Mayor election in Statesboro kicks off

STATESBORO, Ga. (WTOC) - The mayoral race in Statesboro has kicked off leading up to election day.

The incumbent Jonathan McCollar will be running for a third term against candidate Raymond Harris.

WTOC sat down with both candidates to talk about their goals if elected.

November 4 is a significant day for voters in Statesboro because of the highly anticipated race for mayor.

Candidates outline priorities

Incumbent Mayor Jonathan McCollar is running for his third term.

“The people of this community can see clearly that the work that is going on in our community and that this is an administration that doesn’t just care about some, but we are about all of the people that call this community home,” said Mayor McCollar.

Raymond Harris is challenging Mayor McCollar.

Harris is a disabled veteran who has lived in the Statesboro community for over 16 years.

“Biggest reason I wanted to run is because I feel like I wasn’t being heard and when I talked to my fellow citizens they felt like they weren’t being heard. I wanted to be a voice for the people,” said Harris.

We asked both candidates if they were elected in November what would their main objectives be in the office.

Both, candidates spoke on the topic of growth in the community.

Harris says maintaining the existing infrastructure of the city is a priority before any further growth.

“I don’t want to push the city farther than what our services can handle. Just like we have some flooding issues we need to take care of, we need to clean out a lot of gutters and waterways to make sure it can handle the rainwater and runoff. That’s one of the things I want to get done first couple of days I’m in office,” said Harris.

Mayor McCollar says he wants to continue his work to bring more jobs and industry into Statesboro to support additional growth.

“We knew coming into this role in January of 2018 was that we needed jobs within this community. When you have double digit unemployment rate, 50% of people living in poverty, that tells us that clearly jobs are needed in our community. Under this administration, we have cut poverty, cut unemployment in half,” said Mayor McCollar.

Both candidates say they want to focus on more affordable housing within the city.

“I’ve had so many complaints that the mortgages, the rent, is too high in Statesboro and it’s pushing a lot of people out of the city and into the county,” said Harris.

“We want to transition our citizens from renters into owners within our community so that they could build that generational wealth,” said Mayor McCollar.