Columbus City Councilman inspires the next generation
COLUMBUS, Miss. – Having a passion for your community doesn’t have an age limit.
For one Columbus City Councilman, that passion started early on.
It has been a full-circle moment for Ward 2 Columbus City Councilman Roderick Smith.
When Smith was in high school, he served on the Mayor’s Youth Council.
15 years later, he’s back at the same office as an adult.
“I was attending the Boys and Girls Club, and they brought the applications out. And I applied and was elected and selected to be on the Mayor’s Youth Council. And it really taught me a lot of character and taught me leadership skills at a young age,” said Smith.
Smith has always had a passion for his community.
He said he is grateful he had the opportunity to serve on the council when he was young.
Now, he wants to share those experiences.
” It gives them an outlet to do stuff and express themselves because at the time when I was on the youth council, we took different trips around the state of Mississippi. Doing different things, doing community service,” said Smith.
Mayor Stephen Jones said the upcoming youth council members will get to do some of those same activities.
He said he looks forward to meeting the future city leaders.
“As the mayor, we want to hear from all of our young adults. We want the smart ones, we want the ones that are the troubled. You know, I want to hear from all of them. As the mayor, we want to make sure we’re focusing on our kids to give them everything that they need. We want to make sure we have an outlet for all of them,” said Columbus Mayor Stephen Jones.
Smith said he wants to continue to give back and hopes to inspire the younger generation.
“It makes me feel great looking back. That’s why I always talk to our young people and encourage them to do things like this. I actually talked to a couple of young people about getting in the youth council. I told them about my experience and all the different things that we’ve done, and hopefully, we’ll have a strong youth council like we did when I was on the youth council,” said Jones.
Smith served on the Mayor’s Youth Council for all four years he attended Columbus High.
The deadline to apply for the Mayor’s Youth Council is September 2.
You can find the application and more information about the council on the City of Columbus website.
