They are at political odds with one another right now and I think there's more of, I think that there's more of this jump where last weekend came from.
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: Well, we've just got to elevate the conversation.
• 21:39
  Speaker 3: I am a decidedly anti-racist person and I happen to be of the persuasion of Morgan Freeman.
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: And that is to say, how do we stop this?
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: We cease talking about it.
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: Well, I think that there are definitely conversations surrounding race that need to be had, need to be had honestly.
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: This is not a conversation though this is a fight, it is ugly, and Columbus deserves better.
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: It's a tactic.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: Columbus deserves better than that tactic being thrown into the election conversation.
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: I totally agree with that.
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: Mickens meme is implying that the voters should be thinking about that.
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: The voters should be thinking about race as their number one issue and that they should be getting into the ditch and thinking about you know things on that level of you know who's an Uncle Tom and who's not.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: I feel like our candidates need to give more credit to the voters than that and I think that we should have more faith in the voters than that.
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: And elevating that conversation, as you say, does exactly that.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: It gives the voters the credit they deserve and it doesn't expect them or force them or try to coax them into devolving into that or try to coax them into devolving into that.
• 23:06
  Speaker 3: That muck and mire.
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's insulting to a lot of them, yeah, and I think they are ready to move on Right, and I think that if Mickens does not follow suit, he's going to end up with at least a runoff.
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: Well, that's true.
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: That's true.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: Moving into our last topic, we're going to take a look at the races.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: We've talked about some of them already, but let's start with the mayor's race.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: You've got Leroy, who's run as a Democrat.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: He's running against Ward 5 Councilman Stephen Jones in the Democratic primary.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: The two independents awaiting the winner of that primary in the general election are Darren Leach, who we talked about earlier, and Bill Strauss, who do you got Just right now?
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: I'm not talking about who do you think is going to win.
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: Who do you think has the edge, I guess right now, in these races right now in these races.
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: Well, just based on how Columbus has traditionally voted, obviously the Democrat winner is going to be the one to beat.
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: And right now Stephen Jones has really got his hands full, because I think Leroy Brooks brings in a bipartisan vote right now.
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: I think it's going to be an uphill battle for Stephen Jones, but I might be surprised by that one.
• 24:30
  Speaker 3: And then there'll be no primary, no runoff for the primary.
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: So that'll be done April 1st, It'll bring it to the general and then it'll be a three-way, at which point a plurality will win it.
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: You've got Strauss.
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: Leach, and the winner of the Democrats and a very small number of voters can actually decide the mayor's race, as we learned last go-round Keith Gaskin, who won with just 24 votes.
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: Right, take 24 more votes than the incumbent in that race.
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: To your point.
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: You know Leroy Brooks is courting the Republican vote.
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: He's courting the white establishment vote as sort of a candidate for everyone.
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: That's not turning his back on the Democratic vote I don't think that his campaign has but he is definitely going out of his way to court everyone and I think that that could make a difference.
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: I think on the other side of it now, and I want to say again, I have not seen where Stephen Jones has devolved into the identity politics campaigning.
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: Mickens was doing that as an endorser of Stephen.
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: I have not seen Stephen do that yet in any of his ads or his posts or anything like that Right, stephen Jones puts forth a very professional demeanor.
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: He does, he does, and he's got a lot of city experience too.
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: He's got a lot of experience in city government.
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: Policy beliefs aside, I think that goes a long way with voters Right now.
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: I'm going to be frank with you and I think that we have a problem with the optics of our city hall.
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: I get that many of those on city hall want to be of the people and by the people and therefore dress just like the people.
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: But some of these guys, I'm wondering, do you even own a collared shirt?
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: It's like every time I see them they're in a hoodie and I think to some extent that's fine.
• 26:33
  Speaker 3: But it's like Columbus is in terms of a Mississippi town.
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: We are a town of status.
• 26:40
  Speaker 3: This is not Knox a painter.
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: Okay, I just think some of these guys need to dress for the occasion and, to Stephen Jones's credit, he does that.
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: He does that, he does that and he takes this job very seriously and I think that on the whole, he's taken his job as a councilman seriously, has done a good job and has had some well-thought-out positions and if I was going to try to pick a winner right now between Leroy and Stephen, I couldn't.
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: I don't know who's going to win that.
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: I do think that the winner of that primary has the edge in the general election.
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: I think Leach has a lot of work to do on name recognition and maybe not necessarily credibility, because I don't think that he's distrusted.
