Issue link: http://maconmagazine.uberflip.com/i/1476674
(Creek) Nation. Like I said, it's hard to overstate this park and preserve's impact on us. As you look to the future, what are your professional and personal goals? Personally, I am committed to being the best father and husband I can be… and catching some bowfin down in the swamp with a fly I tied. Working with my colleagues on this commission and helping Mayor Miller and his administration make their agenda become a reality for so many of our neighbors is a chance of a lifetime. The mayor and I are very different people, as are my colleagues on the commission, but that's a strength, I believe. I admire Mayor Miller's stewardship of our community greatly. So professionally, I look forward to continuing to make progress at City Hall with him and my colleagues on the commission. And for the park and preserve expansion efforts, I am deeply focused on making sure the community and our federal elected officials understand this precise moment in the history of the arc of the park and preserve creation process. What are you personally committed to accomplishing in Macon and why? Personally, I've come to believe that the relationship between our community and the Muscogee (Creek) Nation outliving the push to create a National Park and Preserve has deep, esoteric value to our community. There is a deep void in our community because of their forced and violent removal and dispossession. And I hope that our work with the tribe creates something foundational that begins to fill that void and heal wounds that we may not even know exist. What is your vision for our community? Macon has this uncanny ability to admit its past ills -- of which there are many -- and not stagnate in them, but move forward together to create the image of what we want to be. What would be a missed opportunity in Macon? Congress not recognizing the almost century-long effort to create the Ocmulgee National Park and Preserve this year would be a missed opportunity not just for Macon, but for the region and state. This is the moment, and I don't believe we have a choice but to rise to it. What does it mean to be a good leader? When I was elected in 2020, I received a note from a former state- wide constitutional officer and conservationist that I deeply respect . The note read, "Remember that you are usually half wrong and the other guy is half right…" Trying to remind yourself of that when you're at your most sure and your most righteous, I believe, is leadership. What do you consider your greatest achievement? My family, but it's hardly my achievement. My wife Rebecca and son Stroud have a kindness in them that I daily strive to match and nurture. Simply being able to witness and learn from the kindness Rebecca instills in our home and our community through her own work as a nonprofit leader and therapist is what I am most proud of. I'm deeply proud of both of them and learn to be a better person every day I get to spend with them. AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2022 | maconmagazine.com 43