County commissioner candidates release unfiltered statements | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Welcome to Beaufort County Now's inaugural candidate statements, unfiltered edition. We begin by thanking those five candidates who are seeking their parties' nomination to run for Beaufort County commissioner in the November general election who timely submitted their entries. For the sake of fairness, we will hold open the proverbial door of this publication for the remaining four candidates to submit their entries, up until the weekend before the primary election day.

    A word of advice for these remaining candidates: Beaufort County Now's traffic is about 300 unique IP addresses per day. With routers so prevalent, that could mean more than 400 unique visitors per day and at an average of 15,400 hits per day, I believe that could be the case. What we are trying to express to these young politicians, and young politicians everywhere, one should never pass up an opportunity to broadcast your message. Not with this kind of traffic in a medium that rewards, by search engine indexing, articles that have age and unique content. Just a word of advice here about a new medium that is exponentially gaining popularity.

    Now for a bit of housekeeping: The submitted candidates are listed in alphabetical order. All remaining candidates who submit will be listed in the same manner.

Cindy Baldwin,  Republican
    I never expected to enter politics. I am a mother of 5 children, 3 boys and 2 girls ranging in age from 9 to 26 years old. My husband and I built our own residential construction / development company from the days of when my husband was a framer, and I worked as a marketing representative for IBM. I chose to leave IBM after 8 years because my focus needed to be on the children, and we made a conscious decision to make family our first priority. That was one of the hardest decisions I had to make, because at the time, you never quit IBM. IBM offered lifelong careers, benefits and education. Additionally, at the time I was earning twice the salary, which included health benefits and retirement. Owners of small business know that benefits such as these rarely exist.

Part of the family pictured here as our son John, returned from a 2 year mission in Chile.
    Together we built a one of the best luxury residential building companies in Raleigh, NC. Still we remained true to the family comes first. With that mind, we decided to move to Bath, NC. Because of the redistricting of schools in Wake County as well as gang activity, higher crime rates, traffic, and the negative impact that affluence can have on children, we uprooted our family two years ago to come to Beaufort County.

    We picked eastern N.C. because family is still a top priority with most in the area. The people are warm and loving. We received over 22 cakes and pies from the neighbors when we moved in. I cried when I went to my first PTA meeting and they opened the meeting with a prayer. We fell in love with the water and the historic nature of the town of Bath. We had plans to continue our business as a homebuilder and developer keeping the natural beauty of the town and surrounding area intact.

    The obstacles we encountered are the reason I am entering into politics. My eyes were opened as we experienced regulation after regulation that changed daily. We witnessed a masterful game of political maneuvering. We found that laws and regulations are only enforced when we don’t have “friends in high places.” And lastly we learned that small business owners suffered the most as more and more people took advantage of political system. I am the voice for small business owners all across our county so that you many continue to provide jobs to our families.

    With the realization that very few truly understand the constitution, and the role of government, I offer free classes on the constitution at my home every Tuesday night. My role is to educate everyone as to how inspired the constitution is, and how we need to demand that our elected officials maintain their oath to uphold this magnificent document. The government needs to fear the people, which will in turn keep them honest NOT the other way around with the people fearing the government. I will fight to keep Beaufort County as one of the last vestiges of strong Christian values that honors the constitution as well as the Bible.

Stan Deatherage,  Republican
     My political existence is completely at your whim, and I pray your whim is a bit on the serious side: That you understand the serious times that we have now engaged, that you recognize this is no time for political neophytes, who want to learn on the job. It is also the worst of times to place your bet on the pseudo insider, whose special interest handlers would have us remake our government to suit their special needs.

    In my nearly fourteen years as a county commissioner, I have stood as a bulwark against sweeping change "you can believe in," to the exclusion of the few for the benefit of the many; those folks who "pay the freight" in Beaufort County - the taxpayer. That has always been my directive as your conservative county commissioner: Will my actions benefit the many, or will they act as a detriment to the success, or as we have witnessed most recently, the survivability of the collective individual and their families?

    And in that one dilemma, there lies the fallibility of government, and therefore marks distinct differences between liberals, true conservatives and those who occupy the "squishy middle."

    Liberals, and those politicians who occupy that "squishy middle" will always try to discern how to accommodate their base of voters, to the exclusion of any set of principals in governing this county. This precept of doing "what the people want me to do," is an impossible supposition on these politicians part. They would be better served to have a determined set of principles borne from the one document they are sworn to defend by oath - the Constitution of the United States.

Commissioner Stan Deatherage teaches Civics 101 and the "Founding Principles" of the United States Constitution at Washington High School in 2005.
    The Founding Principles, inherent within this document, are not only the law of the land, they are the predominant ingredient of the governing tool box that aids any genuine politician. Sadly, in today's governing spheres: federal, state and local (Beaufort County), it is more about "Change you can believe in," rather staying true to the path set by "Our Founding Fathers," and I sincerely believe we have lost our way.

