Hometown Hero: Life-Long Local Ted Godwin Discusses 12 Years Serving Johnston County

What were you wanting to do when you ran for county commissioner? Well, it was two primary things. One was trash, solid waste. I felt the system was broken. We had a decal system. I called it the restricted access to where you need to put your trash. Right? And I wanted to change that system and it is changing now. Finally it’s taken me all this time. I was on the short end of a couple of six to one boats, but kept plodding away. And I think people have realized that we need to fix it. The other thing was just fiscal responsibility. I’ve always been little to the right of Jesse Helms, some have accused me, but I’m very conservative. I’ve always wanted to save taxpayers money, but I understand the county’s growing. We’ve got to provide services. People expect those services, but I’d like to see it done, in a way that’s not a waste of taxpayers money, too often when somebody’s not spending their own money they get a little overboard.

 Welcome to another episode of Best of Johnston County, brought to you by Breeden Law Office.  Our host, Jonathan Breeden, an experienced family lawyer with a deep connection to the community, is ready to take you on a journey through the area that he has called home for over 20 years. Whether it’s a deep dive into the love locals have for the county or unraveling the complexities of family law,  Best of Johnston County presents an authentic slice of this unique community.

[00:00:00] Jonathan Breeden: Are you ready? All right. Three, two, one. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Best of Johnston County Podcast. I’m your host, Jonathan Breeden, and today we have a special guest with us, County Commissioner Ted Godwin. Welcome, Ted.

[00:00:17] Ted Godwin: Glad to be here Jonathan.

[00:00:19] Jonathan Breeden: Golly, we’ve known each other for basically the whole 23 years I’ve been living here in Johnston County. You live in Johnston County a lot longer than that, but you were one of you and you particularly your wife or one of some of the first people I met when I came here many years ago, she was working at, and it was sort of my banker who helped me get a lot of this stuff set up out here at 4042 when I came here in October of 2000 and met you shortly thereafter. And I think you were in banking as well.

[00:00:46] Ted Godwin: That’s right.

[00:00:46] Jonathan Breeden: Long before you got into being the politics of it. So I guess for some of our listeners who a lot of people that listen to this are new to Johnston County. It might not know. Thank you, Ted Godwin, everything you do. Just tell me where are you from? Where’d you grow up? Just sort of a [00:01:00] biographical background.

[00:01:01] Ted Godwin: I was born and raised in Johnston County and the Glendale community over near Kinley, went to high school, the old Glendale High School, it consolidated. We were the first consolidation in 1965. I was a junior at North Johnston, second graduating class, went to NC state. Didn’t quite finish the degree because Uncle Sam was interested in me. Okay. So I spent some time in the military. Came back, went to school in engineering, but wound up going into banking and was a banker for 42 years.

[00:01:26] Jonathan Breeden: Man, you were with KS bank?

[00:01:29] Ted Godwin: I started out with First Union Wilson. From there I got moved to Southern Pines, that’s where I met Donna.

[00:01:34] Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

[00:01:34] Ted Godwin: From there to New Bern and then back here almost 30 years ago.

[00:01:37] Jonathan Breeden: Oh my goodness. How about that? So, and then y’all had some children?

[00:01:41] Ted Godwin: Yeah, we’ve got three boys. Right. And they’re all grown.

[00:01:44] Jonathan Breeden: They’re all grown now.

[00:01:45] Ted Godwin: Four, five grandkids.

[00:01:46] Jonathan Breeden: Oh my goodness. Do your boys still live in Johnston County?

[00:01:49] Ted Godwin: Yes. One of them has already graduated, he’s a dentist, he’s living in the western part of the state.

[00:01:53] Jonathan Breeden: Oh, cool.

[00:01:53] Ted Godwin: My granddaughter has just graduated from East Carolina. The little boys, I call them they’re two eighth graders and a [00:02:00] sixth grader and one’s at the innovation Academy and the other two at North Johnston middle.

[00:02:03] Jonathan Breeden: Okay. So you still have a lot of skin in the game with your grandchildren in the public schools in Johnston.

[00:02:09] Ted Godwin: I even pulled the chains at the middle school football game this year.

[00:02:12] Jonathan Breeden: Oh, I tell you what that’s awesome. So, I guess when did you decide, I mean, I guess before you became a commissioner, you were pretty involved in varying community activities. You and I did some volunteer work together. What were some of those things you did, you know, before we get into when you actually became a commissioner?

