December 7, 2019
By: Dwayne Page
The DeKalb County Republican Party caucused this morning (Saturday) to formally nominate candidates for the offices of Assessor of Property and Constable in the August 2020 County General Election.
Incumbent Assessor of Property Shannon A. Cantrell of Smithville was nominated for re-election.
Cantrell was first elected Assessor of Property in 2016.
“I appreciate the nomination by the party and the support of the people in DeKalb County. I look forward to their continued support in the August 2020 election. As always my door is open. Come by to see me. Give me a call. Whatever I can do for you I will,” said Assessor Cantrell.
Cantrell said he has enjoyed his service to the people of the county as Assessor of Property and he praised his staff for the work they do.
“I can’t say enough about my staff. They do a tremendous job. We have done our best to streamline the office to make it run more efficiently and I think we have done a really good job in picking up new construction. We have put some systems in place to be notified when people are building so we can get out in a timely manner and pick those up. With all the building being done in DeKalb County right now, its been a little bit overwhelming but we are doing the best we can with that. The assessment levels and appraisals are definitely going up as far as overall values in DeKalb County which is a good thing for homeowners. I also want to thank the county commission for allowing us to add a staff member to the office which has been a tremendous help. We appreciate the commission and others in supporting us in what we need to work in the office,” said Cantrell.
“Some people have come into the office with questions about the increase in their taxes for 2019. In a lot of those cases it was simply because of the property tax rate increase we had here in DeKalb County as set by our county commissioners for budgetary reasons. That is not something we do in our office. This year because of budgetary reasons they (county commission) decided they had to increase the tax rate,” added Cantrell.
Cantrell and his wife Tonya are the parents of two, 24 year old Kaylee and 16 year old Levi.
Meanwhile Travis Bryant, who currently serves as a Democratic Constable in the 3rd district has switched parties and will be seeking the same office as a Republican in 2020.
“The Democratic Party has done a lot for me. I don’t want to take anything away from them. They work hard and are good people. I just feel like the things I believe in are more in line with the Republican Party and they have been for a while. That is just what I believe in and where I am at. But to me this (serving as constable) has always been a job. I have always taken pride in law enforcement work and plan to continue to do that. I enjoy serving the people of the county in the 3rd district and I’ll continue to as long as they will have me,” said Bryant.
Bryant works for the Smithville Police Department where he serves as Sergeant.
Jerry Adcock, Republican member of the County Commission in the 5th district moved to nominate Incumbent 5th District Democratic Constable Mark Milam as the GOP’s candidate too for the same constable position since no other Republican has announced for the office. Adcock’s request was tabled by the caucus.
Adcock, who apparently made this move without Milam’s knowledge or approval, said it was his way of honoring Milam who is from his home district. Milam, a Democrat, did not attend the Republican caucus Saturday.
Milam has already qualified to run for re-election in the DeKalb County Democratic Primary on March 3.