Hi all,

With Halloween right around the corner, it’s time to send a message before the Great Pumpkin rises on Halloween night!

Today, we give you the VOTE CONNIE pumpkin stencil. It’s fun; it’s easy; and it’s just the right way to cap off this year’s Town Board race.

Dave is the carver in our family, so here are his instructions:

1. Print the stencil (click here)—or free-hand it as Dave does in his easy-to-follow video in our Connie’s Morning Video’s section of this site!

2. Use some straight pins to anchor your stencil to your pumpkin.

3. The tip of your carving knife to gently trace the outline of the stencil onto your pumpkin.

4. Remove the stencil.

5. Follow the outlines you just created with the tip of your carving knife, and . . .

VOILA! You have one last, seasonally appropriate way to yard sign without a yard sign!

We need to remain committed to policies that fuel a vital community, even as the Town’s population grows. Design standards that connect neighborhoods and preserve open space promote growth that brings neighbors together, rather than isolating us. Town budgets that provide resources for public parks, arts, and programming give us reasons to come together. Community-based safety initiatives encourage and equip us to look out for one another. Well-managed growth lays a solid foundation on which to build community.

But the job of nurturing community doesn’t end there.

Our elected leaders must be just as adept at connecting people with diverse interests and viewpoints as our policies are at creating common space that draws us together. It’s the job of the Board to facilitate a dynamic community conversation that helps us articulate and pursue a shared civic vision. Where divisions emerge in that dialogue, our Board’s response must serve as a model for building consensus. When the dialogue inspires citizen to act in pursuit of the common good, our Board’s goal should be to remove obstacles to that action. Where questions arise in the conversation, our Board’s first instinct should be to widen the array of local talent, perspective, and experience at the table. When no clear answer emerges in the conversation, our Board’s responsibility is to step forward, weigh the options, commit to a direction, and give the community reason to follow.

Strong relationships are key. Servant leaders never stoke conflict; they double back and find a path to resolution.

(This post is excerpted from my responses to a series of candidate questions posed by Davidson’s online local news resource: News of Davidson. The full article appeared on that site on Friday, August 29, 2025 and can be reached here.)

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I will vote for the 1-cent sales tax because Mecklenburg County residents desperately need an adequate and sustainable public transportation system that puts fewer cars on the road, improves pedestrian safety, and encourages the use of alternate transportation, including bicycles, buses, and trains. Still, it bothers me that as a state we seem to want to build critical infrastructure through regressive taxes and privatization only. Shifting costs to the people who can least afford it is a short-term solution that in the end takes a toll on all of us.

Until we solve that inherent inequity, I think the Town should do all it can to acknowledge and respond to the impact of the sales tax burden on people with very low incomes. That’s where stronger partnership and collaboration with our local nonprofits can make a difference. We don’t need more programs. We need to use public resources to amplify existing services and make sure we’re reaching as many people in need as we can.

(This post is excerpted from my responses to a series of candidate questions posed by Davidson’s online local news resource: News of Davidson. The full article appeared on that site on Friday, August 29, 2025 and can be reached here.)

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We have an advantage in Davidson because our planning philosophy has centered on finding a balance between open space and development for decades. We’ve made tree canopy a priority. We’ve insisted that development plans preserve open spaces. We owe that framework to the foresight and resolve of past Town Boards. They knew that the closer our Town moved to build-out, the more pressure we’d face from competing claims on land use.

We’re extremely fortunate that engaged, forward-thinking citizens stepped up back then to launch the Davidson Lands Conservancy (DLC). They created an independent voice for open space and claimed a seat at the table on its behalf. Decades later, the expertise DLC offers our Town is invaluable for protecting the balance our ordinances try to strike between development and open space.

Just as importantly, DLC is helping Davidson raise a new generation of citizens who understand the broader value of open, natural spaces and the contribution green space makes to the quality of life we enjoy. DLC events, summer camps, and volunteer opportunities help land conservation come alive as a relevant issue.

My DLC Board service helped shape my understanding of the issue and informed the choices I made later as a planning board member and as Town Commissioner. Finding balance between the built environment and green space is a task that changes with the possibilities and constraints in every plan seeking approval. What doesn’t change is that the land needs a voice at the development table.

(This post is excerpted from my responses to a series of candidate questions posed by Davidson’s online local news resource: News of Davidson. The full article appeared on that site on Friday, August 29, 2025 and can be reached here.)

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We need to start first with a plan to keep what we build. So much of the focus is on building new—and that’s understandable, given how big the housing gap is. Still we’re looking past a critical lesson about affordability: it is extraordinarily difficult to maintain these builds 10-15 years in when home systems, appliances, and interiors begin to fail.

Funding for affordable housing tends to skip right over the question of how to keep it. Private investment, when it agrees to come to the table is temporary—typically 10-15 years before it demands market-rate returns, especially in a community as attractive as Davidson. Constrained public resources, in contrast, prioritize efficiency, rewarding volume over offering residents design and functionality the rest of us expect, including small dignities like private entrances, in-home washers and dryers, and the porches and stoops that connect us as neighbors.

Town-owned land is our citizens’ asset. We should use it to create affordable housing that we would choose as home for ourselves, our parents, or our children. We know affordable housing can be safe and attractive, but the job for Town resources doesn’t end there. We must commit to reinvesting public resources in it for the long haul. If it were sustainable through canny management of the meager cash flow generated by discounted rents or with homeowners’ incomes that barely keep pace with the cost of living, the market would have already closed the affordable housing gap.

(This post is excerpted from my responses to a series of candidate questions posed by Davidson’s online local news resource: News of Davidson. The full article appeared on that site on Friday, August 29, 2025 and can be reached here.)

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