[00:02:28] Ted Godwin: Well, I’ve always been involved, my Dad was involved in community development years ago back in the 50″s and 60:s. They started Boy Scout troop and little league, that sort of thing.

[00:02:37] But I guess it’s in my blood. But I’ve always been involved in local civic clubs of Kiwanis or Rotary. I was a Rotarian for over 30 years and near the end of my banking career, my boss, man, and a couple of important people I thought here in Johnston County urged me to run for commissioner. And there were several issues on my plate that I wanted to address. And I did, I ran and got soundly [00:03:00] defeated that first year.

[00:03:01] Jonathan Breeden: Yeah. When was that?

[00:03:02] Ted Godwin: That was in 2008.

[00:03:04] Jonathan Breeden: 2008. Right. I remember that campaign and.

[00:03:06] Ted Godwin: I was running against an incumbent and he was a good guy and I had no, nothing against him, but we were in the same district and. So I ran and got defeated, but I got my feet wet and got to know a little bit about what was going on.

[00:03:17] And so I ran under unopposed in 2012 and I did have opposition in 16 and 20. Thought I would hang it up, but there’s still some things I need to see through.

[00:03:29] Jonathan Breeden: Right. Cause I mean, you’ve been on there now. I mean, this is your 12th year as a Commissioner. You’re coming to the end of your third, four year term. And I know you filed for re-election. There’s going to be a primary on March the 5th of 2024 in just a few weeks. This primary is gonna be coming up and you’re gonna be asking for the voters to give you another four year term. And there’s no democrat in the race. So the winner of the primary is going to win the race, and that’s how it is often in Johnston County with local elections.

[00:03:59] And I [00:04:00] don’t know if that’s good or bad, but that’s just where it is right now in Johnston County, and we’ll let the listeners decide whether they think that’s a good thing or a bad thing. But unfortunately we don’t have two parties in this county that are very active.

[00:04:13] So the primaries is where it’s at, but you know, people have different opinions even within the Republican party as to what should happen. So, what were those things you wanted to do when you first run in 2008? I remember, cause I remember you working on the campaign. I talked to you during that campaign, but just tell the people that weren’t here then.

[00:04:29] What were you wanting to do when you ran for county commissioner?

[00:04:32] Ted Godwin: Well, it was two primary things. One was trash, solid waste. I felt the system was broken. We had a decal system. I called it the restricted access to where you need to put your trash. Right? And I wanted to change that system and it is changing now.

[00:04:46] Finally it’s taken me all this time. I was on the short end of a couple of six to one boats, but kept plodding away. And I think people have realized that we need to fix it.

[00:04:55] The other thing was just fiscal responsibility. I’ve always been little to the right of Jesse [00:05:00] Helms, some have accused me, but I’m very conservative.

[00:05:03] I’ve always wanted to save taxpayers money, but I understand the county’s growing. We’ve got to provide services. People expect those services, but I’d like to see it done. In a way that’s not a waste of taxpayers money, too often when somebody’s not spending their own money they get a little overboard,

[00:05:17] Jonathan Breeden: Right? No, you’re right about that. And I so tell the listeners a little about how the new trash decal system is going to work. I went to the solid waste site on barber mill the other day and I didn’t have a decal and I had some old picture frames and they’re like, you’re going to have to go to the dump itself because you don’t have a decal.

[00:05:35] And that doesn’t qualify as recycling here. So I drove to Smithfield to the dump and put the picture frames into the, being at the dump. And and they didn’t even charge me the $5.00, which was very nice of the lady at the dump. She’s like, you got three picture frames, I’ll let you just do it.

[00:05:54] Ted Godwin: That’s very inefficient. We need to do better than that. In other counties I had seen where my son when he was in [00:06:00] college in Pitt County they didn’t have the restricted access. And I have land in another county in the western part of the state, and it’s just a line item on my tax bill. Right. And I thought, well, that’s maybe the best way to do it.

[00:06:11] I equate it to education. I’ve had kids in the school system, I don’t have any now. But I still pay taxes. That’s the biggest part of my tax dollars for education. The county is better off to have a good education system. I think the county is better off to have a good trash system. And people say well, I live in town.

