Nick's Priorities

Smithfield has grown nearly 8% since 2020, and the pipeline is full: Mallory Pointe's 812 homes are building now, the Cottages at Battery's 104 homes were approved in 2025, and roughly 210 more are planned at Promontory. Nick isn't anti-growth — he's anti-careless growth. Every new project should be measured against what our roads, water and sewer systems, and county schools can actually absorb, and against the historic, walkable character that makes Smithfield worth moving to in the first place. Nick supports honoring the density limits in our own ordinances rather than routinely waiving them, and he'll push for the Planning Commission and Council to work from the same playbook instead of at cross-purposes. As Chair of the Board of Zoning Appeals, Nick has spent years applying these rules impartially.

In the last few years, Smithfield residents have watched the real-estate tax rate climb back to 16 cents after a 34% reassessment, the general fund jump roughly a third to about $15 million, water rates rise from $7 to $8.50 per thousand gallons — on their way to $9.50 by 2028 — and sewer rates jump from $3.99 to $6. Then the town paid $6.5 million for the 57-acre Grange property, more than double its $2.9 million assessment, without an independent appraisal. Nick believes protecting that land may well have been the right goal — but no family in Smithfield would buy a house that way, and the town shouldn't either. He'll insist on independent valuations before major purchases, honest math on rate increases, and budgets that treat reserves as a safety net, not a slush fund.

Nick built and ran a small business in a historic Smithfield building, so he knows the stakes when town requirements collide with razor-thin margins. He'll champion clear, consistent, and timely treatment for every merchant — the same rules, applied the same way, with common sense when circumstances warrant. Job one downtown: our farmers market has outgrown its borrowed bank parking lot, and its lease only runs through 2026. Smithfield needs a decision on a permanent market venue, made in the open, that serves vendors, downtown merchants, and neighbors alike. Nick also supports putting the town's adopted five-year tourism plan to work for Main Street, because every visitor who comes for the ham, the history, or the river should leave having spent money in a local shop.

The Grange purchase wasn't just a spending question — it was a process question. Months of closed sessions, a $6.5 million commitment, and a public hearing held a month after the vote. Before that, a $1 million sports-complex commitment made behind closed doors. Smithfield's residents are owed better, whatever the merits of any single decision. Nick will push for a simple standard: major financial decisions get independent numbers, published in advance; public hearings happen before votes, not after; and closed sessions are the rare exception, tightly justified, not the routine. He'll also hold himself to that standard — including recusing himself from any matter where his own interests are involved, full stop.

Our schools are run by Isle of Wight County, but the town's growth decisions fill their classrooms. Housing already approved in and around Smithfield is projected to add more than a thousand students; Hardy Elementary is already over capacity, and Smithfield High's renovation is waiting in the county's capital plan. The county has raised taxes in part because growth doesn't pay for itself — and town decisions helped drive that. Nick will make school impact a first-class question in every rezoning and special-use decision, not a footnote, and he'll push for genuine coordination between the Town Council, the Planning Commission, and county school officials so that approvals and classroom capacity move together.

Smithfield is a safe town, and keeping it that way as we grow means funding police, fire, and emergency services ahead of the growth curve, not behind it — and being straight with residents about what new development requires of them. Nick also believes a town where nearly one in five adults is a veteran should lead by example in honoring that service: supporting veteran-owned businesses, partnering with veterans' organizations on town events, and making sure town hiring and vendor practices are veteran-friendly. [As a veteran of the [BRANCH OF SERVICE] himself, Nick doesn't see this as a program — he sees it as a promise.] (Confirm service details with Nick; if not confirmed, delete the bracketed sentence.)