At the close of March, we initiated contact with all Paulding County candidates, extending an invitation for them to address common questions posed by the community. Enclosed are their unaltered responses to these inquiries, providing insight into their respective stances. While not all candidates opted to participate, we believe that understanding their viewpoints is pivotal in making informed decisions as constituents.
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Dean Schneider’s ANSWERS
1. Can you please introduce yourself and share a bit about your background? Hello, I am Dean Schneider was born and raised in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, which is right outside of Milwaukee. I have a Bachelor of Science degree from The University of Wisconsin in Construction Management in the Civil Engineering department. My wife Cathy and I have been married for 25 years, moved to Paulding County in 2005, and have raised 3 children here. Our youngest son Derek is currently a junior at North Paulding HS, our middle daughter Sydney is in college at Georgia Highlands and our oldest daughter Courtney recently graduated from KSU with a business entrepreneurship degree. My wife and I work for a company that provides laboratory equipment, casework, and fume hoods mostly for college and universities and other large facilities such as the GBI, CDC, etc. We are also part owners of a small business called Ultimate Tailgating that is located here in Paulding County. I am the youngest of 9 siblings and grew up working on my grandfather’s dairy farm in Wisconsin. I am a football fan and love the outdoors, fishing, and hunting.
2. What motivated you to run for the position of Post 4 Commissioner? Residential overdevelopment (especially the rental home subdivisions that are currently being developed) without our roads keeping up with the traffic, schools keeping up with the added students (both in teachers and classrooms), and sewer and water keeping up with the much needed retail, business, and industry that is desperately needed to offset our current tax base.
3. What is your stance on the development of rental communities in Paulding County? I worry about what these developments will look like in 10 years and I am not for them in my community.
4. What specific strategies do you propose to ease the strain of overcrowded schools in our district? Slow down the population growth. The school board and the commissioners are on the same team and have to help each other out with addressing the current school(s) needs. The school board needs some breathing room and we as a whole need to stop adding students at a lightning rate so that they can react accordingly to the current student population.
5. Given the shortage of law enforcement personnel, what strategies do you propose to address the lack of police presence and ensure public safety in Paulding County? Give them what they need and treat them like the heroes that they are. I have personally met with both candidates for Sheriff many times and agree with most (if not all) of their thoughts and ideas for our county as we move forward.
6. Balancing the needs of residents with development demands can be challenging. What approach will you take to achieve this balance? My balance will be heavily in favor of existing residents and taking care of their needs rather than potential new residents. Once we get things under control and more balanced, we can adjust and steadily move forward.
7. What measures will you implement to ensure growth and development occur responsibly? I will make sure that the roads, schools, police, fire, DFCS, etc. can handle the current situation and that future development is closely monitored so that we do not have to keep playing catch up in one area versus another. For now, residential development should slow or halt until our infrastructure has caught up. I would also favor local ownership over outside investments. I will be less likely to support a new development of rental homes compared with a new development of homes owned by Paulding County residents.
8. Could you outline your strategy for tackling traffic congestion and improving road infrastructure within our district? This question is geared more towards the DOT. However, it is interrelated insofar as the cause is exacerbated by overdevelopment. We can’t seem to build roads fast enough to keep up with the development of these large residential subdivisions.
9. How important do you consider preserving green spaces and natural areas within our community, and what steps will you take to uphold this? To me this is a quality-of-life issue. Not only does greenspace provide recreation for myself and our residents, but a community with greenspace will have higher property values than one without. A community with greenspace will have less congestion than one without. Paulding is beautiful in part because it’s maintained a rural feel. Let’s keep it that way.
10. How do you plan to engage with community members to gather feedback and address their concerns effectively? I have listed my email address on my campaign literature and flyers. I have no problem giving out my phone number and I will do my best to respond to emails within 24-48 hours. I cannot promise that we will always agree, but I can promise to listen with an open mind and respond accordingly (good or bad). Commissioners work for their constituents and should be fired if they ignore them. I will share my thoughts and tell people how I feel, vote as I have promised, and if the voters choose someone over me, I am OK with that. So far this has been a great experience for me with meeting so many people that feel the same as I do. I prefer face-to-face and one-on-one conversations and have had hundreds of such discussions since I started this process and I hope that this continues.
11. How do you plan to attract and retain young professionals and families in Paulding County, ensuring a vibrant and dynamic community for future generations? Perhaps the biggest draw is good schools and safe communities. If we lose this, we may never get it back. This again ties into how we are developing our community which leads to who we are attracting.