[00:06:29] They’ll, we haven’t worked out the details yet, but the people in town won’t pay the same thing that I’ll pay out in the county. And the other thing is people that pay to have someone pick up their trash.

[00:06:41] They don’t use the convenience side, so it’s non issue, but that’s like sending your kid to private school, it’s your option. You still gotta pay your taxes even when you do that.

[00:06:49] Jonathan Breeden: Correct. Well, and I have Anchor Disposal, which is a good Johnston County based business right out here. They’re based right here at 4042, they pick up the trash at my house. I know there are [00:07:00] other plenty of private trash haulers out here as well.

[00:07:04] So, but my understanding is the convenience sites are going to be open to everybody. And what is the go live date on that?

[00:07:11] Ted Godwin: We’re not sure on that.

[00:07:12] Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

[00:07:13] Ted Godwin: Well, I’ll take that back after July 1, there won’t be any decals.

[00:07:18] Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

[00:07:18] Ted Godwin: You might say that’s the go live date.

[00:07:20] Jonathan Breeden: Okay. All right.

[00:07:21] Ted Godwin: And obviously when more people are bringing trash, someone raised the question one time. It says, well, you’re going to get a lot more trashed in. I said, wow, right about that. That’s what we want, we want the trash where it belongs.

[00:07:32] Jonathan Breeden: Correct.

[00:07:32] Ted Godwin: And we’ll have to expand some sites and and look at maybe create, we don’t want to create a bottleneck or anything like that.

[00:07:38] Jonathan Breeden: Right. Yeah. And the I know that there’s kind of landlocked there at the one on Barbara mill, which is where I go and you don’t have to have a decal even now for the listeners. If you want to recycle metals or TVs or computers or any like that. The recycling is included, you just can’t drop off general waste and so that same day that they sent me to the dump [00:08:00] with the picture frames that they determined was general waste, I was able to drop off some cardboard boxes and some scrap metal that we did at my house.

[00:08:09] But yeah, I still had to go to the thing, but I’ll be happy to see that’s going to be good. And hopefully the lady that won’t say the lady next to the one next to Barbara Mill at some point will do that. Because I know that site definitely needs to be expanded and that’s the one that.

[00:08:22] Ted Godwin: I think we’re moving forward on that.

[00:08:24] Jonathan Breeden: Yeah, well, that’s great. And of course, now people listen is Johnston County is very blessed that we have a landfill that is still got almost 99 years of active use about it. So, you know, we don’t have a landfill capacity problem they have in some other areas. They’re having a mess and payable right now.

[00:08:41] You want to google about that? Because they need a new one and where do you want to put it? Nobody wants to landfill.

[00:08:46] Ted Godwin: Not my backyard.

[00:08:47] Jonathan Breeden: No, we’re very fortunate in Johnston County to have the landfill we have and the solid waste team we have and our convenience centers are nice. The people that work there are extremely helpful and the people at the dump, the few times I’ve been there have been [00:09:00] very helpful too.

[00:09:00] So, I think we’ve done a pretty good job with that, we’ve done a lot. I’m a big fan of the County Commissioners in this County. You know, y’all could go back and listen to Patrick Harris was on a few weeks ago. His thing, I think y’all really done a good job.

[00:09:12] I always talk about what a good job I think Rick Hester has done as the county manager. We had Adrian O’Neill on a few weeks ago with the Parks department and you know, bringing him on and everything he’s trying to do I think has been really good.

[00:09:25] Let’s talk a little bit about the budget. People don’t know a ton about their county budget. The county budget is now more than $200 million.

[00:09:34] Ted Godwin: More than 300 million.

[00:09:35] Jonathan Breeden: More than $300 million.

[00:09:36] Ted Godwin: It’s about 350 million this year. We lock dropped the tax rate by 4 cents because of the growth. It afforded us that opportunity to do that, and obviously it’s the taxpayer’s money and we have to be fiscally responsible with that money. But we’ve got a lot of things going on in such a growing county. We’ve just finished the I don’t want to say jail the detention center .

[00:09:57] Jonathan Breeden: Right, right.

[00:09:58] Ted Godwin: And it’s a very nice facility [00:10:00] without being overboard, I cautioned them about that. We don’t need to Taj Mahal, we just need something functional and efficient and appropriate.

