QUITMAN — Cyndi Kerr of Quitman is a woman of many talents — she’s a hairdresser, has her sewer license and was re-elected Nov. 6 to her third term as mayor.
“I’m cross-trained in just about everything,” Kerr said.
The 49-year-old received 131 votes to Stan Reynolds’ 123 votes in the close election. The Quitman city limits also include a small portion of Faulkner County, where she received 8 votes to her opponent’s 7.
Kerr said she campaigned hard.
“I always do,” she said. “Never take anything for granted.”
She said Reynolds, a former member of the Quitman City Council, told her he thought she made too much money. Her salary is $30,900, but Kerr said she’s brought in $1 million in grants in the past four years, including money to build sidewalks and renovate the sewer plant.
Reynolds, 43, who served 10 years on the Quitman City Council — until 2016 — said he thinks the mayor’s salary “is a little high.”
He said he would have “drastically” reduced the salary, “at least $10,000 a year,” had he been elected.
“I make more because I bring more to the table,” Kerr said. “Three days a week, I do office work, where the other [mayors] did not. We do a lot of things out of City Hall — water, sewer, Parks and Rec, [district] court each month. Sometimes I sit at the bench beside the judge, Lance Wright, and I serve as his court clerk if our court clerk is out. I’m very active in the water department and the sewer department. I do things like water-bill entries.”
She oversees 10 employees, including the sewer department supervisor, but she said if needed, she could step into the role.
“I have my sewer license, and I can actually be over the sewer department,” she said. “I went to some classes at the Arkansas Rural Water [Association] in Lonoke. I went and completed those courses.”
Kerr has come a long way from not even knowing what a city council member does.
“I moved here when I was 18 after I graduated,” she said. Kerr grew up in Prattsville, a “very small town close to Sheridan.”
Quitman’s population is 763.
Kerr said she planned to work at her aunt’s business, Calico Trailers in Quitman, for the summer, then move away. But she met Steve, and they were married. They have two children, Jalesa Cook, 30, and Chaz Kerr, 29, both of Quitman.
“I own a salon, and one of my customers came in and said, ‘We need some new life on the City Council’ and asked if I’d be interested. “I was like, ‘I don’t even know what a city councilman does.’”
Kerr said the man explained it to her, and “I went to City Hall and checked it out and said, ‘I can do this.’”
She served for two terms, four years, on the City Council before she ran for mayor.
“I kind of got to the point that [I said] I really like this, but I kind of had reins on me, and I couldn’t do everything I wanted to do,” Kerr said. “I thought, ‘I’m going to run for mayor and, obviously, be done with it — I can’t do both — or be mayor.’
“I said, ‘I’m going to dive into it head first and see if I can’t make a difference here.’”
Kerr defeated Carthel Pearce her first term and Doug Deckard in her second election.
Deckard was killed in an accident about a year ago, she said.
“He used to work for the city, and he knew a whole lot about our water system …,” Kerr said. “We had a flood, and he was trying to find out where a water break was, and a guy came off the highway and hit him. … It was a nightmare.”
Reynolds said he and Kerr ran “a clean campaign,” and Kerr won “fair and square.” Reynolds
said he doesn’t know if he will run again. “A lot of things change in four years,” he said.
Kerr said she wants to continue what she started as mayor and obtain more grants for streets, parks and other areas of the community.
“We have sidewalks started; we plan on doing 1 to 3 miles in sidewalks. We are going to improve our ball field; it’s like constant work on that,” she said.
“For me, [running for re-election] was just about doing more of the same I’ve done for eight years,” Kerr said, “because we’re progressing in a good way.
“I want to keep the ball rolling in a good direction.”
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.