Mayor and City Council hopefuls answer questions on podcast


Peterson: We brought into the community…close to a million dollars. It was good. As far as my first thoughts, look at Woodmen of the World…If they fall short on their budgetary outlook over the course of a year, by about 20, 25 thousand dollars, then the city and county are going to have to fill that void…I don’t think that the taxpayers should be put on the hook…Would I be supportive of public tax dollars being used again? No, I would not…We do need to take care of our own, but I just don’t see where more of the public tax dollars need to be spent in the same way it was.


Whittington: Well, I can remember when the proposal came about to build the Woodmen Center. There were a lot of folks upset that we were going to spend city dollars and tax money on a private entity like that…but when I look at the Lions Water Adventure Park and the fact it made almost a million dollars in the three months that it was open…Part of me says that it was somewhat luck, because I don’t think anybody expected the water park to take off like it did…we have to be mindful of the tax dollars…I would support that. It depends on what that enterprise is and does it bring revenue to the city…


5. Kinston hasn’t had professional baseball for two seasons. How important do you think it is for the city to get another professional team and would you vote to bring a minor league team back to Kinston?


Clark: Would I like to see one back? The answer is yes. I think we have a facility here that’s really high-quality that’s sitting there and not being used today. There’s still some avid baseball fans sitting here. I more than likely would vote to have a team come back here under the right conditions and getting the right kind of team, but the first thing is finding that network to get someone interested in coming back here…We need to spend our energy wisely, and if it’s a realistic chance of bringing baseball back, then yes. I think I would work hard to get it to come back and could probably be successful.



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