[00:10:07] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:10:07] Ted Godwin: And we’re fixing to go live with the 911 center being moved out to the public safety center adjacent to the detention center.

[00:10:14] We have a strong need for DSS building, that’s something we’re looking at right now. That’s the next thing on the agenda, really. And of course the big thing we’re dealing with on our agenda. I don’t want to get away from the budget, but is the land use plan,

[00:10:28] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:10:28] Ted Godwin: If I run into people, as I run into people out in the county, the biggest complaint I hear is growth, right?

[00:10:34] How do you slow growth? How do you stop growth?

[00:10:36] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:10:37] Ted Godwin: I grew up here. I used to play baseball at the old Cleveland high school here when there was nothing around there. So I’ve seen a big change, I would love to see it change back to what it was. That’ll never happen, I’d love to see growth slow down.

[00:10:51] Some people say, if you’re not growing, you’re dying. I’m not sure I buy into that, I think you can grow without getting bigger get better.

[00:10:59] Jonathan Breeden: Right?

[00:10:59] Ted Godwin: [00:11:00] The land use plan the way it’s laid out is a very good plan if we properly translate that into meaningful ordinances that can make it work,

[00:11:08] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:11:09] Ted Godwin: That plan if you’ve looked at it pushes density towards the towns.

[00:11:12] Jonathan Breeden: Correct.

[00:11:13] Ted Godwin: Allows them to grow retains as much open space as possible.

[00:11:17] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:11:18] Ted Godwin: But a lot of people have a misconception, that way don’t you just stop allowing subdivisions? Well, the number one political philosophy I have is freedom, and when someone’s got a piece of land I can’t go tell him that he can’t build a house on his land. Now, we can put in some parameters that if you’re going to turn that tobacco field into houses we can control the density because it impacts the infrastructure, the water, sewer, if there’s a sewer, the traffic, the highways.

[00:11:46] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:11:46] Ted Godwin: All of those things yet it becomes a community issue then and not a private property owner situation.

[00:11:52] Jonathan Breeden: Right. No you’re absolutely right. And I think people, you know, being a lawyer and knowing how these ordinances [00:12:00] work and how zoning works, you know, if somebody comes up with a plan and it meets the zoning and the ordinance requirements. You can’t really vote it down or they’re going to sue you.

[00:12:11] Ted Godwin: That’s right. And they’re going to win.

[00:12:12] Jonathan Breeden: And they’re going to win. Go after town of Smithfield about that, I mean, they have been sued multiple times in the last couple of years and they have lost every single time and it’s spent a lot of money of the Smithfield citizens taxes, defending lawsuits where they lost. The last one they lost was over whether there could be an RV park on the backside of the outlets that backed up to a neighborhood over near Triple S High school.

[00:12:38] Yeah. And they lost that one. And so it is yeah, it is difficult. And so I think people just think, well, the commissioner should just not approve any subdivisions. Well, that’s not legal and that’s not realistic, and people have the right to live where they want to live and people want to live in Johnston County.

[00:12:54] And to me, that’s a good thing. I mean, I’m glad people want to live here and I think the [00:13:00] Commissioners and the citizens of this county have made it a place where people do want to live.

[00:13:05] Ted Godwin: Yeah, we’ve had so many things on our plate to deal with, a lot of people don’t even realize it’s a big deal to us to get a triple A bond rating.

[00:13:14] Since 1999, the county has experienced eight upgrades in our bond rating. Why is that important? We borrow a lot of money because we build a lot of schools because of the growth. And when you borrow money, that triple A bond rating is important. We’ve saved millions and millions of dollars in interest costs because of that bond rating.

[00:13:32] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:13:32] Ted Godwin: And the most recent one we put forward for the school system was, I think it was 20 or 30 million that, I mean, that we sold. And we got that triple A bond rating finally.

[00:13:43] Jonathan Breeden: Right. And I know the commissioners had been working on that for over 20 years, they had been working on trying to get a triple A bond rating and that allows you to borrow money as cheaply as possible. Because it’s telling the investors who are buying the bonds that this is a [00:14:00] well run county, it is going to pay its bills. It’s almost like having an 800 credit score for you know, if you’re a citizen, you know that’s considered a perfect credit score and if you can get a triple A bond rating, it’s telling the investors in these bonds that you can You know, you can trust this county is going to make its payments and that’s a good investment.

