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| Councilman Troy Ephriam |
Political Beacon pre-election poll was right
Who will lead Prichard for the next four years? That’s the question that’s now on the minds of many. With a low voter turnout in Prichard, I thought with many people wanting change would have shown up at the polls in larger numbers. Maybe the change in the scheduled date caused the low voter turnout...who knows.
But at the end of the day, a frontrunner clearly emerged in the race to become Prichard next mayor for the next four years in Troy Ephriam. Ephriam serves on the City Council and has served as Council President.
Ephriam edged out Davis, 1,437 votes to 971 leaving the other three candidates with a decision to make, in whom they should throw their support behind. All of those candidates that are not in the run-off should be considering that move as you read this post. Because it is important on who becomes Prichard next mayor, all of those candidates promoted change for the better. So it will be interesting to see who they support moving forward.
Back
in August, the Political Beacon conducted my own polling for the election of
mayor in Prichard, and the results showed a close race between Ephriam and
Davis. Ephriam was leading in a tight race with 28 percent to Davis 26 percent,
however I had Harden in third place according to results. In Tuesday election
Campbell-Morris managed to get more of her supporters to the polls to come in third
place. Harden came in fourth place and Teresa Fox Bettis finish last as the
results showed in my pre-election poll.
With
Ephriam receiving the amount of support he did yesterday at the polls, and he
lead in all precincts clearly shows that the people is hungry for change.
It
bother me to see the mayor do an interview on TV last night and claim that the
people are demanding change now and that it is impossible. He also quoted that
it takes time. It’s been eight years Mayor Davis, and in those eight years
nothing has been produced for Prichard that’s productive besides FedEx, but the
shame ole politics that got Prichard into this current mess. Eight years is enough
time to make needed improvements much more could have been done for the city
and its residents. Change doesn’t happen overnight, but the attempt does.
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| Mayor Ron Davis |
The
people of Prichard want lower waters bills, jobs, businesses, and more tax
revenue to support the city. Everything is growing around Prichard including
Chickasaw, Saraland and Mobile. With Airbus coming to Mobile the neighboring
city, the City of Prichard has a prime opportunity to take advantage of
development and jobs in the city.
Reducing
the debt in Prichard, paying the bills on time, cleaning the communities,
clearing blighted properties, repairing and building infrastructure, recruiting
new businesses and jobs will help the city of Prichard. A plan for progress for
the next five years has to be put in place and the people of Prichard will need
to rally between their new elected officials to bring change. They too must hold
them accountable every step of the way.
Some city council
races are headed to a run-off election as well.
There
will be a runoff in District 1 between Lorenzo Martin and Herman Towner, in
District 2 between Earline Martin-Harris and Gwen Williams, in District 3
between Derrick Griffin and Alberta Young, and in District 4 between Donnell
Hunter and either Michael Cooley or George McCall, pending provisional ballots.
Ossia
Edwards defeated her two opponents in District 5, to keep her seat on the
Prichard city council.
A
run-off election will be held in the City of Prichard, Tuesday, October 9, 2012
from 7am-7pm.
