With all of the filings received by the County Clerk’s office, the final list of the Board of Education and County Commission candidates are in.
Chris Gross filed to run for the Blackwater District position, and as covered previously, Cathy Hebb filed to run for the Shavers Fork District position.
Gross is opposed to Common Core. “It’s a curriculum that was enacted before it was finished being written,” Gross said.
Gross would also like to see a more vigorous vetting process of teachers by the board. “I’m not a yes man. I don’t mind standing up for stuff,” he said. Gross would also like to see the county schools follow the direction of the changing job market. “With technology, we are coming to a point of singularity, where you need to be versatile,” he said.
“I want to be more proactive. That’s the biggest reason I want to be in there,” he commented. Gross identifies as an Independent. “We have to find more common ground as Democrats and Republicans,” he said.
In addition to incumbent Diane Hinkle and Alan Kidwell, Fred Davis is running for the Blackwater District position of the County Commission. Davis filed as a Democrat, and commented that he is running, “For the people of Tucker County.”
“A lot of friends and people have asked me, ‘Won’t you run?’ because there are some things they think I’d be pretty good at and to give them a voice,” Davis said.
Davis held positions on the Thomas Parks and Recreation Board, the Thomas Community Center Board, and ran youth programs in the county for 35 years. “I get along with people and I always listen to people. I don’t go overboard with just what I think,” Davis said.
Focusing on vocational and trade programs is important to Davis. “I want to do that to help some young people out around here, because not everyone wants to go to college,” he said. He believes the industrial park owned by the Development Authority could be a location to house such programs.
Davis wants to address the concerns regarding the emergency services in the county through training and hiring additional personnel to improve response times and reduce the number of times a single unit is called out. “I want to open classes up for the EMT training, to get more people involved and hired, so they’re not called out seven times, and to get people on the scene quicker,” he said.
Hiring residents of Tucker County for county positions is important to Davis. “I would hire people from our county for the county jobs. I promise you, if I get in, you could get a county job for living in Tucker County.”
Broadband capability and drug abuse are issues of which Davis would like to receive public input. He would also like to create a park where the Battle of Corrick’s Ford took place.