[00:14:20] Ted Godwin: One of the things that has kept us from getting that in times past was one of the things that was really hard to change. The metric was the average family income in the county, and that’s hard to change over a period of time. And through the efforts of our Economic Development Office, Chris Johnson has done a great job.

[00:14:38] Jonathan Breeden: Yes.

[00:14:38] Ted Godwin: And the Commissioner’s creating a business friendly environment. Since 2014, 2015, we’ve added not millions, but billions of dollars in economic growth, jobs, high paying jobs. And there’ll be more to come in the future. They haven’t been announced yet, and that has really afforded us the opportunity to get that triple [00:15:00] bond rating

[00:15:00] Jonathan Breeden: Well and the Commissioners have been, and I was fortunate to spend 2 years on the economic development committee of the county that the commissioners place that put me on that committee, and I was on that from 20 to 2022 and we worked on the incentives and the sort of the tax incentives that helped recruit the business.

[00:15:17] And I worked with Chris Johnson and I think the commissioners put me on there cause I kept complaining about these tax kickbacks that they were giving, and I think the commissioners are like, well, you keep complaining about it, we’ll put y’all there and let you actually learn and see who we’re competing with and what we have to do.

[00:15:33] And now I don’t give them a hard time anymore. And I think that’s probably, I think they’re happy. Their lab is the best commission.

[00:15:38] Ted Godwin: But people need to understand that we’re not giving anything away. We’re just reduced. Well, the competitive aspect requires that we do this. But when someone pays us a dollar in taxes and we give them back as part of this incentive 90 cent that first year Well, we’re still getting 10 cent that we didn’t have.

[00:15:57] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:15:57] Ted Godwin: And after a few years we’ll be getting the whole dollar and keeping it. [00:16:00] So we’re not giving away anything from the coffers, it’s their own money.

[00:16:04] Jonathan Breeden: Well, and we’ve been fortunate that we’ve been able to get some of the investment we have, you had the Novo Nordisk expansion that is now up and running 95 acres on the roof over 2 billion dollars in just the expansion that to give y’all an idea of what that is that at the time the Novo did that was the largest single private investment in the history of North Carolina.

[00:16:28] Ted Godwin: That’s right.

[00:16:28] Jonathan Breeden: And it. Really added to the tax base for the county without sending people to school and it doesn’t need food stamps and welfare services and DSS services. And that’s where commercial is so important. And it added a lot of jobs that are paying an average of around $70,000, which is really good money.

[00:16:51] And they’re talking about building another plant now that they’re gonna maybe close that road where it goes through their Paltan [00:17:00] and be able to connect both sides of their thing. And they brought an entire line from Germany, I think there. So, that’s a huge thing for Johnson County.

[00:17:08] Grifols has been expanding, they’re going to go across the railroad tracks now, they’re doing a tremendous job. These are high paying jobs that are good for the county, good for our citizens. These are good products, they’re making life saving products right here with our citizens.

[00:17:22] Ted Godwin: And there’s other things happening, not only in that hub around Clayton, but down towards Four Oaks and over, of course, in Selma. A lot of things are happening there, the Workforce Development Center that the commissioners helped bring into being 25 years ago has been wonderful as far as Grifols and Novo and the Pharmaceutical Campus is there.

[00:17:41] But, we’re just starting another similar product, but it’s high tech manufacturing training center in Four Oaks.

[00:17:49] Jonathan Breeden: In Four Oaks, that’s right. In the old Forbes bank buildings.

[00:17:52] Ted Godwin: Well, it was in that general area, I guess. Actually it’s it’s right near the ramp going off of 95 there at Forbes.

[00:17:59] Jonathan Breeden: Right. Okay.

[00:17:59] Ted Godwin: They’ve [00:18:00] got some land and we’ve gotten a grant from the state, the county’s putting up some money. We’re gonna build something similar to the Workforce Development Center in Clayton. Right. It’ll be tailored towards high end, high tech manufacturing.

[00:18:12] Jonathan Breeden: Right. I did. I had read about that. That’s really good, and then they’re building a bunch of new warehouse, flex space down around Benson right near I 95 and 40 that’s coming there. We’ve got some brand new industrial flex space here, right here at 4042 on 42 that’s just getting finished. That’s gonna allow some small businesses that need flat industrial space to come here. And we’re excited about that.

