Live from Music Row Monday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed District 4 School Board Candidate Kelli Phillips in-studio to talk about door knocking, early voting, upcoming August 4th general elections, and issues with her opponent.
Leahy: Now we are joined in-studio by our good friend Kelli Phillips, who’s a candidate from Metro Nashville Public School Board in the 4th district. Good morning, Kelli.
Phillips: Good morning. How are you?
Leahy: Well, I guess the question is how are you, because we are 24 days away from the election. Twenty-four days. Early voting begins this Friday, and you wanted to share a little bit about early voting. Where can people vote here in Davidson County, starting Friday?
Phillips: So, starting Friday and going through Tuesday, you can vote downtown at the Howard School building. So that’s where early voting is going to be for the first part of it.
Then, starting on the 20th, going through the 30th, you’ll be able to vote at your local early voting area. Mine is going to be the Hermitage library on James K. Lane.
Leahy: The Hermitage library on James K. Lane.
Phillips: Yes.
Leahy: And that will start Tuesday the 19th. Or Wednesday the 20th? It starts at Hermitage on Wednesday the 19th. So whatever district you’re in,
Leahy: Wednesday is the 20th, right? Right.
Phillips: Wednesday the 20th. Okay.
Leahy: And then early voting ends on the 30th.
Phillips: Correct.
Leahy: Saturday. Then tick-tock goes, because then we have, the Saturday is the 30th, Sunday is the 31st, Monday is the first and Thursday Election Day …
Phillips: Big day.
Leahy: … is the 4th. It seemed to have jumped on us really here quickly. Only 24 days left. Yeah.
Phillips: Time tends to do that the older we get, doesn’t it? It seems like it’s been over a year that I’ve been campaigning, but now that we’re in the last stretch of it, it’s in the blink of an eye.
Leahy: Now tell us exactly where the 4th district is. Tell us the boundaries of the 4th district and a little bit about what you’ve been doing for your campaign.
Phillips: District 4 is the McGavock cluster, and that’s going to be Hermitage, Old Hickory, and Donaldson. And McGavock, that’s a large school cluster.
So as far as what I’ve been doing in the campaign, I have great people that are helping me. I’ve gotten the opportunity to meet so many people knocking doors.
Leahy: So tell me about that. When you say knocking doors, when did you start knocking on doors? And how many doors have you personally knocked on? Let’s get the numbers of that out first.
Phillips: Right, well, in our district, we’ve probably reached, I would say 500, 600 people knocking on doors. And I have people to go out and help me. So I don’t necessarily get the opportunity to knock on every door.
But I will tell you what I do, and anybody who knows me knows that I can have a rally anywhere. I had one last week in the line at Hobby Lobby and met eight people and got six votes while waiting in line at Hobby Lobby to check out. So I take the opportunity to meet people wherever I go.
Leahy: How many votes are you going to need on August 4th to win this election?
Phillips: I think it’s 7,000 votes.
Leahy: 7,000 votes?
Phillips: Yes, it’s a big number.
Leahy: How many of them do you think you have already?
Phillips: I would like to say 51 percent, just for odd sake. That’s a hard number to guess, but, I mean, based on the people that we’ve talked to, I expect to have a good turnout of the registered Republicans that we’ve spoken to. Some independents and then even some Democrats that are leaning towards voting Republican.
Leahy: So you are a Republican on the ballot in this on August 4th for county-level elections. This is on the general elections, not the primary. It’s a general election.
Phillips: Yes.
Leahy: You are the Republican, and from what I can tell, there are five district seats up this year and Republicans are competing in two of those five. Is that right?
Phillips: Correct.
Leahy: And you’re one?
Leahy: I’m one of them.
Phillips: And then Todd Pembroke is in District 2.
Leahy: He’s in District 2, but the other districts are no Republican candidates.
Phillips: There’s no Republican candidates. We do have two independent candidates that are running. Fran Bush is in District 6, so she’s a current school board member.
Leahy: Running as an Independent.
Phillips: Correct. Running as an Independent. And then Amy Pate is in District 8. So remember, Pate for Eight and she’s running as an Independent. So those are good people.
Leahy: When we come back, we’ll talk with Kelli Phillips about the issues and her opponent in the 4th District for Metro Nashville Public School Board.
Listen to the interview:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
