{"id":8696,"date":"2011-09-15T17:01:23","date_gmt":"2011-09-15T21:01:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.raleighpublicrecord.org\/?p=8696"},"modified":"2011-09-15T17:01:23","modified_gmt":"2011-09-15T21:01:23","slug":"corey-branch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/voter-guide-2011\/2011\/09\/15\/corey-branch\/","title":{"rendered":"Corey Branch (D)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Age: 33\"\"<\/a>
\nCurrent Occupation: Network Manager for AT&T
\nWebsite: www.branch4districtc.com<\/a><\/p>\n

How long have you lived in Raleigh?<\/em><\/strong>
\nI was born and raised in Raleigh, North Carolina. Outside of the four years in college and one year af\u00adter college, I\u2019ve been here my entire life.<\/p>\n

Why have you decided to run for office?<\/em><\/strong>
\nI decided to run for of\u00adfice to give back to a city that\u2019s given so much to me. I look at the economic con\u00additions as well as the com\u00admunity as a whole, and I look at our youth, and that\u2019s something that I re\u00adally want to invest in be\u00adcause the people invested in me, and now\u2019s the time for some good, strong leadership.<\/p>\n

What are the three biggest issues you think the city of Raleigh faces and how would you address those issues?<\/em><\/strong>
\nThe city started address\u00ading some of the issues first by looking at the compre\u00adhensive plan, so I\u2019ve re\u00adviewed the comprehensive plan. I\u2019ve looked at South\u00adeast Raleigh and how it fits within that plan, and one of the main issues that they\u2019re focusing on is the New Bern Avenue corridor.<\/p>\n

Another one is our youth. As we look at our youth and activities and things that they have, we have parks in the area, but what activities do we have in these parks? We have or\u00adganizations that are doing things and they\u2019re look\u00ading for places to meet, but let\u2019s collaborate and bring those two together.<\/p>\n

And then the last thing is just community involve\u00adment. At the last election for municipal positions, only 3,259 people voted for the District C candidate in all, yet there are 50,306 registered voters in Dis\u00adtrict C.<\/p>\n

What do you think are the best and worst decisions the current city council has made?<\/em><\/strong>
\nThey have made a lot of decisions that everybody is going to question. I think just overall, the compre\u00adhensive plan is the main tool that needs to be used in order to make the city a better city and work to\u00adgether overall.<\/p>\n

I think when we look at the new police and fire sta\u00adtion they\u2019re trying to build downtown, what we need to look at is what is needed in that building and how are we going to go about building it and financing it. I think we need this building.<\/p>\n

What do you think is the most important issue facing your district and how would you address it?<\/em><\/strong>
\nThe most important is\u00adsue facing my district is jobs. We need to look at the economic development within our community. We have Tower Shopping Center, Longview Shop\u00adping Center, and retailers are leaving them, and we need to find ways to bring the retailers back. We used to have two movie theaters in Tower Shopping Cen\u00adter. Now the closest movie theater is either in Garner or it\u2019s in North Hills. So, we need to look at ways to utilize and keep money in Southeast Raleigh, and it helps the city overall.<\/p>\n

What do you think the city should do to house its public safety functions?<\/em><\/strong>
\nAs far as the public safe\u00adty functions and the hous\u00ading of it, I like the area dis\u00adtrict offices that they have, but we also need to make sure they have a centralized office that they can bring everything to.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

How do you feel about impact fees?
\nImpact fees are some\u00adthing that needs to be vis\u00adited. I understand the con\u00adcept of when we\u2019re doing construction and things of that nature; how we need to look at the impact on the community and the environment. And thus, that\u2019s why the fee is set up, thus the name \u201cimpact fees.\u201d So, I believe as we look at our current condi\u00adtions, we need to make sure those fees meet our current situation.<\/p>\n

What ideas do you have for public transportation in Raleigh?<\/em><\/strong>
\nRaleigh is growing, so when I look at my district, I have an area called Bat\u00adtle Ridge and Chastain in which the public transpor\u00adtation does not reach. So, we need to talk to our cur\u00adrent Capital Area Transit system and have them look at ways to reach out to out-reach areas within Raleigh city limits, as well as with TTA to look at interact\u00ading with other cities and municipalities because our citizens, not just Southeast Raleigh, but across Ra\u00adleigh, work in other cities as well.<\/p>\n

How do you think the city should plan to meet its future water needs?<\/em><\/strong>
\nWhat we have to do is look at our current wa\u00adter supply. Where do we stand? If we were to sup\u00adposedly get no rain going forward, how much wa\u00adter do we have, and then look at that plan and work backwards. So, sometimes you have to look at worse-case scenarios in order to plan properly for future growth. I think that\u2019s the first step really in going forward and looking at our water growth and plans.<\/p>\n

The city has been given a million dollars to do whatever it wants. What do you think the money should go to?<\/em><\/strong>
\nA million dollars for the city of Raleigh and looking at our budget is not a lot of money. So, the first thing I think we need to look at is areas in which we have moved monies around to finance to make other things happen. I think the first thing we need to do is just review what we cur\u00adrently have, and try to find ways for that million dol\u00adlars to supplement areas that we have actually reas\u00adsigned money.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Age: 33 Current Occupation: Network Manager for AT&T Website: www.branch4districtc.com How long have you lived in Raleigh? I was born and raised in Raleigh, North Carolina. Outside of the four years in college and one year af\u00adter college, I\u2019ve been here my entire life. Why have you decided to run for office? I decided to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24038,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[378],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8696"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24038"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8696\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}