[00:18:35] It’s also got some out parcels and that’s going to add jobs to Johnson County as well. And, you know, when we had, if you go back to episode one, we had Paul Flaherty with HCR commercial, and we talked a little bit, the copper district is coming to Clayton. And that’s going to be, basically something that looks like North Hills right there in Clayton on Highway 40 on Highway 42. I mean, you’re talking about transformative projects, you know?

[00:18:59] Ted Godwin: Yeah, you’re [00:19:00] talking about what they refer to as Class A office space. And that’s correct. High end stuff.

[00:19:04] Jonathan Breeden: Right. And I think it’s gonna have some industrial in the back and it’s going to have, it’s a little bit like, it’s middle, like North Hills Riverwood is going to be.

[00:19:10] Places to live, retail below townhouses above maybe a 10 story building. We’ll see if they stick with that. But I mean, it’s going to be, I don’t know, I’m excited, I find this fascinating. I know a lot of people like this, all this growth, like jobs and investment and giving places for our citizens to work. I think it’s great.

[00:19:28] Ted Godwin: You know, I’ve served on the inter-state. Well, when, now we call it the inter-state 42 42 highway 70 corridor commission for several years now, and that’s a consortium of counties between here and Carteret County really has to do with Eastern North Carolina connectivity to improve economic development. But we’re one of the few counties that’s got three interstates going right here through where we are.

[00:19:51] Jonathan Breeden: Well, right. Cause we have the two of the biggest interstates in the entire country intersect right here in Benson. And then we’re getting this new [00:20:00] interstate 42 that they’ll be building over the next 20 or 30 years. And that’s going to add economic development too, because it’s going to make it easier to get products from the ports into the center of the state and those are going to come through Johnston County.

[00:20:13] Ted Godwin: The good thing about Johnston County, we’ve had all this growth and all of this things going on. I can still get on my bicycle and ride 25 miles in the country roads near where I live and meet two cars.

[00:20:26] Jonathan Breeden: Right. No that’s excellent.

[Commercial] Have family law questions? Need guidance to navigate legal challenges? The compassionate team at Breeden Law Office is here to help. Visit us at www. breedenfirm. com for practical advice, resources, or to book a consultation. Remember, when life gets messy, you don’t have to face it alone.

Let’s talk a little bit about the park. If you listen to the episode with Adrian O’Neill, the County Parks and Rec Director the County has purchased this land here at Polenta and Government Road to build the Cleveland Community Park, or it’s going to be the first County Park.

[00:20:42] I know you voted what do you see? You know, what do you see as a timeline? Everybody, you know, it’s 30 to $50 million to build it is the quote I’ve seen. What’s the timeline for the citizens to see that part come into fruition?

[00:20:58] Ted Godwin: That’s a good question. And I [00:21:00] guess it depends on how you approach it and what you get developed to start with. Obviously, we’re not going to put anything out there like a Shrek the first year, but something that would in our studies with the feedback we’ve gotten from the input of citizens, the passive recreation that you would see in a park, walking trails things for kids to do and that sort of type of thing.

[00:21:22] That’ll probably be first. I don’t know all the intricacies. We’ve got a lot going on. It’s hard to remember the exact things. I do know it raised my eyebrows when they talked about that kind of money.

[00:21:33] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:21:33] Ted Godwin: But if the people are willing to vote for a bond issue, that’s really the only way you could afford something like that.

[00:21:40] And of course, our people do a good job of meshing that need into the other needs that we have and prioritize them in and pacing those bond offerings in line with our repayment schedule so that we retain a solid financial footing.

[00:21:55] Jonathan Breeden: Right. Well, you can only run bonds under North Carolina law and even number years.

[00:21:59] Ted Godwin: [00:22:00] That’s right.

[00:22:00] Jonathan Breeden: There’s not going to be a bond on the March 5th primary ballot. Is there a chance that there would be a parks bond on the November general election ballot for Johnston County?

[00:22:10] Ted Godwin: I’m not sure. The commissioners hadn’t made that decision yet. There’s been a lot of requests having to do with not only school needs, but JCC, the college needs, and we’re looking at all of that and again, trying to prioritize it within the financial framework that we’re forced to deal with.

