Knoxify

Cort­ney Piper has chimed in to the Knox­ify head­quar­ters. Ms. Piper is run­ning as a Demo­c­rat can­di­date for Knox County Com­mis­sion Seat 2B.

1. Intro­duce your­self to Knoxville, who are you, and why are you running?

From the moment I stepped on cam­pus at the Uni­ver­sity of Ten­nessee as a mem­ber of the Lady Vol Swim Team, I fell in love with the Uni­ver­sity, the peo­ple and the Knoxville area. I felt like I had it all; the Smoky Moun­tains were min­utes away, the area is sur­rounded by beau­ti­ful lakes and I also had the con­ve­nience of city liv­ing at my fin­ger­tips.

I grad­u­ated from the Uni­ver­sity of Ten­nessee Cum Laude with a dou­ble major in Polit­i­cal Sci­ence and Soci­ol­ogy after a suc­cess­ful swim­ming career.

The expe­ri­ences I had as a student-athlete at UT were some of the most mem­o­rable of my life. All of the hard work I had put into earn­ing a schol­ar­ship cer­tainly paid off. My work ethic was formed dur­ing those years when I would wake up at 5am and swim nine miles per day. I did this while also attend­ing class and excelling in the class­room. The SEC is the tough­est swim­ming con­fer­ence in the coun­try and you can’t be com­pet­i­tive if you don’t put in the many hours of hard train­ing.

My senior year I was co-captain of our team and earned SEC aca­d­e­mic hon­ors dur­ing each of my four years. I still hold one of UT’s top ten fastest times in my favorite event, the mile.

After grad­u­a­tion, I had the oppor­tu­nity to spend some time in New Eng­land work­ing for an orga­ni­za­tion that helped com­mu­ni­ties fac­ing toxic issues. It was a great expe­ri­ence and I learned a tremen­dous amount about work­ing with the pub­lic to find solu­tions to their prob­lems. How­ever, after a huge snow­fall in Octo­ber, I said, “it’s time to get back to Knoxville!”

Since mov­ing back to Knoxville, I’ve had the oppor­tu­nity to work with two great orga­ni­za­tions: Keep Knoxville Beau­ti­ful and The TN Clean Water Net­work.

I’ve been a sub­sti­tute teacher in the Knox County Schools, vol­un­teered for the TN Golden Retriever Res­cue, I am cur­rently a steer­ing com­mit­tee mem­ber for Knox County One Ques­tion, Chair the City of Knoxville’s Bet­ter Build­ing Board, serve on the North Hills neigh­bor­hood asso­ci­a­tion board, belong to the Master’s swim pro­gram at UT and par­tic­i­pate in numer­ous char­i­ta­ble events.

Peo­ple I meet are impressed at how involved I am in our com­mu­nity. For me, being involved and civi­cally minded is some­thing I always wanted to do.

I have a pas­sion for help­ing peo­ple!

I believe our gov­ern­ment should rep­re­sent the needs of its con­stituents first and fore­most and has a respon­si­bil­ity to uphold the integrity of the public’s trust. It is one of my cor­ner­stone val­ues and one that you will see in every aspect of my cam­paign.

I am com­mit­ted to uti­liz­ing my pas­sion, expe­ri­ence, and energy to trans­form our county gov­ern­ment into a citizen-driven vehi­cle.

My cam­paign is focused on cre­at­ing a cit­i­zen dri­ven gov­ern­ment, revi­tal­iz­ing our neigh­bor­hoods, grow­ing local busi­nesses, improv­ing edu­ca­tion and pro­tect­ing everyone’s right to clean water.

2. We think it’s bet­ter know­ing what not to do rather than hav­ing an exten­sive plan. What areas or inter­ests would ben­e­fit Knox County not to ven­ture into?

I agree that know­ing what NOT to do is a great guide. But it is not enough — you have to have a vision and apply it to every­day actions in order to move it for­ward (see my plat­form at http://www.piperforcommission.com/platform/)

As Com­mis­sioner,
I will NOT engage in petty infight­ing or power grabs for my own per­sonal gain.
I will NOT place see­ing my name in the press with a clever sound bite above the inter­ests of my dis­trict.
I will NOT cut back room deals to try to “anoint” a hand– picked can­di­date.
I will NOT agree to ran­dom, per­va­sive, thought­less devel­op­ment.
I will NOT let this dis­trict go unno­ticed.
I will NOT let other areas of Knox County attract small and medium sized busi­nesses while our dis­trict goes unno­ticed.
I will NOT agree to a project that will flood our prop­erty and pol­lute our water.
I will NOT limit or stop cit­i­zens of this dis­trict from voting.

3. What 5 things could you not live without?

1. UT Foot­ball
2. Shoes
3. Hockey
4. Com­puter
5. Cell Phone