Who Is JAMES RYCKMAN

Sometimes a candidate tells us something important about himself before the campaign speeches begin.

Back in March, I wrote a Main Street post called Hope Arrives Early, A New Season of Candidates for City Council.

At the time, several people appeared to be stepping forward, willing to challenge long held seats on the Rocky Mount City Council. One of the names I mentioned was James Ryckman.

I wrote about the importance of potential candidates appearing early enough for us to get to know them. Ryckman posted an impressive résumé suggesting that he intended to run,

You can read that earlier Main Street post here.

I tucked his name away.

Now James Ryckman has my attention again.

He has recently been posting on Concerned Citizens. One of the posts concerned his experience with Rocky Mount’s utility billing system. I began reading it knowing utility billing has everyone’s hair on fire.

But, I kept reading for another reason.

I became interested in the man who had written it.

The farther I read, the less I was thinking about one man’s utility bill and the more I was thinking about how James Ryckman’s mind works.

He doesn’t simply say something is wrong.

He sets about determining why.

He reconstructs dates. He follows numbers. He reads policy. He compares what is supposed to happen with what actually happened. He identifies contradictions. He asks for documentation. He challenges explanations that don’t reconcile with the record.

And when he gets to the end of a problem, he wants to know what should be done about it.

He went to the policy. I like that !

He compared what the City said should happen with what actually happened. He followed the numbers, identified contradictions, asked for documentation and refused to accept an explanation simply because it had been given to him.

Whether every conclusion he reaches ultimately proves correct is not my point here. It strikes me as a useful habit for someone interested in City Council.

The method is my point.

Ryckman works in software engineering and cybersecurity for banks. and more. That professional background may explain something about the way he approaches a problem.

Problems that are increasingly important questions for municipal government and for Rocky Mount in particular.

City government today is not simply streets, garbage pickup and zoning meetings. It is financial controls, utility systems, cybersecurity, software contracts, databases, billing systems, outside vendors, audits, technology and millions of dollars moving through systems most citizens will never see.

A council member does not have to be an expert in all of these things. But it certainly helps to have someone at the table who understands how systems work and knows how to ask the next question and the one after that.

This may be what impressed me most. There is nothing casual about the way Ryckman makes his case.

We live in a time when an opinion can be typed in thirty seconds. Research takes longer. James Ryckman appears willing to do the longer work.

That is a quality worth noticing in someone not only for a particular Ward but for someone who is making decisions for the rest of us.

Ryckman doesn’t seem satisfied simply to prove that something is wrong. He wants to know what should be done about it.

We could use that kind of thinking on the Rocky Mount City Council.

I haven’t met James Ryckman. I don’t yet know where he stands on many of the issues that matter to Rocky Mount.

But I have seen enough to find him intelligent, prepared, he has technical knowledge, an analytical mind and a willingness to do the work before reaching a conclusion.

For a long time, I have argued that Rocky Mount voters deserve choices. The expiration date for office is long past in Ward 1 and 2, for instance. You don’t have to give a lot of thought to the fact that It Is past Time For a Change.

We need serious candidates who bring experience, ability, independence and new ways of thinking to the City Council.

If James Ryckman intends to seek a Ward seat, I am delighted by the possibilities he could bring.

James Ryckman’s resume and posted comments have my attention. I want Main Street readers to know this name. If we are to have new representation, it is going to take all of us to make that happen in many different ways beyond being able to vote in that Ward.

I’ve been watching James Ryckman. Let’s watch together.