GFWC Belpre Women’s Club hosts Meet the Candidates Night
The GFWC Belpre Women’s Club held a “Meet the Candidates” event at the Belpre Elementary School gymnasium Tuesday night. From left are Susan Abdella, Romel “Boo” Henderson, Floyd Alan Millhone, Jim Nelson, William Locke, Erica Campbell, Richard Seebaugh, Lindsey Dennis, John Ambrozy, Dave Ferguson, Nathaniel Godfrey, Mike Lorentz, Penne Riffle, Larry Lorentz, Frank Meredith IV and Cathy O’ Donnell. (Photo by Gretchen Dowler)
Richard Seebaugh introduces himself during the GFWC Belpre Woman’s Club “Meet the Candidates” event. (Photo by Gretchen Dowler)
Belpre Mayor Mike Lorentz answers a question during the Q&A session of the GFWC Belpre Woman’s Club “Meet the Candidates” event. (Photo by Gretchen Dowler)
The GFWC Belpre Women’s Club held a “Meet the Candidates” event at the Belpre Elementary School gymnasium Tuesday night. From left are Susan Abdella, Romel “Boo” Henderson, Floyd Alan Millhone, Jim Nelson, William Locke, Erica Campbell, Richard Seebaugh, Lindsey Dennis, John Ambrozy, Dave Ferguson, Nathaniel Godfrey, Mike Lorentz, Penne Riffle, Larry Lorentz, Frank Meredith IV and Cathy O’ Donnell. (Photo by Gretchen Dowler)
Richard Seebaugh introduces himself during the GFWC Belpre Woman’s Club “Meet the Candidates” event. (Photo by Gretchen Dowler)
Belpre Mayor Mike Lorentz answers a question during the Q&A session of the GFWC Belpre Woman’s Club “Meet the Candidates” event. (Photo by Gretchen Dowler)
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BELPRE -- The GFWC Belpre Woman's Club held a "Meet the Candidates" event at the Belpre Elementary School gymnasium Tuesday night.
The event was open to the public and was an opportunity for candidates for Belpre City government to meet local constituents. The event forum allowed approximately three minutes for each candidate to state who they are, what office they are seeking, and gave them an opportunity to let the citizens of Belpre know why they are seeking public office.
"I want to work towards teamwork collaboration and work with city employees on projects and needs such as water lines and ordinances," said mayoral candidate Susan Abdella. "Certain projects that I also want to improve upon are the parks and senior center as well as focus on tourism and keeping within Belpre's family friendly values."
"Belpre needs to help seniors and youth as well as more businesses," mayoral candidate Romel "Boo" Henderson said. "We need to have a positive impact on the community and we need to use grant money instead of people's money."
"The mayor's salary is roughly $79,000 and I intend to run on half of that," said mayoral candidate Floyd Alan Millhone. "I plan on donating the rest of that money back into the community. I want to represent everybody."
"Community involvement, excitement, honesty and integrity is what the city of Belpre should be about," mayoral candidate Jim Nelson said. "This is your city, it's about what you want for Belpre. Excellent community, excellent people."
Other candidates, such as First through Fourth Ward and At-Large council seat candidates, some running unopposed, as well as Belpre City Schools Board of Education candidates continued introducing themselves as well as their causes that they are running for. Some issues included in their answers were infrastructure, economic growth, land development, communication between the mayor and council, safety service director, housing and employment.
Following individual introductions and statements, a Q&A session was held. Questions were submitted in writing. The moderator was Roger Sheppard, former vice president and general manager of WTAP-TV. Helping to facilitate that segment were members of the GFWC Belpre Woman's Club.
Sheppard, with the help of a few members of the GFWC Belpre Woman's Club, explained earlier before the start of the event that it was not meant to be a debate and simply just to get to know the candidates on the Belpre November ballot. They also explained what a write-in candidate meant for the ballot, as some of the candidates at the event were write-ins.
Questions asked of the candidates included how finance pertained to the city of Belpre, how the Belpre City School Board of Education candidates felt about the school levy, what it meant for the city of Belpre to develop more commercial property, zoning issues, issues pertaining the senior citizen center and the Belpre City pool, what to do about police officer shortages, how to efficiently answer questions asked of the Board of Education and how to keep communication open between the mayor and city council.
"The biggest problems that I believe we have right now are business, infrastructure and sewage," said Nelson of the question "what is Belpre's biggest problem and how are you going to fix it?"
"We need a bigger budget," Millhone said. "We need to be able to get ahold of those funds and bring them in in order to use them. We also need a sewer plan."
"The biggest problem is the mayor and council working together," said Henderson. "As well as creating activities for the kids such as the city pool, every city around us has developed a city pool for their community."
"I see our problems as two-fold," Abdella said. "Infrastructure, we need a plan before we can ask for state help, and then the problem of us being a landlocked city."
Candidates were welcomed to stay and meet with constituents personally at the close of the event. The "Meet the Candidates" event was broadcast via livestream with MOV2Go.