Steve Mensing, Editor
♦Recently local attorney and Spencer Alderman Jeff Morris was selected by the Rowan County Commissioners to serve on the new 21-member Economic Development Task Force (the EDT), along with three other nominees: Shawn Andrew Campeon, Tony Allen Ward and Janet L. Martin. The following interview was conducted by phone with Jeff Morris on Saturday afternoon.
Steve Mensing: Congratulations on being selected to serve on the Economic Development Task Force. You are a private business owner as an attorney. You worked for ten years as a Construction Supervisor for Food Lion, a Fortune 500 corporation prior to attending Wake Forest Law School where you earned your Juris Doctorate. You’ve practiced law in Rowan County for many years.
Why do you believe the commissioners selected you from the list of nominees?
Jeff Morris: I am honored to be selected to serve by the County on this Task Force. There were only five applicants, out of which four of us were chosen. I suspect the County Commissioners knew I would bring a unique view to the Task Force. We work in a “team” spirit to study options for economic growth in Rowan County from the perspective of people with business experience. At Food Lion, I was assigned to the Mid-Atlantic Region for seven years and to the Texas/Oklahoma/Louisiana region for three years. I was in charge of new store construction and remodels, ensuring contractors built our stores according to plans and specifications. On remodels, I worked with project estimators to perform cost effective design/build additions, while keeping our stores in full operation without any daytime closures. I am also a municipal lawyer for a couple of small regional municipalities, and am serving in my third consecutive term as an Alderman in the Town of Spencer, where I reside.
Steve Mensing: You possess the ideal background for the post, Jeff. What exactly is the purpose of the Task Force?
Jeff Morris: The Economic Development Task Force will have only four meetings this fall. We’ll all be working as part of a team, to come up with ideas and options that can be presented to elected officials, the economic development constituents, and other stakeholders.
Steve Mensing: Stakeholders? Stakeholders has taken on a new local meaning.
Jeff Morris: (Chuckling) I see stakeholders as fellow business owners, the unemployed, as well as high school and college students who face an uncertain economic future. Realizing that local government has a vital, yet limited, role in job development, their futures hinge on economic growth.
Steve Mensing: Okay. Your political party affiliation is with the Democratic Party. You produce a weekly radio program on http://www.the-cbe.org called “A Week In Politics”, in which you identify yourself as a moderate Democrat.
Jeff Morris: Yes–I do. But our County Commission is 100% Republican in composition. So please understand that my selection to the Economic Development Task Force is a far cry from a “political” decision.
Steve Mensing: I don’t doubt the wisdom of your selection by the county commissioners.
Jeff Morris: You know when I give my word to serve our county, I leave my politics at the door. I’ve discovered it’s still there when I leave the meeting room.
Steve Mensing: Often Democrats, are stereotyped as supportive of free-spending policies when it comes to the role of government. Is there anything you might say to blunt reservations that some may have with your Democratic affiliation?
Jeff Morris: Certainly. That’s directly related to my unique perspective as an elected member of a small town in the northern part of our County. While some business people may think it’s the role of government to buy and gift land and buildings to multimillion dollar corporations, as an elected official, I fully realize it’s neither within our local governments’ means, or desire, to go down a free-spending path. We all have limited means within our local governments, tempered by the taxpayers and voters who elect their leaders. As an appointee to a county task force, it’s not my role to lecture the county commissioners — or city councils — on a perceived need to spend our way to prosperity.
Steve Mensing: Sounds Reaganesque.
Jeff Morris: Stereotypes exist about my party. I learned over the past six years of service on the Spencer board that we must live within our means. Some times, the best thing a local government can do is to step out of the way. For instance, it used to take three or four months to open a business and have a storefront sign on it in the Town of Spencer. Then we encouraged some regulation roll-backs, and instead of having to appear before two or three town committees, most downtown businesses can come in, sit down with the Land Management Directors, and have an administratively issued permit in hand for the business and the sign in as little as two days. That’s my idea of promoting economic development. At least in Spencer. And we’ve seen great cooperation from staff, as well as a good response from new businesses.
Steve Mensings: That is good news. That really does transcend politics-as-usual.
Jeff Morris: Spencer is a special town, with a great elected board. We put aside our political affiliations and work together to do what we believe benefits Spencer the most.
Steve Mensing: After the commissioner’s meeting, where you were voted in, someone from Salisbury mentioned to me that Spencer should not have one of its elected officials serving on the County’s Economic Development task force. What’s your take on that concern?
Jeff Morris: I’m not the Town of Spencer’s nominee. I’m one of four Rowan County’s nominees to serve on the Task Force. I believe in the integrity of the EDC folks charged with bringing this group together, to work for the good of the county’s economic outlook. I am approaching my service on this task force with an open mind, and I intend to go into this thing without any suspicions, grievances, or axes to grind. Of course, I can’t control the concerns that other people may have. I have learned to be a peace-maker, a team-player, and a problem-solver. Give me a problem, and I’ll work with the other team players to find some options to solve it. There is no place for a territorial or adversarial position.
Steve Mensing: I greatly appreciate you taking the time for this interview. We would all like to see economic growth and jobs brought to the county. But all too often, we hear: “What’s good for Salisbury is good for Rowan County”, or “What’s good for Charlotte is good for Rowan County, if only we develop Smart Growth and Transportation Connectivity for our residents to get to work there”, or “We must spend more on education by supporting the Rowan-Salisbury Schools’ downtown Central Office Building.”
Jeff Morris: Indeed, you know me well enough to realize that your point is not lost on me. I am hopeful. But just trust that my hopefulness is a far cry from naïveté.
