The Columbia County Young Republicans organization welcomed local candidates to meet prospective constituents in their monthly meeting Saturday evening, at Top Dawg Tavern on Washington Road.
The group meets to encourage Republicans under 40 to socialize, share common values and discuss community issues, explained CCYR marketing and events coordinator Hailey Etzel.
“We’re the next generation of the Republican Party,” Etzel said. “So we’re looking to kind of establish our presence, get active in our community and make a difference.”
Amid several public races leading up to the election primary in May, the March meeting was wider in scope than usual. Six Columbia County candidates for the seats on the Board of Education, Board of Commissioners and the coroner’s office attended the gathering for a chance to introduce themselves to voters.
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Each candidate was granted five minutes to give presentations, after which they fielded questions from the public selected by the CCYR and then from the audience.
Incumbent District 4 school board candidate Lee Ann Meyer emphasized some of the district’s initiatives over the past three years, such as the partnership with the Richmond County School District to establish the Junior Achievement Center for the CSRA, and the creation of CCBOE’s Academic Curriculum of Excellence (ACE).
“We all know that that our nation is in dire peril, there are places in our state that are in dire peril. I think in Columbia County we have it pretty good,” said Meyer. “But we need to keep it that way.”
Her opponent for the District 4 school board seat, Katie Allen, stressed the importance of establishing and enforcing policies to reflect educational criteria and parental oversight.
“You don’t just go talk to people and get elected, you hear their concerns, and bring [them] to the school board so that it can be discussed in an official way and then you make decisions,” said Allen. “Those decisions usually take the form of policies… Polices set standards and expectations of what we can expect with our school.”
In late 2022, Allen filed a lawsuit against the CCBOE, culminating in a superior court hearing in June of last year, arguing that the availability in schools of material with LGBTQ references violated parental rights.
The rights of parents to have access to information about instructional and reading materials for students was a salient issue in Allen’s presentation.
“Parents need to be able to look at everything the child is doing easily — because we’re busy — every step away from home,” she said. “And be able to identify where children are having issues or what they’re reading and what they’re doing.”
Philip Kent Jr., running to replace David Alalof in the school board’s District 1 seat, emphasized cooperation with fellow board members and administrators.
“It’s not like a state legislator, who can bring for the bill and say, ‘this is what I want to do’ and then ask for a vote on the floor and then all of a sudden get it done,” Kent said. “You’ve got to have the support from everybody in that board, and then come to your superintendent of schools and say, this is what we’d like to get done collaboratively,’ and we got to push for that direction.”
Kent, a managing partner with internet service provider Metro Fiber Systems, also expressed support for school choice, saying “competition is always a good thing” and that the Columbia County school system, ought not rest on its laurels.
“We have the most money… to do the most wonderful things for kids,” he said. “But if we’re not putting those funds and resources in the right direction, then what’s the point of having all this all this money over the private school?”
Veteran law enforcement officer Terry Norman, who officially announced his candidacy for Columbia County coroner last year, touted his aim to treat citizens with “Christian compassion.”
Norman also voiced his support for bringing a crime lab to Columbia County, noting that while the governor and GBI director would have more say than the coroner would in establishing a local crime lab, he would “love to be at the table when that conversation happens.”
“We are doing our community — Richmond County, Columbia County and surrounding counties — a disservice by not having a crime lab,” Norman said. “We will surpass Richmond County [in population] by 2030, so we will be the largest second largest area in Georgia, and we don’t have a crime lab. That’s not good.”
Board of Commissioners District 3 candidates Michael Carraway and Rickey Meredith completed the presentations for the night.
Carraway emphasized the need for infrastructure improvements, including supporting liquidated damages clauses to penalize contractors for delayed county projects, saying, “I will not run for reelection in four years if I can’t make a difference.”
Meredith said he intends to follow the lead of citizens’ in making decisions for the county, saying, “even though we’re all accountable, that doesn’t mean we have all the answers. You have the answers. Together we can make this work.”
Skyler Q. Andrews is a staff reporter for The Augusta Press. Reach him at skyler@theaugustapress.com.
