Danny Foley is vying with incumbent Clayton Kendrick for the Mayo River District seat on the Patrick County Board of Supervisors in the November election.
Foley, who previously served on the board from 2004-2007 and from 2012-2015, said he started considering campaigning for the job in December.
“I just got to seeing that the county looked like it needed a change, and needed to go in a little bit different direction than what it was doing,” he said. “Nothing major, but we just needed a different shift.”
Foley said U.S. 58 will be open up to tractor-trailer traffic once the construction project is complete.
“What the county needs to be planning on is infrastructure down 58 to be ready for when that happens. Without infrastructure, you don’t really get any growth. That’s why we really don’t have a lot of growth in Patrick County, because of the shortage of infrastructure,” he said.
Foley believes the county needs to seek grants for infrastructure improvement and create a five-year plan. Work also may be needed on the Patrick County Administration Building.
“There’s a lot of cracks in it, and I really think we need a structural engineer to check it out to try to make sure that the building will be usable for the next 50 years,” he said.
“The citizens of Patrick County are very smart and have great ideas. I’ve heard a lot of them over the years, and we just need to work for the future of the county,” he said.