Everyone KNOWS the Councilmen Who Run The Show

This is not about party politics, race, or personality. It’s about the structure of trust in a city and what happens when it is hollowed out.

This isn’t a rant. It’s not gossip. It’s not vengeance. It’s a sober assessment of the cost of silence and the weight of complicity.

We have two local elected officials that have amassed power, partly by intimidation, partly by manipulating systems to serve a personal agenda.

Everybody KNOWS who holds the reins, who calls the shots, who profits. And yet, election after election, the same names, remain stamped on the ballot, and back in office.

What has happened in Rocky Mount is that power, once consolidated, rarely serves. It protects itself. It curates allies. It appoints insiders. It rewards loyalty over talent.

And when leadership becomes more interested in controlling who opens a business than what kinds of businesses will serve the community, then revitalization is influenced like a private club.

You perhaps know I read about American heroes that have helped shape the country. I am fascinated with these men of wisdom who understood public service as duty, not reward. Here are two quotes I want you to take on board.

James A. Baker III: Secretary of State
“You don’t just speak truth to power, you carry it, quietly and firmly, into every room where power has forgotten its purpose.”

General George C. Marshall:
“When a thing is morally wrong, it is not politically right.”

These men were not perfect, but they were guided by principle. This is a stark contrast between leaders of consequence and the small-town machine politics that operate without shame.

In Rocky Mount, everyone KNOWS that race plays a role. Quietly. Systematically. Who gets discouraged, who gets delayed, and who gets a nod behind closed doors.

One way that control plays out, is through the selective use of codes. Promising buyers and tenants are run off with sudden, often exaggerated demands. These roadblocks aren’t applied evenly, they’re used to steer outcomes. Everyone KNOWS it.

This writing is about the men whose influence extends across the city. They have made Main Street theirs to control. When leadership suppresses opportunity in the name of control, progress cannot be guaranteed.

What might have been a shared revival, becomes a manipulated game, where the color of your skin matters.

What should be a local government of collaboration and consensus has instead become a stage for maneuvering and manipulation. Two men have used their seats to block, delay, and direct decisions that benefit a select few while the broader needs of Rocky Mount are sidelined.

The future of downtown, the distribution of grants, even the hiring of top-level staff, all seem to pass through a filter of “My Agenda” rather than the city’s best interest.

There’s a deep weariness that settles in when people believe nothing will ever change. That weariness is the true power behind the status quo, it dulls outrage, silences effort, and makes resignation feel like realism.

There is nothing radical about demanding accountability.
There is nothing extreme about expecting our elected leaders to put service before ego, and the good of the city before personal power.
There is no reason people can’t refuse to stay silent when we see what is happening and know the truth.