THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, April 30, 1996 TAG: 9604300303
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY PERRY PARKS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ELIZABETH CITY LENGTH: Long : 227 lines
DAVID BOSOMWORTH
Age: 64.
Home: Breezewood Drive, just south of the city limits.
Occupation: Retired from U.S. Coast Guard.
Education: Bachelor's degrees in political science and business administration, Kent State University, 1953. Master of business administration in industrial management, University of Michigan, 1954.
Memberships: Rotary, Albemarle Amateur Radio Society, Elizabeth City-Pasquotank County Airport Authority. Former member of Elizabeth City Council, United Way, Red Cross.
Family: Wife, Phyllis. Two children.
David Bosomworth liked working 30-hour weeks on the City Council so much that he wants another turn in government - this time as a Pasquotank County commissioner.
``I basically enjoyed what I did on City Council, found out that I enjoyed public service,'' says Bosomworth, who stepped down after one term on the council because he moved a stone's throw outside the city limits.
Bosomworth, who filed for the at-large commissioner seat just before the deadline, says he wanted to make sure incumbent Zee Lamb faced a contest .
``I feel like competition brings out the best in everybody,'' Bosomworth said.
``I had lots of encouragement from people in the community who wanted me to bring the same sense of hard work and integrity to the county board that I had brought to the City Council.''
So Bosomworth, a retired commanding officer at Elizabeth City's U.S. Coast Guard Air Station, made it a three-way Democratic primary for the at-large county seat.
The winner will face Republican Jerome Goldschmidt in November.
Bosomworth has focused his campaign on what he calls the ``three E's'': education, enterprise and enforcement. Building goodschools, providing good jobs and keeping people secure will help preserve family values in the community, he says.
By the year 2000, Bosomworth says, he expects a second high school to be built and mobile classrooms to be history. He also wants to push technology in the schools and explore more alternative settings for disruptive students.
Economic development, or enterprise, will require long-range planning that focuses on building the infrastructure to get and keep businesses, Bosomworth says.
``I'd like to have some sort of long-range plan about how we're going to address some of the needs,'' Bosomworth says. ``The benefits of living in northeastern North Carolina are kind of denied our younger population'' because they have to look outside the area for jobs.
``Economic development will help retain our young folks.''
Bosomworth also supports better regional coordination to fight crime.
``I'd like to see the drug task force be re-established,'' he says. ``Crime and violence doesn't stop at the city limits or at the county boundary. I think it's important that we devote some resources specifically to that problem.''
Law enforcement needs to keep pace with county growth, he says. And he thinks officials should explore establishing a permanent skeleton fire crew to supplement volunteer efforts.
A fourth ``E,'' Bosomworth adds, is efficiency, a search for ways to combine similar city and county services, such as planning and inspections. Bosomworth supported the city-county merger study that was killed last year.
``I've come out and said that merger is dead and I'm not going to resurrect it during my term,'' Bosomworth says. ``But I'm sorry the study wasn't allowed to come to completion.''
Bosomworth says he can use his experience with city government to help the city and county work together on the many issues that concern both boards. Serving on a government board is a lot of work, Bosomworth says. Because of the time commitment, he says it's easier for a retired person to do the job.
``There's so much stuff to digest and study and read that it's extremely difficult,'' he says.
``It takes awhile to get up to speed on those things.''
JAY GADDY
Age: 54.
Home: Crescent Drive, Elizabeth City.
Occupation: President, Gaddy Truck Sales Inc.
Education: Bachelor's degree from East Carolina University, graduate study at the College of William and Mary.
Military service: U.S. Marine Corps Reserves.
Memberships: Deacon, First Baptist Church; Elizabeth City Morning Rotary Club; past president, Pasquotank Ruritan Club; Mason; Eureka Lodge 317; 32-degree Scottish Rite Mason; Elizabeth City Shrine Club; Elizabeth City Area Chamber of Commerce; past board of directors, Elizabeth City Boys Club; past director, Jaycees.
Family: Wife, Anne. Two children.
Pasquotank County, says commissioner candidate Jay Gaddy, is the ``promised land.''
Gaddy says he saw enough of the place as a longtime John Deere salesman to know.
``I traveled all over the county, talking to farmers,'' Gaddy says. ``I know so many people in this county from having traveled it for 25 years.
``I know more people from more walks of life than any other candidate.''
Gaddy says he loves the Elizabeth City area because its people are so friendly. He has raised two children here and hopes his grandchildren are raised here as well.
``It's the greatest town on Earth,'' Gaddy says. ``I'm sold on it.''
Gaddy wants to apply his love for the area by serving on the county Board of Commissioners, with an eye toward making Pasquotank County as good as it can be.
As the only one of three Democratic primary candidates with no prior political experience, he says he's got a lot to learn if he gets elected.
``I'll study, study, study, try to learn as quick as possible and familiarize myself with the workings of the board,'' Gaddy says.``It certainly will be a learning process for a short while. . . . But I do know everyone on the Board of Commissioners, and I certainly feel I can work with this board as well as anyone can.''
One thing Gaddy says he knows for sure is that he won't support any tax increase for the county. Taxes are too big a burden on average folks already, Gaddy says.
``I'm out there every day,'' he says. ``These people are having a time out there trying to finance cars or come up with any money for anything, really.
