KEVIN MORRISON
Not exactly a surprise announcement but Greene County Mayor Kevin Morrison made it official Monday, turning in his qualifying petition to the Election Commission and later in the evening telling the Greene County Republican Party he is seeking another four year term in office.
Mayor Morrison was first elected in 2018, reelected in 2022. He will be seeking his third term in office, saying the job is not yet done.
KEVIN MORRISON
As is required by the party by every candidate, Morrison made his financial contribution following the announcement. The money collected from the candidates is then used to support advertising for the primary winners in the general election.
MAYOR MORRISON FULL ANNOUNCEMENT
“I come before you as the incumbent county mayor to announce that today I submitted my petition and qualified for reelection.
We’ve got a lot of work left to do. We started a lot of good things. It was very refreshing to hear from each one of these county commission candidates to understand how important economic and community development is. This business right across the street (Food City) and the hundreds more around Greene County are the ones that are largely paying the freight. That business over there is a commercial business assessed at 40%. They’re providing the jobs, they’re providing the risk, and we, everyone in this room, for a long time, has assisted in keeping Greene County’s tax rate low.
In the first congressional district, we had the third lowest tax rate in the first congressional district. In the 20 counties of East Tennessee, we are still number three. And that’s largely because we make investments in economic and community development. Because the more jobs we have, the more businesses that we have paying taxes, the less that we pay residentially on our real property. That’s the reason, for instance, we made the investment in Snapps Ferry Road and that may pay off very big, very soon.
We have endured several major challenges. COVID in 2020, this incessant inflation that has raised our taxes, it has raised our grocery prices, it has raised our fuel process, it has raised our land prices, it has raised process of automobiles and everything else. That has caused a lot of people around the country to start looking for some place like Greene County. Previously, we were picking up three residents a day. And we were second in terms of growth two years ago, we were first last year, and I’m not sure where we will shake out this year. There’s two people coming to Greene County every day. And that puts tremendous pressure on our infrastructure that you heard some of these county commissioners talk about. Roads, bridges, water, sewer, broadband, services for EMS, solid waste.
I worked over the New Year’s holiday the Friday and the Saturday immediately following Christmas. Greene County took in four hundred tons of garbage. Five years ago that was 100. We made 15 tractor trailer trips to the landfill at Morristown both days and barely were able to stay ahead.
EMS is answering more calls than ever before. And we have shifted to a convalescent unit to try to run the paying calls, the Medicare, the Medicaid, the insurance calls, so that we have reserved advanced life saving trucks in the event of a motor vehicle accident, or house fire or other emergencies, heart attacks, and stroke.
We have survived the state’s largest, most costly natural disaster. That was big.
We started a lot of initiatives to try to keep our tax rate low. We have finally started addressing facility and infrastructure that hasn’t been touched in over 60 years.
We’ve got a lot of work to do with roads and bridges. Easterly Bridge still lays in the river today 16 months after the flood. There’s more roads to repair. There’s more people to help. And that’s why I’m running. to try to complete the mission and to complete the work that I started.
We have a tremendous team, by the way, your sheriff, all of these elected officials here, register of deeds, our state legislative delegation, our circuit court clerk, our trustee, a tremendous team. That’s the reason people are coming here. Because this is red, white, and blue, mom, apple pie, Chevrolet, hot dog baseball America. I’ve been around the world, and I’ve seen it. There’s no place like home. I would absolutely positively fight a bear for this place if I have to.
But I’m asking for your vote and your support, as I declare my candidacy for re election as your county mayor. And it has been the honor of my life. I have served with a lot of great people, but when I take my last breath, the honor of my life will be that I was the mayor of my community. And I hope I’ve done the job to earn your vote.
And with that, Mr. Chairman, I have a donation for you, sir, and the Republican Party, you guys have been so good to me. Thank you very much, sir.
MONDAY CANDIDATE QUALIFYING
Morrisons was one of two qualifying petitions Monday at the Election Commission Office.
The other was for Robin Quillen, who is seek reelection to her sixth term as third district County Commissioner, having been first elected in 2010.
