Candidate Questionnaire: Radha Ravi Varma
Cary, NC – This is an installment in our Candidate 2017 series, in which candidates get to respond in their own words to the same three questions.
We publish the responses in the order we receive them. This questionnaire is submitted by Radha Ravi Varma, running for District A on the Cary Town Council.
Why are you running?
I am running for Cary District A (West Cary) Council because I love my Town and would be honored and humbled to participate in its future. With your support, I promise to work diligently and intelligently to make Cary the best town to live in. It is well known that our town has numerous issues that influence its future and the quality of our lives. As a well-regarded community, we should openly discuss these issues, and construct the best solutions within our budget to turn Cary into a beacon of service and pride for other cities to emulate.
To Save Our Lives, Our Town, and Our Planet.
What are your top three priorities and how will you accomplish them?
With all your support, I propose to:
- Completely eliminate home invasions and break-ins
- Attain the highest level of safety where we live, work, play, and our children study
- Protect surging property values by ending aggressive overdevelopment in West Cary
- Completely ban new home development in West Cary until caps are removed from all schools
- Ban plastic bags and other non-recyclable plastic items and adopt water free, fertilizer free organic lawns (around our homes, schools, offices, greenways, parks, and roadsides) to conserve water resources and preserve & protect our environment
- Provide four lane access roads at all schools – West Cary has 3 high schools and the largest middle school in Wake County within a 5-mile radius. School transportation creates excessive noise and traffic around our homes which may degrade the quality of our lives, property values, and environment.
- Make Cary once again the No. 1 place to live and work. According to Money magazine, Cary was the No. 1 place to live and work in 2004 but the same magazine dropped our city to No. 37 in 2016
- Reduce the highway 540 toll and collect a fair fee on the entire 540 Loop
Save Our Lives, Our Town, and Our Planet!
Give us a brief bio and tell us about your relevant experience
I am an honest, trustworthy, open minded, nature lover, and easy-going person. I have a great love and respect for my family, my fellow families and the environment that we all share. Like many others who live in our Town, I also prefer a quiet and harmless environment in which to live and work.
I hold a Master’s Degree in Power Systems Engineering and a Bachelor’s Degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering. I have worked as an educator, software engineer, and mentor, and currently working as software developer, real estate broker, and a real estate investor.
I moved to the USA 19 years ago and have lived and worked in California, Ohio, Massachusetts, Washington, and Oregon. I have been a frequent visitor to Cary since 1998 and finally moved here in 2013 to raise my children in this wonderful environment.
I have been married to my wonderful wife, Indradevi for 17 years. My wife is a pharmacist and she has been volunteering in a school since 2014. We have two wonderful daughters, Harini – a high school sophomore and Varshini – a third grader.
My hobbies include reading, handyman work, farming, gardening, oil-free cooking, and listening to and learning music.
Save Our Lives, Our Town, and Our Planet!
Website: http://radharavivarma.com/
Read more in the Candidate 2017 series.
Water free, fertilizer free lawns? If you live in Cary, maintain your yard. Pride in personal property is what makes Cary great. No way you get my vote with the ridiculous priorities you mention.
Good Luck. You’re *really* going to need it. #ElectJenniferRobinson
I’m confused . . . You bring out many so-called problems that you describe as harmful, but then you state that you “finally moved here in 2013 to raise my children in this wonderful environment.”; I’ve lived in Western Cary for over 30 years and have helped move Cary to be “this wonderful environment” – thus my confusion!
Your pledge of “Completely eliminate home invasions and break-ins” seems like just another political impossible promise that you may never achieve.
My confusion leads me to believe that staying the course with my current elect official and not to change my council representation in District A and across our Town of Cary Council, is the best choice to ensure my home town continues to be “this wonderful environment” to raise my grandchildren.
You crazy. Elimination of crime. If you can do that then you need to run for the White House. But since that will never happen– people answer the questions for real. If not stop dreaming.
Besides the fact that it’s an unattainable goal – we live in Cary, people. It’s a statistical fact that Cary is one of the lowest crime municipalities with more than 100,000 people in the ENTIRE COUNTRY, let alone NC proper. We’re already essentially at “…the highest level of safety where we live, work, play, and our children study.”
The NCGA has severely restricted the ability of municipalities to block development. Good luck getting anything approved and passed that restricts the abilities of developers to develop more things, and not pay development fees to improve the infrastructure and services of the area when thousands more people show up.
The Town of Cary already uses low-water landscaping methods for many of its public areas and greenways. What water does get used is, in many of those places, greywater for irrigation purposes.
Cary itself can’t provision 4-lane roads at all schools – many of the feeder roads to those schools are county or state roads, not local roads. That means funding to expand them falls to CAMPO at the best, and the NCDOT at the farthest away from our control, and they’ve already planned projects through 2040 — http://arcg.is/2iPnrdX
Dare county (OBX) banned plastic bags back in 2010 – and with arguably more reason to do so, since the ocean and all. The NCGA overrode that 2 weeks ago and eliminated the ability of municipalities to pass such laws: http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2017/Bills/House/HTML/H56v7.html:
* SECTION 19.(a) Part 2G of Article 9 of Chapter 130A of the General Statutes is repealed.
* SECTION 19.(c) Section 13.10(c) of S.L. 2010‑31 is repealed.
* SECTION 19.(d) This section becomes effective September 1, 2017.
37th on Money’s list is still 37th out of all U.S. towns and cities with populations of 50,000 to 300,000 (823, and there are only 59 cities larger than 300k people in the U.S.), by eliminating the 100 worst job growth markets, then the next 200 highest crime communities, then any community with a 90% ethnic majority. That cut the list to 200. Then add in median property vs median income, local economy, low taxes, and accessibility to health care, culture, good public schools, and sports. Out of the remaining 100, eliminate the 5th or higher city from any one state or one per county to get to the top 50.
Also, the Town of Cary doesn’t control the 540 loop tolls, that’s a state road. The toll system is managed by the NC Turnpike Authority.
Good response.
Well said, Mark. Your response to Radha’s proposal is spot-on and calls out his utter misunderstanding of how government works at the local level. This candidate’s proposal sounds like a middle schooler’s promises while running for student council: “If you elect me we’ll have nachos for lunch every day!” Not to mention that he’s lived in six states in the past 19 years and he lists three current professions. Seems like nothing can hold his attention for very long. I can’t imagine that this run for town council is anything more than a whim. His interest in it will certainly fizzle out quickly. He’s probably better off running for a seat on his HOA’s board.