    This is why I challenge the efforts of the federal and state governments when they overstep their constitutional bounds. From a practical standpoint: Their stuff all flows downhill and we, here in Beaufort County, are the catch basin. Your county government, unlike the local overlay municipal governments, have to clean up their mess, as we provide the interface for the dispensation of their services. As the duly elected servant of this community, I have the proxy to bring discourse against these wrong-headed policies. Other people, however, do not feel this way.

    Recently at the Democrat County Convention, Party Chairman Alice Mills-Sadler commented, as reported by the Washington Daily News, on April 18, 2010, "Local Republicans don't want to talk about local issues, like economic development. They want to talk about D.C., I wasn't elected (Chairman Mills-Sadler served with me as a county commissioner in the mid 1990's) to promote or further advance their issues. I work for the people I serve."

    Our disagreement on the proper path of government could not be better defined than it was in her statement. Her unintended advice to me: Don't concern yourself with Washington, DC. The Democrats ruling from Washington, DC know what is best for us, and doing just fine. Deal with real "hot-button" issues like economic development. Do what the people want you to do.

    This is exactly how liberals, and those other disingenuous politicians from the "squishy middle" deal with their job. They will never attack the issues unless it benefits their self-serving special interests constituency, and then to add insult to injury, they sell to the gullible (those people who refuse to learn the founding principles) that their populist path is the way government is meant to be.

    Also, her using the economic development issue as an issue of high concern is quite ironic, due to the immutable fact that industry relocates to areas that have well managed local governments that keep their taxes low, and have good education system. The irony: liberals will always, without fail, spend your tax dollars to benefit their always needy constituents. Also, the liberals, who have been in charge of our state's education system for decades has all but wrecked its foundation, it teeters, and for many it has already fallen. With the liberals, who are enabled by those folks from the squishy middle, in charge: What profitable corporation, in their right mind, would want to relocate to a state, like North Carolina, that is set upon its present unshakable path?

    The liberal answer: Throw more tax payer funded incentives at the corporations, and maybe then we can compete with the better governed states.

    Am I, Stan Deatherage, the solution? No, but I am a piece of the solution. I am someone who governs by "Our Founding Principles," and most importantly, I realize that we are a Democratic Republic, and not a Democracy. Moreover, after nearly 14 years of service, I well realize what the public sector can do better than the private sector, and vice versa, and my summation is: The private sector wins by a very wide margin. It is my job, however, to enact policy, and engage our precious tax dollars, to wisely do what is within our government's essential purview, and stay out of the private sector's way, and allow it to operate as unencumbered as is prudent. I pray that I will continue to have the wisdom to know the difference. While I challenge myself to have the wisdom to know what is government's wise place in our lives, I will also continue to challenge other politicians to do so as well.

    That is my promise: I will continue, and I will never be deterred, but first, I need your help to continue as your advocate. Please give me your vote if you believe that I should continue to have your proxy to be your voice. If you want to know more about me, go to StanDeatherage.com or search the internet. Its all there; most of it true, some of it is not. But that's life, right?

    Please stand with me now, for these are serious times that befall us all. I will stay on as your county commissioner until I am finished, but, of course, that is up to you.

Tony (T.J.) Keech,  Republican
    Depending on how you know, me, I go by “Tony” or “TJ” (Tony, Jr.). I am a Beaufort County native, born in Washington and living off of the River Road area of Washington my entire life. I attended the public schools in Washington, graduating from Washington High School in 1997. I graduated from Beaufort Community College with an Associate’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering Drafting and Design Technology. I earned my Bachelor’s Degree in Criminal Justice Administration from Mount Olive College.


    I am a hard-working, family man. I have held county jobs such as a Real Property Appraiser with the Beaufort County Tax Office, Deputy Sheriff with Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office, and am currently employed as a Probation/Parole Officer II in Beaufort County. For the past three years, I have been employed part-time as a District Security Officer with the United States Marshals Service (Eastern District Office).

    I am married for going on 8 years, with a son who is not yet two years old. I enjoy spending time with my wife and son during my “non-work” hours. I attend Rosemary Church of Christ, am President of the newly Chartered Washington Evening Lions Club, and pride myself on investing time and resources into the county in which my child/children will grow up. To that end, I believe that Beaufort County must THRIVE, not just SURVIVE, if I and my family and future generations beyond those that are already living here, will have any chance of carrying our community forward and triumph over global competition.

    When elected as a Beaufort County Commissioner, I will help to improve the quality of life for residents both North and South of the river, NOT JUST WASHINGTON! So, how do I propose to do this? One strategy is to keep taxes as low as possible. Another is to work with county agencies to streamline services, cut unnecessary or wasteful spending and implement cost-saving methods of conducting business. A third strategy is to look into large turnover within departments of the county, addressing the problem so that Beaufort County can stop being a training ground for other counties and so that hundreds of thousands of Beaufort County tax dollars can be saved and reinvested more appropriately in community services and programs.

