CLARKSBURG, W.Va. — One of Clarksburg City Council’s three incumbent candidates said he has a simple message: there is no bigger issue in the city than a growing reliance on opioids.
“Either we beat this problem, or we lose our city,” Ryan Kennedy said Tuesday on “The Gary Bowden Show” on the AJR News Network.
Kennedy said every initiative that current and future council candidates want to undertake will depend entirely on how the city addresses the drug problem.
“If we don’t solve that problem, nothing else is going to matter,” he said. “All the other problems we have–whether it’s the run down houses, the crime, etc.–it all permeates from that center core of the drug problem.”
Kennedy, an attorney, father of four children, and Clarksburg native, said he noticed a stark difference in the city’s neighborhoods between his time growing up in Stealey and when he first returned to the city after college, military service, and several years of living and working in Pittsburgh.
“Unfortunately, much like other people, I couldn’t find a job locally right out of school,” he said. “So I took a job in Pittsburgh for a couple of years. First chance I got, I came back because this is my home. This is where I love.”
“[Stealey] was a very nice, safe neighborhood that I lived in at that time. Now I have to watch my kids when they are in my own front yard.”
A fiscal conservative, Kennedy said he is willing to commit more of the city’s budget to law enforcement and drug treatment and rehabilitation.
“During my first term, I’ve really been kind of a voice for fighting the drug problem, fiscal responsibility, and greater openness and transparency in government,” he said.
Since Kennedy joined City Council in 2013, public meetings can now be viewed on the internet.
The election is June 6. Early voting opened Wednesday. Kennedy was the sixth candidate to speak to “The Gary Bowden Show.” See our related stories below.
Previously Interviewed:
- Chuck Arnett (challenger)
- Tom Saunders (challenger)
- Margaret Bailey (challenger)
- Marshall Goff (challenger)
- Robert Kaplan (incumbent)
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