Bruce Norton.

NORMAN PARK, Ga. — Bruce Norton is currently sitting as the mayor of Norman Park, a position he has been holding for 12 years. Before then he served on the Norman Park city council for three years. 

Norton said he saw his neighbors, friends and coworkers struggling — as were residents in many small towns — and felt he needed to be a part of a solution. 

“They came to the house and begged me to do it [run for mayor] but I didn’t really want to do it. Just like everybody else I saw people all over town suffering like many small towns all over Georgia,” Norton said in an interview. 

Shortly after taking office as mayor, Norton attended a mayor’s conference where then-Gov. Sonny Perdue spoke.

“He said that 80% of the towns in Georgia were less than 5,000 people,” Norton recalled. “So there’s a lot of little towns. Along those lines (the state) had written a lot of laws to give us a lot of leeway to manage and run the city ourselves.”

Norton said that these state policies, grants, the Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax and the Archway Partnership are just a few of things that have helped him improve the lives of the people of Norman Park. At the beginning of his tenure, Norton planned to improve Norman Park’s main street.

“I had a vision and I knew what I wanted to do. Like a lot of little towns we have a main street. We wanted to do that,” he said. 

He along with Archway, the county’s development authority and the University of Georgia School of Art designed lighting, greenery and structural improvements downtown. He said another portion of the improvements included setting up a private clinic. 

“We thought a clinic would be a good idea. Well, we didn’t have any land and we didn’t have a building. Everywhere we turned we heard, ‘no, no and no.’ Eventually we had a family donate us the building. But now we got an old building and some land,” he said. 

He went to the development authority, where he has since sat on as a board member, and it helped secure a new building for the clinic. That was all within his first year as mayor. 

Along with the improvements to downtown, Norton and his staff helped facilitate the selling of the old Norman Park college. He also oversaw the improvements of utility, sewage and water lines and helped to secure a new water tower for the town. He said many of the improvements around Norman Park have occurred throughout his tenure as mayor have been funded by state grants. 

“We have done a tremendous job with grants,” Norton said. “We had the need for the grants, no doubt about that; with a dilapidated sewer system and a water system and that includes a new water tower. We’ve developed this town into something to be more proud of… So I feel like I can do the same thing with the county.”

Norton said he lowered taxes three separate times throughout his mayorship, and it is something he’d like to repeat if elected to the chairman position on the board of commissioners. 

He said his campaign is built on progress. 

“Progress in Colquitt County is an important thing. There are many things in this county to tag onto and use to develop the right kind of progress. Colquitt County has always been ahead of the curve,” Norton said. 

He cites Colquitt County’s history with agriculture as a beacon of progress. There have been changes to the landscape of Colquitt County’s agriculture moving from cash crops to livestock in years past. Now, he would like to focus on produce and other non-row crop exports.

“The history of agriculture here within the county is magnificent. We have seen the transition of so many forms of agriculture. It is our biggest industry. It is tremendous today. I can see developing those options even more. They can be things like packaging on the shelf, show people what Colquitt County provides the country. I can see tax burdens lifted to those working the crops. There is so much we could do for the people of Colquitt County,” Norton said. 

Norton will face current Colquitt County Board of Commissioners chairman, Denver Braswell in the May 24 Republican primary. Early voting is taking place 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday-Saturday until May 20 at the Colquitt County Courthouse Annex. Voters who don’t cast ballots early will do so on May 24 at the polling places in their district. The Republican winner will be unopposed in the November general election.