Council candidate Denise Wood

Published 10:36 pm Saturday, September 29, 2007

Denise Wood says growing up with four brothers may have helped prepare her to be the only woman on the Dalton City Council.

Wood was the only person to qualify for the District 1 seat on the City Council for the Nov. 6 election. That seat is currently held by Bobby Grant, who is not seeking re-election.

New council members take office in January. Wood says she has been told she will be the first female City Council member in the city’s history.

“I’m excited. It’s important to have women represented, and it’s going to be a good thing to have a woman on the council,” she said.

Wood earned a bachelor’s degree from Indiana University in 1976.

“I was the only woman in most of my classes, or one of maybe two or three women in a class of 200 people,” she recalled.

She and her husband, the late Terry Q. Wood, first came to Dalton about 30 years ago. Terry Wood sold band uniforms, and the company he worked for wanted him closer to Tennessee.

“We chose Dalton because it was so pretty and convenient, close to Chattanooga and the interstate,” she said.

Wood has three children: Matthew, Heather Carpenter and her husband Eric, and Heidi.

Wood is the director of environmental compliance at Mohawk Industries, where she has worked for almost 10 years.

“We deal with air permitting, water permitting, wastewater permuting, waste permitting, recycling issues, and as far as my department at Mohawk, we approve every chemical used in all of the Mohawk locations,” she said.

Wood serves on the Dalton-Whitfield Regional Solid Waste Authority.

She says she “isn’t sure” about the privatization of any city services.

“But I do really think consolidating services with the county is a great idea. You’ll get more bang for the taxpayers’ buck,” she said.

Wood did not point to any particular departments.

Wood says she doesn’t yet know enough about the issues to say whether she favors changing the city charter to make sure the City Council has the final vote on selecting police and fire chiefs. She says she wants to discuss the issue with the city administrator and city attorney.

Wood says she plans to spend the next four months preparing to take office. She says she’ll be talking with city officials and attending City Council meetings and work sessions.

She says she has also asked for a copy of the city code and plans to go over it during the next few months.

Even though she faces no opposition in November, she says she plans to attend candidate forums and meet with voters to hear their views.

“Ward 1 is the most northerly part of Dalton and encompasses part of the Cleveland Highway and the Bypass. My neighbors and my Ward 1 fellow citizens have been talking more about roads than anything,” she said.

Wood said she supported the recently passed Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST) and believes the transportation plan it will fund will benefit the city.