[00:22:26] Jonathan Breeden: Do you support building JCC a new campus in Clayton in the land that the railroad gave there at 42 and 70 that also I think Novo may have had some ownership in too?

[00:22:38] Ted Godwin: I can’t say that I support that because from what I understand, the cost to develop that land because of the nature of the soil would be prohibitive. I’m not against him getting a Clayton campus. I think the college does a great job and can do a better job offering what kids need to get ahead in life. Not everybody needs a four year college. [00:23:00] Experience. And I’ve seen from my own family, you know, I had a nephew that graduated second in his class in high school, got a scholarship, full ride when he got out with a chemical degree, he needed to want to go to work at Grifols. Well, he needed to go to JCC to get a lab certificate.

[00:23:16] Jonathan Breeden: Right. And you know, and for everybody that doesn’t know, I don’t think Grifols or nobody cares what degree you have, almost everybody to go to work there has to go take the intro to bio works class, which is a one semester class that is similar to a high school chemistry class that talks about what they do in the manufacturing process.

[00:23:39] And the clean suits they wear, I mean, they look like astronauts and they have to go through air chambers and all that because they’re making injectables that are in IV bags that and it has to be completely clean cause you don’t want anything to get into those IV bags that gets injected into you, and that’s one of the programs that they offer there at the workforce development center in Clayton.

[00:23:59] And [00:24:00] that’s a tremendous thing, if you go do one semester there, it’s, I think it meets a couple of nights a week. Last time I saw, it costs, like $500. It really wasn’t that expensive and you could go get a job. At Grifols and Novo and I mean, they pay 25, $30 an hour for just about anything there.

[00:24:16] I mean, so they really, and they’re always looking to hire people. So if you’re listening to this and you’re thinking about changing careers, think about going and calling JCC and looking about getting into bio works. So you don’t know if there’ll be a parks bond in 2024.

[00:24:30] Ted Godwin: I don’t know.

[00:24:30] Jonathan Breeden: There’s other parks needs other than this one. There’s the mountains to the sea trail, there’s stuff like that. But I was just curious because I’ve never seen to get a straight answers. I talked to commissioners is where we have it this year or not.

[00:24:43] Ted Godwin: Yeah, I don’t know yet, I’d have to defer. I’m only one of those seven guys. But in listening to your previous podcast with their Parks Recreation Director, Adrian O’Neill, who does a great job. We were most fortunate to get him. I don’t know how there’s other things that come into play.

[00:24:58] For example, the [00:25:00] open space fund that he talked about, how will that be impacted by our land use plan when we adjust those ordinances? I don’t know if that’ll stimulate that or slow it down. All of that would factor into the money’s available that we’ve been used to having available. But to get to that point, I think we’re going to have some type of bond issue, but it may need to be broader than just there in Cleveland.

[00:25:21] That’s important because we’ve identified a site and a plan. But there’s other areas in the county that might need similar attention.

[00:25:28] Jonathan Breeden: What about going back to the sort of fire tax type plan that got promoted a few years ago? You were on the board when they had the meetings out here at Cleveland high school where they were going to create a 4 cent tax for the Cleveland township out here.

[00:25:44] And it would follow the fire tax district and the fire taxes, whatever it is, eight or nine cents. I don’t know exactly what it is, but and it would, and that would be used to build this park. I mean, it’s a different version of the park, but a park in this community where the citizens [00:26:00] here would actually pay for it, and maybe not the rest of the citizens of the count.

[00:26:03] Ted Godwin: Yeah, we got some good feedback from that meeting and I was in favor of going forward and allowing the citizens to vote on that.

[00:26:10] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:26:10] Ted Godwin: People in that area wanted to vote on it and experienced that tax increase and experienced the Park. Great. I was all for that. I wasn’t necessarily in favor of us arbitrarily putting it in place when I knew there was a lot of opposition against it.

[00:26:24] Jonathan Breeden: Well, and then we find out that the law is you can’t really put that to a vote. That wasn’t something that could actually be voted on. Yeah. So I think you know, I’m just happy that the land got preserved.

[00:26:35] I’m happy that Michael Naught and Denton Lee and Scott James, you know, bought that land as private citizens and sort of held it till the county could get the grants and buy it. You know, we’re very fortunate. I’ve talked about being on the first call, I went to Rick Hester’s office and him and I called the lady that owned the land.

