Columbus mayoral elect discusses goals and plans for city
COLUMBUS, Miss. (WCBI) – Columbus Mayor Elect Stephen Jones will take office on July 1.
Jones is a Columbus native who has served on the city council for 9 years.
He never planned on pursuing a life in politics, but he said it was a calling.
“I actually never wanted to even be in politics, never even thought about being in politics. I think it’s just God put me where He wanted me to be. I’m being led by Him and not really by myself.” Jones said.
He grew up on the northside of town and moved around locally, but he says God put him back on the northside, guiding his steps on where he was meant to be and serve.
Jones said that during his campaign, many of his supporters voiced concerns about crime.
“Even though the DOJ came down and said the crime was down, it’s still the point of, you know, making people feel safe and doing everything that we can to make sure that people are safe and feel safe in Columbus and putting out, you know, a better image of Columbus as well,” said Jones.
And how does he plan to tackle this issue?
“A lot of this stuff we had already started,” Jones said. “We just have to continue with it and make it better. For instance, cameras, we have the new gunshot detection cameras. We’ll be adding more of those so that we can actually follow people around the city when something does happen, or if it’s a gunshot, they can zoom in on those shots and see who’s coming out of that area.”
He also wants to have someone monitoring these cameras 12-24 hours a day, with a center dedicated to this for added efficiency in catching criminals.
“And then also add them in places, you know, maybe get a mobile one, then we can move around to add to help with the litter.” Jones said.
In doing this, he hopes to change the reputation the city sometimes gets by showcasing its best qualities.
Jones said in his term, he also wants to pursue better communication with the city council.
He has some things he wants to change within departments, but he’s not ready to talk about all of it just yet.
“I don’t want to put it out there until I have a chance to actually sit down with the department heads and get their input and so on,” Jones said.
It’s one thing to talk about change, but Jones has got a game plan that he wants to work out with the council.
Along with this, there are other things he wants to see in his term.
After years of delay, Jones hopes to see the Terry Brown Amphitheater completed and open.
“I think that it would be great for the citizens,” Jones said. “It’ll be great for businesses, the hotels, they’ll fill up when you have an event there. The 2% tax that we get from it will go toward parks and rec, and the CVB will have more money to contribute to other things. So all around I think it’s going to be great, and it helps us put us as a tourism city.”
Jones says he has lots of goals for the city, and one of them is unity.
“To bring us all together. And like I said, put out a better image of the city and make sure that we’re reaching our full potential,” Jones said.
Jones said he hopes to build trust in the community.