``I'm saying that you can definitely look for other ways for income than taxes.''
Gaddy thinks the county should add another full-time inspector to its rolls. But he says any services the county takes on should be balanced with cuts somewhere else.
The commissioners have served the county well, Gaddy says.
``The board has a good reputation for making decisions. And they take action,'' he says. ``Being in business for so long, I make many, many decisions every day myself.
``I also know sometimes you don't make the right decision. But you learn so much and become much better when you make the wrong decision.''
Key issues the commissioners will have to wrestle with in the coming years include county growth, school construction and recycling, Gaddy says.
His main goals for a four-year term are to make the county safer, cleaner, prettier, friendlier and healthier.
``I would like to have a county where people are living together much better,'' Gaddy says. ``I would like to have a better environment, a more friendly environment where we're not as afraid of crime, or people are more comfortable about living around each other.
``I want to do a good job. I want them to be proud of me.''
Gaddy, a longtime salesman, prides himself on being able to work with people.
``When I die, I want to put on my epitaph: `Here lies Jay Gaddy. He told me a joke. It made me feel better,' '' Gaddy says. ``I love to see people smile.''
ZEE LAMB
Age: 37.
Home: Rivershore Road in Elizabeth City.
Occupation: Lawyer.
Education: Bachelor's degree from Duke University, 1980. Law degree from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1986. Also attended Duke's graduate school on public policy.
Memberships: Chairman, Pasquotank County Board of Commissioners; North Carolina Association of County Commissioners board of directors; National Association of Counties board of directors; Christ Episcopal Church; former director, Elizabeth City Area Chamber of Commerce; former director, Albemarle Manna; Girls Inc.; Pasquotank Arts Council; J.C. Sawyer PTA; Governor's Crime Commission; vice chairman, Albemarle District Jail Commission; Albemarle Criminal Justice Partnership.
Family: Wife, Nancy. Three children.
Zee Lamb, the only incumbent Pasquotank County commissioner facing challengers May 7, is running on his record.
``That's a record of progress,'' Lamb says, ``a record of moving Pasquotank County forward.''
The chairman of the county's Board of Commissioners, a representative on the National Association of County Commissioners and a member of half a dozen statewide boards, Lamb says he's a proven leader.
``It's an honor for me to have been a county commissioner for the last eight years,'' he says. ``I believe I have been part of a team that has truly made a difference in this county.
``But the job isn't finished.''
Chief among Lamb's accomplishments is helping the county overhaul its school buildings since 1988 - including finding financing for a second middle school that will be under construction soon.
``At the K-8 level, we've rebuilt the entire school system,'' says Lamb, who was part of a unanimous commission vote to borrow $23 million for school projects last year.
The next priority, Lamb says, is to make sure a new high school gets built. Lamb says he helped put the high school issue on the table, even when the county could have rested on its laurels after expanding in the K-8 grades. ``That's the easy way out,'' Lamb says. ``That doesn't solve the problem of having 1,600 students in a high school built for 1,200.
``We'll need help from the state. Our local funds have gone as far as they can.''
Lamb says he has also been a fiscally responsible commissioner.
``I'm interested in keeping taxes low,'' he says. ``For the last three years, we've kept the same tax rate. . . . We've made cuts when we needed to make cuts.
``One of my opponents,'' he says, referring to former City Councilman David P. Bosomworth, ``has voted for three straight tax increases.''
Bosomworth and businessman Jay Gaddy are both running against Lamb in the Democratic primary. The winner will face Republican Jerome H. Goldschmidt in November.
Lamb says one reason he is being so doggedly opposed is fallout from his vote to end a city-county merger study last fall. The study was killed in midstream by a county motion after a citizen panel had spent nearly two years looking into how the city and county governments could be combined.
The merger issue was one of the most contentious in recent memory. And Lamb says some merger supporters would rather see him out of office.
``It's the democratic process,'' Lamb says of the opposition. ``I realize I've been targeted by a small group of people with specific interests and hidden agendas. . . . I believe it's a result of me standing up for what the people believe in.''
Aside from his work on public education, Lamb says his accomplishments include helping bring a state prison and its 450 jobs into the county, and pushing to create the new city-county tourism board, which is responsible for aiming occupancy tax money directly at tourist activities.
Lamb also is involved in crime issues, locally and throughout the state. He says he supported a 20 percent increase in the sheriff's budget last year. He has testified on crime matters before both the state and U.S. senates.
``I'm an advocate,'' Lamb says. ``I am out front. I'm willing to take a public stand. I don't consider myself a follower.
``I believe I've been an effective commissioner. I don't just talk a good game. I get things done.''
Beyond providing leadership on the board, Lamb says his presence also helps put an underrepresented group in the spotlight - younger people. At 37, this lawyer is more than 10 years younger than the next-youngest commissioner. Most are older than 60.
``Young people need to be involved in government,'' Lamb says. ``Young people may not approach policy and politics the same way as others.
``People often say they want young people to be involved. And I'm that young person.''
Lamb says this will be his last race for the county commissioner's seat. He supports 12-year term limits.
KEYWORDS: PASQUOTANK COUNTY COMMISSIONER RACE CANDIDATE PRIMARY
ELECTION by CNB