[00:26:50] Ted Godwin: Yeah.

[00:26:50] Jonathan Breeden: Because she was trying to give the county the 13 acres across the street.

[00:26:53] Ted Godwin: Yeah.

[00:26:53] Jonathan Breeden: And I’d been out there to look at it and Rick had been out there to look at it. We were like, it’s not level and it’s full of stomps [00:27:00] but we knew she had the other one. And I was like, and I just asked her would you be willing to consider selling us the 80 acres on this side of the street?

[00:27:07] And she said, well, maybe and that, you know, the rest is kind of history. And and so she did, and you know, we were fortunate to get that, and I think it’s going to be great. It may not get built the next five years, but I think it will get done and they’re going to redo the main gca campus across the fire department as part of that entire process, but it’s going to take some time.

[00:27:29] Ted Godwin: And I think it’s a good starting point that may duplicate itself in other parts of the county because there’s a lot of other parts that are growing.

[00:27:37] Jonathan Breeden: Right. Well, so what we’re starting around time. I could talk to Ted Goblin for hours. But what is you excited about? moving forward here like I mean, you’re running for another four year term. What is you excited? Why do you want to do this? What is you excited about Johnston County?

[00:27:52] Ted Godwin: Well, I’d really like to see, you know, we’ve worked hard on this land use plan. And while I understand having been a banker, I understand the [00:28:00] need for growth. But also grew up here and I’d sure like to see it preserved as much as possible. But I’d like to see that land use plan really come to fruition through some good solid meaningful, I don’t know how to say it best but managed growth.

[00:28:15] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:28:15] Ted Godwin: You know some people say when you say managed growth that translates into stopping growth.

[00:28:21] Jonathan Breeden: Right.

[00:28:21] Ted Godwin: But I think there’s ways that we can compromise and bring about a suitable end that everybody can live with good and feel good about it.

[00:28:30] Jonathan Breeden: Okay. All right. Well, that’s cool. And I guess the last question I’ll ask you is you’ve been here your whole life. You raised your family. You’ve been an elected official for 12 years.

[00:28:39] What do you love most about Johnston County?

[00:28:41] Ted Godwin: That’s easy. The people here, not, you know, we’ve got a culture here. I’ve lived in maybe I shouldn’t say this in high Yankee areas. I lived in the Pinehurst area while, and the people here don’t adhere to that P word pushy.

[00:28:58] Jonathan Breeden: Right?

[00:28:59] Ted Godwin: In Johnston County, [00:29:00] just good people. We’ve seen, we’ve developed a culture and the people that come here and we’ve got a lot of people that come here. From other places, they fall into that culture, and I’m just love being here.

[00:29:08] Jonathan Breeden: Well, that’s awesome. So if people want to learn more about you and I guess your campaign, how do they reach out to you?

[00:29:14] Ted Godwin: Well, I don’t have a campaign spot. But I do have a Facebook Ted Godwin for Johnson County Commissioner Facebook page. All right.

[00:29:23] Jonathan Breeden: Well, that’s cool. All right. Well, thank Ted Godwin for coming in and being our guest today on the best of Johnson County podcast.

[00:29:29] If this is your first time listening to this podcast, if you do us the favor of liking or following or subscribing to this podcast, wherever you were seeing it, whether it be on Apple podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or if you’re seeing any of the links on Tiktok or instagram or the breeding law, social media pages.

[00:29:47] So that you’ll be aware of future episodes of the best of Johnston County podcast. There are new episodes are put up every Monday. So every Monday, come back and look and see which guests we have that week.

[00:29:57] I think you will find the guests that we’ve had if you [00:30:00] go back and listen to some of the ones previously and the ones coming up to be very interesting. If you love Johnston County as much as I love Johnston County, this is the podcast for you. So until next time, I’m your host, Jonathan Breeden. Thanks a lot.

That’s the end of today’s episode of Best of Johnston County, a show brought to you by the trusted team at Breeden Law Office.  We thank you for joining us today and we look forward to sharing more interesting facets of this community next week. Every story, every viewpoint adds another thread to the rich tapestry of Johnston County. If the legal aspects highlighted raised some questions, help is just around the corner at www. breedenfirm. com.