12. Can you provide examples of successful leadership experiences that demonstrate your ability to effectively manage complex issues and lead change in a community setting? Some of the past roles in my career have included managing an engineering department (30 plus engineers) for a very large manufacturing facility, VP of company, and Operations Manager for another company. Each of these positions throughout my career have presented many challenges and I can confidently say that have learned from each experience and successfully fulfilled the leadership roles as they were required and presented to me. For each company that I have worked for, I have left them in a better situation than when I started.
13. How do you perceive the current state of Paulding County, and what is your vision for the future of our community? Please outline specific goals and initiatives you would prioritize to realize this vision, considering factors such as economic development, infrastructure, education, public safety, and quality of life for residents. Our residential vs. commercial tax base is very lopsided. Paulding County currently relies on approximately 88% of its income from property tax. Compare that with Bartow County which only relies on 30%. I know this cannot change overnight, but my goal would be to move this in the opposite direction by promoting more retail, business, and industry into our county.
14. In what ways do you intend to support local businesses and foster economic growth within our district? We have already identified sites and areas of interest (Paulding County Airport and a business corridor) to attract businesses. Georgia’s Department of Economic Development is a great resource for this and we should tap into this wealth of knowledge and their ability to help. When possible and economically feasible we should reach out to and contract with local small businesses for our county’s needs. We spend millions of dollars on maintenance, repairs, vehicles, roads, and much more. Paulding businesses and residents should always be the first choice to be involved and invited to supply these services.
15. Transparency and accountability are essential in local government. What measures will you implement to ensure these principles are upheld? Putting commission meetings online is a good practice and good place to start, and I commend our current commissioners for doing that. I feel that the public needs to get plenty of advance notice if major or controversial issues are being discussed, and the voters must know of any direct or even indirect interest a commissioner may have on every issue. I would support a code of ethics requiring any commissioner who has done business with someone before the commission within the last 10 years to disclose that past relationship and abstain from the vote and discussion. For example, if you are a builder and you used to work with the person or business asking to rezone an area, you should announce the past relationship and abstain from that vote.
16. How will you ensure fair and equitable representation for all residents of the area? I will make myself available. I will keep my email open and make my phone number available to all. I will do my best to return every contact/call within 24-48 hours.
17. Could you outline your plan for maintaining stable property tax rates, especially in the face of economic fluctuations? We should create and maintain a reserve so that when property values fall (as they have in the past), we have some margin to work with. This means fiscal responsibility. I would say that our community needs a higher (better) ratio of commercial to residential and a better ratio of large homes to smaller. This will not change overnight, but at least this would be a move in the right direction.
18. How will you ensure tax dollars are utilized efficiently and effectively for the benefit of the community? Our neighbors in Polk County were recently successful in attracting a $344 million solar glass facility that will require up to 600 new positions. They had to spend tax dollars for the infrastructure improvements to make that happen, and the return on investment for that will be many times over. We should concentrate on the same endeavors. Our commissioners made a long-term investment in the Richland Creek Reservoir right here in our back yard, which will help to provide for our long-term water needs and provides an alternative to buying from outside the County. This also secured hundreds of acres of beautiful recreation land use for our residents. This is a win win and we need to make more of these types of decisions moving forward.
19. How do you plan to encourage economic growth and job creation to alleviate inflationary pressures on residents? See my response to Question 14. Sometimes we need to spend money short-term to make money long-term. I give our commissioners credit for attracting Costco to the Dallas Hwy location. We spent quite a lot of money to get that location ready and up to their needs, and this investment has already paid for itself. I will add that, in my opinion, the current administration in Washington DC is largely responsible for the inflation we all feel.
20. What steps will you take to ensure that public infrastructure, such as roads and utilities, keep pace with the demands of population growth and development? It’s easier (and less expensive) to limit growth than it is to pay for the infrastructure necessary for another housing development. So that’s priority number one. Commercial development produces more tax revenue and consumes less county resources than residential development, so let’s change the balance of commercial to residential for the better.
21. Additionally, we invite you to share any closing thoughts or insights you believe are important for the community to know. I love this county. It’s been very good to me and my family. I’ve never run for office before and am not attempting to be a polished candidate. I consider myself a concerned neighbor, a proud Paulding County resident, and a friend with zero higher political aspirations. I know not everyone will share my beliefs, and I respect that. I know that I will not get everyone’s vote, but I think that I can be a force for improving our community. No matter what the voters decide, I promise to support our nominee. Our differences as candidates are small compared to the differences which will exist between the Republican and the Democrat candidates. I hope I can earn your vote and thank you for considering me.
For further insight into Dean Schneider’s platform and initiatives, please visit his Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61556414198348 or email him at deanschneiderforpost4@gmail.com