• 27:25
  Speaker 3: But as we've talked about, I think Mickens helped him this week.
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: Well, maybe I think he did.
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: That may be true Unintentionally, but you know you've got Leach, who's got a lot of work to do on the name recognition side.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: Bill Strauss is a spoiler candidate and I think if he spoils anybody he's going to spoil Darren Leach.
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: I don't think he's going to take votes away from the Democratic winner.
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: I think if he is still in the race when ballots are cast in June, if Bill Strauss is still in the race, it's going to be to Darren Leach's detriment.
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: Well, let's look at the wards.
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: Look at Ward 1.
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: We know who two of these people are.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: We know, first of all a big sort of surprise for some people, open secret for others.
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: The mayor who is not going to, who's not running for re-election for mayor, is going to run against Ethel Stewart in Ward 1.
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: Keith Gaskin he was in Ward 5 before redistricting.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: Now he's in Ward 1.
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: He's going to challenge an incumbentin.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: He was in Ward 5 before redistricting.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: Now he's in Ward 1.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: He's going to challenge an incumbent.
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: He's running as an independent, so he'll be awaiting the Democratic primary winner.
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: But that Democratic primary is between incumbent Ethel Stewart and Democrat Tommy Smith.
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: Ethel Stewart's probably moving on to the general election.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: She has some firepower.
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: Okay, If you recall, she won her last election like 775 to 100, 120, something like that.
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: She won it by several hundred votes.
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: And so it's very interesting to look at what Keith Gaskin did for him to step into that race as something that just typically does not happen.
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: One could say that that speaks to the humility of his character.
• 29:10
  Speaker 3: He just wants to help the city.
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: He doesn't have to be absolutely in charge, but he feels like he could make a difference in this particular role.
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: I hope that his feelings don't get too hurt if he loses to Ethel Stewart for Ward 1.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: I think he might have had a better shot, seeking re-election for the job he's already got.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: So Keith may know something that I don't and he may think that things have shifted in his favor a little more, but I think that she might be the hardest council person to beat.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: So, shifting over to Ward 2, the aforementioned Joseph Mickens, the incumbent Democrat, he's running against Laisha Mishishi O'Neill and Roderick Smith in the Democratic primary.
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: There is no Republican, so the primary winner will take the seat.
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: Obviously, mickens is worried, or he wouldn't be making videos at Probst Park about Leroy Brooks.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: He's not even running against and he wouldn't be making videos at Probst Park about Leroy Brooks he's not even run against and he wouldn't be claiming that his two opponents didn't live in his ward.
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: Should he be worried?
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: He should be worried, particularly after posting that meme and particularly after that video.
• 30:19
  Speaker 3: I think at the very least he has earned himself a runoff.
• 30:23
  Speaker 3: Now I don't know Ms Shishi, I don't know Roderick Smith, but they gained bigly after that video and after that meme.
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: Well, I think the thing that is going to hurt Mickens the most is you might remember, late last year he came after the building official, kenny Weigel, in public pretty heavily Called him a liar, accused Kenny of calling Mickens a liar.
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: He did it in a public meeting and then followed him out to the lobby of the municipal complex and accosted him some more and later came back and apologized for that.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: It was very unpopular at the time.
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: I don't think that there was a city employee or a city official across the board that thought that that was a good idea or a good move, and I think that Miggins had to walk that back.
• 31:16
  Speaker 3: It's not a good look.
• 31:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's going to hurt him.
• 31:18
  Speaker 3: He calls it straight talk.
• 31:19
  Speaker 3: He actually calls it straight.
• 31:22
  Speaker 3: Talk without a chaser.
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: But you need a chaser with some of this stuff.
• 31:26
  Speaker 3: Yes, you do.
• 31:28
  Speaker 3: Yes, you do.
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: So moving on to Ward 3.
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: Ward 3 is unopposed.
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: Rusty Green, the Republican, congratulations on your reelection.
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: Ward 4, we've got four candidates in that ward.
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: The incumbent, independent, pierre Beard, is running against familiar faces in Democrat Marty Turner and Democrat Levine Harris, the former chairperson for the NAACP, and Turner being the former ward four councilman.
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: And then we've got a newcomer in Robert S Johnson IV, who's running as a Republican and he had a hard time deciding whether he was going to run or not.
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: He qualified, then he dropped out, then he qualified again.
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: What do you think here, dave?
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: So is.
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: Robert Johnson keeping the R beside his name.
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: He is.
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: He's running as a Republican.
