New candidates enter races
Aragon, Cedartown and school board races are all contested for 2017; Rockmart incumbents are running without challengers.
The qualifying period is over, and this year residents in the cities and those voting for the school board race in Rockmart will get to see some political newcomers in the race, while at least two incumbents have decided they’re stepping down from their seats at year’s end.
The ballots are set for the 2017 municipal elections coming up in November, when residents in Aragon, Cedartown and Rockmart will head to the polls to decide on city council and city commission seats, along with a special election to officially fill a school board seat.
In the Board of Education race, the interim District 6 member Judy Wiggins will seek to keep her spot after being appointed to the job in replacing Hal Floyd, who stepped down from his seat to avoid an issue with nepotism rules.
Wiggins, a longtime educator and administrator in the Polk School District, comes into the role with 33 years of overall experience.
Prior to getting the seat on the school board, Wiggins had filled in as a interim principal at several schools in the Polk School District following her retirement.
She’ll face two challengers in the race in her temporary incumbency as a Rockmart-area school board member.
Chris Culver, a local business owner who lives in the district, decided he wanted to run for the board as a political newcomer. He said that with his own children and many nieces and nephews in the system, he’s well versed in the issues of the school board and seeks a chance to make an impact from the other side.
Also joining the race for school board this year is Carolyn Williams, who was the third and final candidate to enter the November special election. Municipal elections have also drawn political newcomers in Aragon, a trio of which are in the race along with a recent incumbent for seats.
Local landscaping business owner Kelsey Collum, who took over the seat for Duel Mitchell after his resignation at the beginning of the year, seeks to keep his seat on the Aragon City Council in the coming months.
Several others joined the race later in the week when incumbent council member Hunter Spinks announced on Facebook on Aug. 22 he wouldn’t seek re-election this year. Spinks was up for the seat formerly held by Kevin Prewitt, who left the city in June 2016 to move to Cartersville. He had previously sat on the council but decided not to run after his seat expired in 2015.
The trio new candidates who are vying for the seat held by Spinks through the end of 2017 and for one left open when Tammy Mulkey resigned from her council seat in May are Judson Fee, owner of Gracie Trucking Company, along with, Amy Causey and Linda Hilburn.
More will be forthcoming about their candidacy in the Sept. 6 edition. Meanwhile in municipal elections in Cedartown, one political newcomer has joined in the political campaign while a longtime commissioner will not be seeking a new term.
Jessica Payton, a neuromuscular therapist who owns Balanced Movement in Rome and lives in Cedartown, said that her goal in running for the City Commission is to both do her best to help move the mission of the current board forward into the future, and to help better inform citizens in the community how they can better achieve the changes they want to see in the city in the near term.
Joining her in the race are incumbents Matt Foster and Jordan Hubbard, both who qualified for their seats early in the week to retain their positions on the city commission. Foster, a Northside Elementary teacher and Hubbard, a local business owner and Rockmart High School dual enrollment history teacher, are both seeking second terms on the commission.
Also in the race for the at-large seats is Patrick McNally, who joined in late last week before qualifying ended.
McNally, who has run for the commission twice before and failed to get in office, is seeking his latest run for office as one longtime commissioner plans to end his term in 2017.
Incumbent Larry Odom, who in 2016 served as chair for the city commission, decided not to qualify for the coming election. The Standard Journal tried to contact Odom several times for comment but were unsuccessful in reaching him.
The set of council races in Rockmart meanwhile will go uncontested for the coming year, with no candidates deciding to step up against council members Lucille Harris, Joe Hederson and Sherman Ross on this year’s ballot.