Congressional candidate Carter visits Madison

Coach Roy Carter rolled into Madison a few minutes late Friday morning due to a transportation glitch.

“This was supposed to be a bus tour, but that changed early yesterday,” said Carter, a candidate for the Democratic spot in November’s 5th Congressional District race. “We made it to Iredell County and I guess the bus was overcome with shock at the price of diesel fuel at a station we passed and just stopped dead.”

Carter, 64, and his supporters quickly changed to vehicles and hit the road to Alexander County, the first stop on his two-day, 12-county tour. Time schedules went out the window, but the candidate was determined to keep every commitment.

“With the primary just five days away, I wanted to make sure I visited every county in the district,” he said. “I think it’s important for the voters to know that I care about every precinct in the 5th Congressional District, from the largest to the smallest.”

Only three of Rockingham County’s 18 voting precincts are part of the 5th Congressional District. All of the Huntsville and New Bethel precincts cast votes for the race and the Hogans precinct is split depending upon address.

Thursday’s first leg of Carter’s 12-county tour took the campaign caravan to the westernmost counties of the district – Alexander, Wilkes, Watauga, Ashe, Alleghany and Yadkin. Friday started with Rockingham then moved to Stokes, Surry, Iredell, Davie and Forsyth.

Carter retired in January after a 40-year career as an educator and football coach. He charged current 5th District Rep. Virginia Foxx with prompting him to enter the political arena.

“My reason for running is simply my disapproval of Virginia Foxx’s voting record, especially on young people issues and economy issues,” Carter said.

Aware of the numerous economic hits local communities have suffered in recent years, Carter narrowed the assaults on the national economy to two critical issues.

“Number one would be the outsourcing of jobs,” he said. “Second is the war in Iraq, where we are spending $400 million a day, which our economy cannot stand. That’s just diverting money from social programs and things that we need to be building now and not seeing them decline.”

Carter’s first stop in Madison on Friday was at Dick’s Store, owned by former Rockingham County Democratic Party chairman Dick Cartwright. Looking over Cartwright’s stock of T-shirts for imprinting, Carter talked about the higher cost of American-made products versus imports.

“One of the things I’d like to do in Congress is renegotiate or get rid of NAFTA,” he said. “We need to start over.”

Carter believes most of the textile jobs that have moved overseas will never return.

“We have to divert our attention to building green jobs, environmental jobs and do things with alternative energy,” he said.

Carter’s opposition in Tuesday’s Democratic Primary is Diane Hamby. Hamby, 53, is co-owner of D&T Painting Co. in Statesville.

Unlike her opponent, Hamby has experience as an elected official, serving as an Iredell County commissioner in 1993 and 1994. She was the last Democratic commissioner elected in Iredell.

Hamby lists her top priorities as the economy, health-care and energy. She says the 5th District is losing too many middle-class jobs and more needs to be done to keep industries in the area.

Hamby says there are simple steps that can help the health-care crisis, such as creating a single form for all insurance companies to use.

“That would save millions in administrative costs and that could be passed on to the consumer,” she said.

Carter advocates giving incentives to the nation’s brightest minds and research universities to develop new technologies as a way to reverse the current energy crisis. She believes creating new, clean energy systems will not only help the environment, but also create new green jobs and help the economy.

The winner of Tuesday’s 5th Congressional District Democratic primary will face Republican Rep. Virginia Foxx in November’s general election.

Foxx, 64, is currently serving her second term and is only the third woman in North Carolina history to serve in the U.S. House. Prior to her election to Congress in 2004, Foxx served 10 years in the N.C. Senate.

Before entering the political arena, Foxx held a number of posts as a college educator and administrator. She currently serves on the House Committees on Agriculture, Government Reform, and Education and the Workforce.