Q&A with Dalton mayoral candidate David Pennington

Published 11:51 pm Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Editor’s note: This is the first of two sets of interviews The Daily Citizen is running with the final two candidates for mayor of Dalton. The second set of interviews will run on Sunday.



The Daily Citizen sat down recently for a series of one-on-one interviews with the two remaining candidates for mayor of Dalton, David Pennington and Chip Sellers. Those interviews took almost an hour combined. The runoff election will be held Dec. 4.

Following are excerpts from the interview with Advance Insurance Strategies managing director David Pennington.



TDC: Do you support capping or reducing the transfer fee Dalton Utilities pays to the city? If so, what spending would you cut or taxes would you raise to make up for the loss of revenue? Please be specific.



Pennington: No, I don’t agree with that. It has increased, I think, from $2 million in 1998 to I think they are projecting about $9 million this year. Most other communities do not receive a transfer fee from a utility anywhere near that size. What should have been done with that extra revenue is to reduce the property taxes.



TDC: Is that how you would like to use that money going forward?



Pennington: Yes.



TDC: Illegal immigration is an issue that many people are concerned about. How would you change city policy with regard to illegal immigration?



Pennington: I’m not real sure how to do that because that is really a federal issue as far as illegal immigration is concerned. That said, unfortunately the federal government does not have a lot of incentive to do anything because they are not having to pay the cost for it. The local governments who are having to pay the costs of that illegal immigration really have no authority over any enforcement actions that I know of.



TDC: Some citizens have expressed concern that local law enforcement are not cooperating as much as they can or using all of the powers available to them to combat illegal immigration. Do you share that concern?



Pennington: Me personally, I’ve seen no evidence of that.



TDC: Some cities have done things such as passing laws requiring landlords to verify the legal status of people they rent to. Do you support such measures?



Pennington: I’m well on record opposed to anything that puts anymore undue regulations on private businesses. We have enough of those here now.



TDC: Should the city halt its plans to install more red light cameras while it gathers more data on the one that has been installed at Waugh Street and Thornton Avenue?



Pennington: Yes.



TDC: Why?



Pennington: First of all, I was opposed to those cameras from day one, even before I ran for mayor.

Now, it has come out exactly what we thought that was really about, which was a revenue grab by the city. I was told by certain people that it was to prevent accidents. Now, it turns out that (Thornton and Waugh) is not even one of the top 20 accident heavy intersections in the city. So my question is if it was to prevent accidents, why did you put it on that particular intersection?

It’s also come out that over half the tickets being issued are for rolling stops making a right-hand turn. They were told by a consultant up front that’s what was going to happen, and they still went ahead with it, which proves it’s nothing but a revenue grab by the city, making this a more unlivable place for us to live.



TDC: Would you like to see the one on Thornton and Waugh removed?



Pennington: Yes.