In seeking to replace incumbent Ward 3 Powell City Councilman Tim Sapp, challenger Justin Waterworth describes himself as having a “tower to climb.”

Sapp has served on the council for 20 years and he says the city has seen a lot of accomplishments over those decades.

“I’ve got a lot of time invested in Powell, and I’d be able to continue with my experience,” he said of his bid for a sixth term.

As for Waterworth, he pitched his experience in public-facing leadership roles that include coaching and his position as a Powell Middle School English teacher.

“I’m a quick student, and I trust the people that are around me to be the experts that they need to be,” Waterworth said.

He said he would do his homework, seek to spend responsibly and “try and avoid as many unnecessary restrictions as possible on the citizens of our beautiful town.”

Communicating with the public

During a Monday night forum hosted by the Powell Tribune, Waterworth said the city government is very easy to observe, but may not be easy to understand. He said he’d work to ensure the city uses as much plain language as possible.

“I’m a middle school teacher; I understand [the] national average reading level for adults in this country is the seventh-grade level, right?” he said. “So you … gotta aim your language to the seventh grade level so that everybody can understand it.”

Sapp said he wants to talk to residents and encouraged anyone to get a hold of him to chat or have a cup of coffee.

“That’s part of the job,” he said, “is being able to talk with you, find out what you’re considering, what you’re wanting to know, and try to get the information for you.”

Budgets and tax cuts

When it comes to budgeting, Sapp called it a balancing act and said the city’s current process is “very well done.”

“We’ve been able to keep our heads above water and keep going,” he said. “A lot of towns don’t have the opportunity to have as good a budget as what we’ve got, because we’ve worked at it long enough that we’ve got it worked out to where we have a little more control …”

As for Waterworth, he said he wants to think beyond “what’s the cheapest choice today” and keep up on infrastructure maintenance.

“… you gotta prioritize your essential services first, and you gotta make sure that those are available,” he said, including thinking about what’s needed to keep those services going.

Waterworth said it makes sense to examine discretionary spending and recurring obligations.

Both expressed opposition to Proposition 1, which would reduce property taxes on residents’ primary residence by 50%.

“Myself, on a fixed income, it’d be nice to have a little more of my income,” Sapp said, “but I can't support this at all because of what damage it does to the facilities of everything the public uses.”

As for Waterworth, he said it appears no one knows exactly what will happen if the measure passes, “and I am not willing to gamble fire and hospital and school and police and city budgets and infrastructure and all of those things on an unknown outcome.”

Revisiting e-bikes?

Both candidates also said the city may need to do some more work when it comes to e-bikes.

Waterworth complimented the city’s recent efforts to create safety rules while suggesting it should focus on distinguishing reckless riding from responsible riding; the teacher said he doesn’t know if middle schoolers are necessarily able to know which is which.

Sapp, meanwhile, expressed concern about more powerful motorcycle-like electric devices being ridden on city sidewalks by young kids.

“There needs to be something in this ordinance yet,” he said, “whether it’s a safety license you have to have, or whether it’s putting license plates on them, to where they have to have some control and some way to know that the person’s capable of handling that equipment.”

Regulating pet numbers or behavior?

As for a recent hot topic — Powell’s pet regulations — Waterworth said the city should regulate harms and nuisances, “but I am confused why we spend so much time regulating the number [of animals].”

Waterworth mentioned that he knows “plenty” of people who exceed the city’s two-dog limit. 

“If we’re going to make rules and ordinances, we have to be willing to enforce them,” he said, adding, “Let’s focus less on the number and more on the care that’s being taken for the animals, and then our neighbors around us.”

Sapp, meanwhile, defended the city’s current rules.

“We’ve studied through and tried to get ordinances that work with everybody,” Sapp said. “Everybody’d like the ordinance to work for them, but their neighbor also has to put up with their animals.”

He gave the example of potentially having six dogs at one end of a three-lot cul-de-sac.

“Is it fair to the other neighbors around to add more to that? No,” he said.

The race could be fairly described as a toss-up: In the four-way primary election in August, Waterworth received 134 votes (33.9%) while Sapp received 133 (33.7%).

Ward 3 includes the southern side of Powell and parts of central Powell, including downtown.