City Council Election: Interview with Mike Panter

City Council, Election
Mike Panter

FANNIN, Ga. — Mike Panter is a candidate for the Post 2 seat on the Blue Ridge City Council. He spoke with FYN to discuss his candidacy, previous achievements, and future goals. Mike Panter is incumbent and running against Angie Arp, who has previous experience on the city council. 

On collecting delinquent taxes and business license fees: 

Panter says that his push to collect unpaid taxes and fees began right after the COVID-19 pandemic began to affect the city: “We had a loss of revenue for that month [April 2020]. I was brought into a finance meeting, and there was a lot of discussion about, you know, what we were going to do.” Panter says it was then that he began to consider how to generate more income, “I was informed … by the accountant that the delinquent taxes were over $300,000, and my comment was ‘why have they not been collected?’” 

Panter explains that he was told the council had never wanted to collect the taxes “because it was a black eye for everybody.” He commented, “If my 80 year old mother can pay her taxes, everybody can pay their taxes.” Panter notes that the city ended up collecting over $200,000 in delinquent taxes. “Also during the process I found out we had over 90 businesses … that had delinquent business license,” which Panter says have now all been collected through 2020. Additionally, he mentions his work to increase business license fees from $50 to $250, a figure that had gone unchanged since 2004. 

Panter says: “Going forward, if elected … we will continue to collect our taxes, we’ll continue to collect business license [fees], and if we don’t, we’ll take the appropriate action, because, you know, the future … of the city of Blue Ridge depends on our collection of revenue.”  

On city water:

“I also did a search of our water. I found out that we had around 200 homes that were on residential water rates, but they … were on rental programs,” Panter says, “I deemed them as commercial, cause if you’re renting your home as a business, it’s commercial, it’s not residential.” He says he changed the water rate for those homes, increasing revenue for the city. Panter also brings up subdivisions that are outside the city limits, but are provided with city water: “A lot of these homes … we don’t get taxes from these people.”  

In response to claims about poor water quality, Panter says, “Quite frankly, we’re one of the highest rated water as far as purification, in the state.”  

On city finances:

Panter says that during his term he took “A look at the finances of the city, [and] saw that our bonds … had a 39 year note of over 13.9 million dollars.” He says he was able to renegotiate the bonds, to save the city over 2.5 million dollars, “We moved from a … 37 year bond at 4.1% to a 32 year bond at 2.3% which saved the city … this year alone, a hundred thousand”. Panter also brings up additional benefits of his work with the city finances: “Not only did we save 2.5 million dollars in debt, we got a double A rating which gives us better … financial ability to go out and borrow money and do things that we need to do to work toward the infrastructure.”

On affordable housing:

Panter first clarified his vote on affordable housing: “As you probably know, I voted no on the affordable housing proposal that we had about 3 or 4 months ago. The reason I voted no, was … not because I was against affordable housing. I’m for affordable housing.” 

He says that there’s different levels of affordable housing, with important distinctions. Panter leans in favor of workforce housing, which is usually available for middle class workers. “One of my things is, if we’re gonna do affordable housing … I want us to … have some type of control over who gets this housing. What I mean by that, I feel like that our citizens ought to have priority.” He says that other forms of housing, like Section 8, don’t allow the city to restrict access to people from other cities: “So, with workforce housing, if it’s structured correctly, we could determine where, we could determine the price range, we could put stipulations … for someone to be eligible.” Panter suggests possible requirements such as a year of prior residence, and a cap of 36 months in the housing. The lack of control is what led Panter to vote no. He says, “The way I understand it, if you use federal money for affordable housing, then we, the local city … do not have … our local residents having first option.” 

Panter also mentions that workforce housing is done throughout the country for workers like police, firefighters, and factory workers: “It’s a way that we could make sure that we have a workforce in our city.” He brings up the importance of location for those workers, another reason he voted no, saying, “Workforce housing is built in the geographical area where the people that live there can walk to work, can walk to a drug store, can walk to a grocery store. So all of the things that they need on a day to day basis is available to them.” The proposed location, as he explains, was near two schools and an existing residential area with no sidewalks, streetlights, or turn lanes. 

To voters:

“I spent 38 years in the city of Blue Ridge and Fannin County, working with the youth of this community. I’ve served just about on every board, and the people that know me know that I’m all about the community, taking care of our current community.  Making sure that as we grow, we’re growing financially stable. If I’m re-elected I’ll make sure that the city of Blue Ridge stays financially fit, to be able to expand our fire department, our recreation services, and one of my main goals is to build an aquatic and wellness center for the citizens of Blue ridge and Fannin County.” 

 

FYN made an effort to contact every candidate, but we were ultimately unable to speak with Post 1 candidates Herald Herndon and Jack Taylor; Post 3 candidate Christy Kay; Post 4 candidates Jacqueline Brown and William Whaley; and Post 5 candidates Bill Bivins and Nathan Fitts. Early voting is already underway and Election Day is Nov. 2, 2021. 

 

1 Comment

  1. Tom Fennell October 25, 2021 at 2:13 pm

    i wondered who was behind the giant increase in business licenses and now i know. Mike Panter. Raising the business licenses 500 percent in one fell swoop is clearly anti small business. I urge everyone to vote against Mike Panter

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