    As a Beaufort County Commissioner, I will collaborate with the Beaufort County School Board and agencies like the Beaufort/Hyde Partnership for Children in order to strategize methods of improving the educational experience for our children. It is imperative that Beaufort County increase its intellectual capital (starting with high quality, early childhood education opportunities all the way to increasing the number of students graduating from high school and college both with 2-year and 4-year degrees). It is necessary to have highly skilled and well educated individuals available to work in Beaufort County in order to sustain current business and industry and to bring additional job opportunities for these persons and those that depend on their income. Investing in our children’s education today, can keep our children in this community so that what we invest does not travel to other communities for their growth and prosperity.

Al Klemm,  Republican
    I am running for reelection as Beaufort County Commissioner. I have been very fortunate all my life. I spent 4 years serving my country in the U.S. Air Force. They provided me an excellent technical education. I continued my education after the Air Force and worked at the same time. I started as an electromechanical technician and worked my way up to corporate executive. I am 65 years old, in good health and feel that I have skills that benefit the community. I am a very dedicated, motivated, hard working person who wants to give back to the community. I presently do this as a volunteer and Beaufort County Commissioner. I want to continue serving the people of Beaufort County. It is an honor.


    To be successful as a Beaufort County Commissioner, I believe involvement in the community is important. Since my retirement in May of 2009, I have made Beaufort County Commissioner and volunteer into a full time job and love every minute of it. Some of my areas of involvement:

•  As chairman of the Beaufort County Economic Development Commission, I helped bring jobs to Beaufort County. As of April 12, 2010, 625 Jobs were brought to Beaufort County through the efforts of the Economic Development Commission. Without those jobs, the unemployment rate in Beaufort County would be three percentage points higher and future opportunity reduced.

•  Beaufort County Workforce Partnership member – Coalition of Beaufort County Public Schools, Beaufort County Community College, Economic Development, local providers, business & industry working to enhance opportunity for Beaufort County Citizens. Applicants outside the county presently fill several of the higher skilled jobs; we are working hard to ensure that the citizens of Beaufort County have the skills to fill the jobs.

•  Committee of 100 Board member and member of several committees – the Committee of 100 is the nonprofit arm of the EDC. Its function is to raise money to help fund economic development.

•  NC 20 Board Member – Coalition of 20 eastern North Carolina counties addresses common issues such as insurance rates, environmental regulation and highway construction.

•  Mideast RC & D Board Member (Resource, Conservation and Development)

•  Washington-Beaufort County Chamber of Commerce member

•  Volunteer work for Beaufort County Schools and the City of Washington

•  Vice President, Tranters Run Community Association

    Four key issues of importance to the citizens of Beaufort County are jobs, education, crime and the tax rate. We need more and better jobs in Beaufort County. We must increase the quality of education, increase the graduation rate and teach the skills required to those not going to college. When there is opportunity and jobs, crime falls. A community that has opportunity grows and the tax base expands. This helps keep taxes low and improves the quality of life. I will continue to focus on all four if reelected.

Sonya Shamseldin,  Democrat
    One of the main reasons I entered the race for a seat on the Beaufort County Board of Commissioners is because citizens who live outside the city limits of Washington are not having their interests represented. I want to represent these voices that are never heard. Beginning with our seniors, our citizens that are trying to make ends meets and the future generations. Even our Commissioners own voices tend to be lost due to the fact that they never openly discuss in session their views with the public.


    Beaufort County citizens are people of character and strong values. They work hard to make their lives, the lives of their children and life in their communities better. We need commissioners dedicated to work with them. We have candidates who promise jobs, roads and other benefits but the reality is that no one commissioner can do these things by themselves.

    People ask “how are you qualified for this office”? Just to start, I own property, two small businesses and raising four children in this County. I have taken that “great idea” and developed it into something viable. I know how to manage the Company’s finances so the next inventory can be bought and the bills paid. I’m already steeped in the community from school activities to the various organizations and boards that I serve. I currently serve as the Chair for the Beaufort County Department of Social Services Board of Directors and the Town of Belhaven’s Recreation Advisory Commission. I’m known to be straight forward, motivated, fair and always check my facts before making decisions. I have approached the Board of Commissioners at various times as a private citizen regarding issues that I thought needed to be addressed. The results were always positive.

    One of my favorite quotes is from Abraham Lincoln “Don’t worry if you are not recognized but strive to be worthy of recognition.” This is how I try to live my life to do the things that need to be done without worrying about getting the credit. I live within my means and will take these concepts to the Board of Commissioners when I’m elected.

    I’m asking for your vote on May 4, 2010 for Beaufort County Commissioner. Thank you