Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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OPINION Less Crime, More Jobs by PAUL WILLIAMS My name is Paul Williams and I am running for mayor of Fayetteville, advocate property rights, lower taxes and simplified ordinances that you and I am asking for your vote. I am running to help to reduce crime, to and I can understand. Less taxes and simplified ordinances will lead to increase jobs and develop a road plan that will help relieve traffic congestion. investment in Fayetteville, which will create jobs. If I am elected mayor, I am proposing the following solutions on how to Regarding the recent issues between the City of Fayetteville and the make Fayetteville a thriving economic hub with more commerce and jobs. Public Works Commission, in my opinion, is it a money grab by the city These solutions will help increase our tax base without raising our tax rate of Fayetteville the same way they saw annexation. The more control the allowing more revenue for all other city expenditures. city gets over the Public Works Commission, the more our utilities will go Where Fayetteville is at the present time is not by accident when it comes up. My goals will be to encourage the Public Works Commission to use to our high crime rate and high unemployment rate. As demonstrated their extra reserve funds to expedite and speed up the completion of the Paul Williams by the last budget passed by the mayor and city council, additional police sewer installations of the previously annexed areas. Fayetteville City Council officers were funded last, not first. However, this is a continuation of past appoints board members to PWC. If elected mayor, I would support policies. Consistently, budget after budget, public safety has been used as an excuse to appointing someone from the recently annexed area such as Charles Ragan, who is raise taxes, which is why it is consistently underfunded and as a result, we have high currently runing for mayor, to the PWC board. crime due to having too few police officers. To quote the current mayor, "it plays better" And finally, I will ask the N.C. Department of Transportation to come to Fayetteville using the police as a reason to raise taxes. and update our roads master plan. I would request the city council to approve the new With reducing crime being the number one priority, I am proposing that we hire master plan as soon as possible. This will allow the state to begin the process of funding 100 more police officers. I will insist that we can pay for these new officers without a the roads on the master plan to relieve traffic congestion. Funding and construction will property-tax increase, but instead, hold all other spending in our budget to last year's take many years and needs to be done now for the next generation. level. This year's budget increased by $12 million over last year's budget; this will more Glensford Drive extension was planned approximately 50 years ago. Approximately than pay for the cost of hiring 100 police officers which is estimated to be $10 million. 13 years ago, I got it forwarded to the state for funding. As mayor, I would ask that In contrast, the current city manager recommended a 1.5 cents tax hike to apply for a our planning staff initiate rezoning from residential to commercial along the Glendford grant and hire 15 new police officers. Do you know what the other mayoral candidates extension. This will allow for the residents to sell their property for highest value if they are proposing to do to reduce crime? Are the other candidates proposing real solutions desire; it would also allow for job creation and expanding our tax base as a faster pace. or are they simply relying on others to come up with a plan? They are waiting for the This same process should be used along all our heavily travelled police chief who has said he is working in the constraints of the budget. He works for roads also allowing for more businesses and jobs at a faster pace the city manager who has already stated he cannot hire more police officers without a than we see now. Just because you have 40,000 cars a day in front tax increase. of your property, does not mean city council will approve rezoning. The past, and current mayor and city council have supported more regulations, In the past, it may have taxation, fees and fines on businesses, to include taking away property rights, all of had more to do with how PAUL WILLIAMS, Candidate for City which have a negative effect on job growth, leading to high unemployment. What they much you donated to their Council. COMMENTS? Editor@upandcominhave done in the past and what my opponents are proposing does not work. I will gweekly.com. campaign. How To Find Network ATMs... With over 28,000 locations, it cannot be hard to find, but here is how to locate a network ATM you can use for free! There are lots of ways... • Online - go to www.co-opfs.org and click on ATM locator at the top of the page. You can also find a link to this website on Bragg Mutual's Home Page (www.braggmutualfcu.com). • Text - you can text a city & state or a zip code to 692667 (my coop) to find the nearest locations. Your standard text messaging rates apply. • Telephone - you can call the network and you will be given information regarding the nearest locations to you. The phone number is 1-888-SITE-CO-OP. • GPS - you can download data into your GPS to help you locate network ATMS while you are on the road. • Mobile - download the FREE ATM Locator app from the iPhone App Store. Several Convenient Locations: 2917 Village Drive • Fayetteville, NC • 910-488-3515 219 N. Main Street • Spring Lake, NC • 910-436-1894 201 Hay St., Ste. 101C • Fayetteville, NC • 910-484-2379 Call BMFCU for more information at 910-222-1500 or go to www.BraggMutualFCU.com WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM OCTOBER 2-8, 2013 UCW 7