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Editor’s Note: Efforts to reach the third candidate in the District 13, County Commission race in the May 5 Republican Primary were unsuccessful.

Tim Horner wants to finish what he started for Hamblen County as the incumbent commission candidate from District 13.

It was a journey begun two terms ago, Horner says he wants to continue the forward momentum.

“We’ve accomplished quite a few things over the past eight years… and there’s a few more things that I feel like need to be done,” he said. “So, I’d like to get another term and finish those out.”

Those things include finishing school projects, overseeing the move of the Health Department to its new home on Buffalo Trail and the final adjustments to the jail project, which is largely completed.

Horner said he’s proud of the work that’s been done, especially as the chair of the Justice Center/Public Safety Committee.

A report released in 2015 noted “issues related to overcrowding, obstruction of egress paths, door locks, poor ventilation, poor lighting, inability to classify inmates, security, policy and procedures, lack of preventive maintenance plan, deficient staffing, sanitation issues, and lack of outdoor recreation time” and the fact that “severe overcrowding puts the courts and the prosecuting attorney in the position of releasing inmates that they would not otherwise release for the sake of freeing up a bed.”

During much of that time since, Horner said he has helped lead the Commission through the process of bringing the new Justice Center into being.

“The jail was one of my concerns back in 2018 when the candidates were asked what the three main issues facing Hamblen County were,” he said. “I probably had more insight than a lot of the commissioners because I was a bail bondsman for 26 years. I worked under four different sheriffs and was in and out of the jail all the time. And conditions went from bad to worse to deplorable.”

Horner said he understands people are unhappy with the price tag of the new jail since its cost has risen to over $100 million and is the largest capital project in Hamblen County history.

Bid for the jail originally came in in early 2021 higher than the $65 million that was hoped for, but COVID related supply and labor issues drove up the cost. Opponents of the construction successfully lobbied the commission to send out the project for bids again with “value engineering” to hopefully save on the final cost.

What came back was a cost for the jail that was higher than the original low bid and with less features.The Commission voted to accept the bid at that time and a construction process began that ended with inmates moving into the new space in March of this year.

“So we kind of shot ourself in the foot there, but it was a bad time for everything,” he said, pointing to the economic environment of the post-pandemic era. “The county runs on taxpayer dollars and the biggest expense as a county is schools and the jail and labor and insurance.”

Horner said the expense of everything went up greatly during that time and the Commission did its best to not raise taxes, and succeeded in the effort for a good while.

Finally, last year, the math of rising expenses caught up with Hamblen County, and after a property reappraisal, the property tax was raised from $1.22 to $1.47 per $100 per assessed value, a rate that remains lower than all but two counties in the surrounding area.

“You cannot be an effective commissioner if you tell your constituents, I’m not gonna raise taxes, when taxes are what pays for everything,” he said. “And I hear (candidates) say, ‘We’re gonna cut (taxes to find money for other projects).’ What are you gonna cut? Tell me what you’re gonna cut. You can’t cut schools (or other basic services).”

Horner said county residents’ taxes have gone to worthwhile expenditures.

“We took money out of general fund to pave (more) roads and we put SRO officers in all the schools, which I’m proud of,” he said. “I’d hate to go and tell a parent, you know, (that) you didn’t do all you could. We didn’t do all we could for your child.”

Horner said he understands the frustration of citizens paying more in property tax but said that the rising value of property is a large driver of the difference.

He said he was talking to a constituent about the low purchase price of their home versus the high valuation of the property now. Horner understands the natural desire of wanting to be taxed a lower valuation but retaining the actual value of property.

“They want property value low (for taxation reasons) if they’re gonna keep it, but if they wanna sell it, they want it high,” he said.

Horner said he’s been part of the effort to bring more resources to bear for new roads, while acknowledging there’s more to be done.

“Now that we have dedicated money that this commission set aside, we can get more roads paved,” he said. “You know, everybody’s not gonna probably get their road paved (as soon as they’d like), but (the roads that are selected are) based on traffic.”

Other projects are nearly done but still have yet to cross the finish line.

“We’d like to finish out the new health department and get that finished and everybody moved in there,” he said. “Some more of the schools need some attention. A lot of the classrooms are still yet to be renovated that were open classrooms.”