• 32:19
  Speaker 3: Okay, well, I don't think in that particular ward and listen, I'm a Republican, but I don't think he has a snowball's chance.
• 32:28
  Speaker 3: What's going to be interesting to me is is does Ward 4 want to elect somebody that's going to really put a good brand out there for our city, or do they want to open up the Molotov cocktail and just throw it in there and let it burn?
• 32:46
  Speaker 3: Okay, we've got Pierre Beard.
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: Pierre, if you're listening, I love you, you're a great guy, you've got a good heart, but your record is a problem.
• 32:57
  Speaker 3: People are ready to move along from that, and if you lose it's your fault.
• 33:03
  Speaker 3: You've got to stop blaming folks every time the sheriff's office has to come to your house, and I think people are tired of that.
• 33:10
  Speaker 3: And Marty Turner I like him too, but he's old news.
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: I think LeVon Harris may hold the seat in council ward four when this is said and done.
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: That's a hot take.
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: That's a hot take.
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: I don't know who's going to win that Democratic primary, but I do believe that Pierre has enough support to right now he's the heavy favorite to go back in.
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: I think, obviously the law enforcement things have been an issue and should be and they should be something that voters should think about.
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: But you know, pierre has been a moderate voice on that council.
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: He's made some pretty good decisions on there and he's been the adult in the room a lot of times when nobody else was stepping up to do that.
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: That's going to be a fun race to watch, and as will Ward 5.
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: We're going to get a new Ward 5 councilman.
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, ward 5 and Ward 6, we're going to get new people.
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: Ward 5 and Ward 6, we're going to get new people.
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: We've got a five-candidate race in Ward 5.
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: Shaquayla Clark, democrat.
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: Cedric Fenster, democrat.
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: Gregory Gary Jefferson, democrat.
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: So they'll be running in the same primary.
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: Awaiting them will be the winner of the Republican primary in that war between Mary Jeter and Bob Raymond.
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: I'm going to tell you now, the Republicans in that war have an uphill battle.
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: I feel like that Democratic primary winner is going to be favored to take the seat.
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: I will be honest with you.
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: I don't really know enough about any of those candidates to say which one I think has the edge.
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: Right now.
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: I see more signs for Gary Jefferson, but signs don't vote.
• 34:51
  Speaker 3: What I can tell you about this race is that there will probably be I'm just guessing a runoff in the Democratic primary, and that's not a bad thing.
• 35:01
  Speaker 3: I kind of hate it.
• 35:02
  Speaker 3: Actually, speaking from experience here, I hate to see the resources of the election officials and city officials and have to go out and set things up just for one, shall we say, goofy race over here.
• 35:16
  Speaker 3: So we may see multiple runoffs in the city on April 15th.
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: Bob Raymond might have a good ground game.
• 35:26
  Speaker 3: It's just one of these things that is to be determined.
• 35:29
  Speaker 3: So, yes, I do believe that there potentially will be a runoff for the Democrats on April 15th for Ward 5.
• 35:38
  Speaker 3: Now on the Republican side, full disclosure.
• 35:42
  Speaker 3: I am chair of the county party and so I am, per the bylaw of the party, not supposed to put my hand on the scale where this goes.
• 35:51
  Speaker 3: But one interesting thing about this is, because it is a primary, it's going to be low turnout as far as the Republicans go.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: And that's especially true if Leroy Brooks is successful in the mayor's race in pulling Republican voters over to him.
• 36:09
  Speaker 3: That's it, right, that's it.
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: So, real quick, let's go over Ward 6.
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: We've got two Republicans there in Jason Spears and Kimberly McCarty Davis, and then an independent in Donald.
• 36:20
  Speaker 3: Pope.
• 36:21
  Speaker 3: Well, I look at this.
• 36:22
  Speaker 3: I know Jason Spears has been in the public sphere for a long time and his name is highly recognized, and name recognition typically gives a candidate favor.
• 36:35
  Speaker 3: And I frankly can't speak to the other two.
• 36:38
  Speaker 3: I don't know them that well.
• 36:40
  Speaker 3: I would like to get to know them know them Well.
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: Ms Davis is daughter of former Councilman Mack McCarty, so there's some name recognition there.
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: You know, donald Pope is an upstart independent.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: I think that your name recognition, your greatest name recognition, is going to be Jason Spears, and so I think that I think he has the edge and the others will have an uphill battle to beat.
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: I think he has the edge and the others will have an uphill battle to beat.
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: Opinions expressed on this show are those of the speakers and not necessarily those of the commercial dispatch.