Two challengers running for Leflore County offices told the Greenwood Voters League on Wednesday night why they believe they should replace the incumbents.
Demetrice Bedell is making his second run for Leflore County sheriff against longtime incumbent Ricky Banks. Bedell is running as a Democrat, Banks as an independent.
T.W. Cooper is running for District 4 supervisor. He faces incumbent Wayne Self and Eric Mitchell. Cooper is running as a Democrat, and Self and Mitchell are independents.
Bedell, who had the interior and exterior of the Elks Hall festooned with his campaign signs, said his education and experience make him the right man to deliver “real solutions” as Leflore County’s next sheriff. He’s a graduate of Amanda Elzy High School, Mississippi Delta Community College and Mississippi Valley State University.
Bedell said he has more than 20 years of law enforcement and military experience. He has been chief of police for the Greenwood School District since 2008. Before that, he was a member of the Greenwood Police Department for seven years. He also worked as assistant police chief in Pickens.
Bedell, 45, said, “I’m still young enough to get out and do the job and old enough to know how to do the job.”
He said that as sheriff, he would have an open-door policy to the community. He said he also plans to be a visible presence in the county.
“I’m going to be in your neighborhoods. ... I want to make this a better place, a safer place,” Bedell said.
Cooper, 63, spent 12 years as director of the Greenwood-Leflore Emergency Management Agency before retiring in 2013. Before that, the Itta Bena resident was a Greenwood firefighter for 22 years.
“Running for public office was not on my agenda 10 years ago,” he said.
Like Bedell, Cooper never mentioned his incumbent rival by name. But Cooper said events in the county made him want “to step forward and serve” on the Leflore County Board of Supervisors.
Cooper said it’s the job of a supervisor “to create a level playing field for everybody in the county.”
He talked about how his life experiences had shaped him. Cooper said that when he faced racial discrimination as one of Greenwood first black firefighters in the early 1970s, he thought back to his childhood working on Bledsoe Plantation and said, “nothing could ever be as hard as that.”
Cooper said the most important thing for a supervisor is that “you will keep in mind I was sent here by the voters to speak for them when they can’t speak for themselves.”
After the speeches, Voters League President David Jordan lamented the fact that in the past four years, District 2’s Robert Moore is the only incumbent supervisor who has appeared at a Voters League meeting. Jordan said he hopes that will change this year.
“They’re as welcome as the rain is to the trees,” he said.
• Contact Charles Corder at 581-7241 or ccorder@gwcommonwealth.com.
