From Brooklyn to Selma: The Heart and Hustle of Adele Walker

Jonathan Breeden: [00:00:00] On this week’s episode of The Best of Johnston County Podcast, our guest is Adele Walker, who’s a candidate for the mayor of Selma, North Carolina, and she’s on the ballot right now, and the main election day is November the fourth, 2025.

We talked to Adele a little bit about her growing up in Brooklyn, New York. Her time as a police officer in Florida, her time as a realtor here in Selma, North Carolina. How her and her husband sort of accidentally got into the antique business. We also talked a little bit about her vision for Selma and what she wants to see if she were elected Mayor.

So listen in.

Welcome to another episode of Best of Johnston County, brought to you by Breeden Law Office. Our host, Jonathan Breeden, an experienced family lawyer with a deep connection to the community, is ready to take you on a journey through the area that he has called home for over 20 years. Whether it’s a deep dive into the love locals have for the county or unraveling the complexities of family law, Best of Johnston County [00:01:00] presents an authentic slice of this unique community.

Jonathan Breeden: Hello and welcome to another edition of The Best of Johnston County Podcast. I’m your host, Jonathan Breeden, and on today’s episode we have Adele Walker, who is a candidate for mayor of Selma, North Carolina. She’s gonna be on the ballot on November this sixth

Adele Walker: November 4th.

Jonathan Breeden: November the fourth. Okay. I gotta get better at local elections. November the fourth, 2025. So in just a couple of weeks for Mayor of Selma, she is running against the current incumbent mayor of Selma, Byron McAllister, who was on this podcast a few months ago talking about his vision for Selma and what he wanted to do. And now we’re gonna talk to Adele about her vision of Selma and what she wants to do.

We’re also gonna talk to her a little bit about her time growing up in New York. Her moves to Florida. She’s been to Florida twice. She was a police officer and at EMT and she is now a realtor with Real broker LLC there in Selma. But before we get to that, I’d like you to like follow, subscribe to this podcast wherever you see [00:02:00] it, whether it be on Apple, Spotify, YouTube X, LinkedIn, TikTok, or any of the other social media channels of The Best of Johnston County Podcast.

The Best of Johnston County Podcast comes out every single Monday. It has now for right at two years. We’re over a hundred episodes and we’re very happy to have made it to a hundred episodes. And our plan is to bring you a hundred more over the next couple of years. So if you would do that, you would be aware, made aware of future episodes of The Best of Johnston County Podcast.

And if you wouldn’t mind, go back and list some of the previous episodes over the last couple years, we’ve had the vast majority of the county commissioners, we’ve had the county manager, Rick Hester. We’ve had the County Parks Director, Adrian O’Neal twice. We’ve had Chris Johnson, Johnston County Economic Development Director.

We’ve had tons of small businesses, just dog people, Woody Bailey, Woody’s computing, talking about local IT services. We have had all kinds of guests. So if you love Johnston County as much as I do, this is the podcast for you. Welcome, Adele.

Adele Walker: Thank you.

Jonathan Breeden: We’re happy to have you here. I met you golly, six or seven months ago. I think. I Johnston [00:03:00] County Republican Party Convention.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: I think that was in March of 2025 when you were first launching your campaign for Mayor of Selma. So tell the audience who you are, what you do.

Adele Walker: My name’s Adele Walker. I am a real estate agent in downtown Selma, and I also own a antique and thrift store called Walker’s Treasure Box.

Jonathan Breeden: I did not know that. I’ve learned something new and downtown Selma’s full of antiques and antique stores. That’s sort of what it was known for.

Adele Walker: Correct.

Jonathan Breeden: You know, it still is. I mean, maybe there’s not as many antique places, but it’s still a great antique location, correct?

Adele Walker: Correct. Yes. Yeah, I co-own that with my husband.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. How many antique stores are in downtown Selma now?

Adele Walker: Unfortunately a few have closed, so we’ve got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. Well that’s good. That’s good.

Adele Walker: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: They all doing a good job.

Adele Walker: Yeah, they’re doing great.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, that’s awesome. That’s awesome. Yeah. ’cause I mean, that really was the thing when I thought of Selma, at least until Eastfield, I [00:04:00] thought of the antiques.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm. Correct.

Jonathan Breeden: And we’ll talk a little bit about Eastfield in a minute, but so where’d you grow up? You sound like you’re from New York.

Adele Walker: Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York.

Jonathan Breeden: Alright. And at some point, I think you’ve told me before we started recording, you moved to Florida?

Adele Walker: Yes, my parents moved to Florida my middle of my sophomore year, moved to Miramar, Florida and then we moved to West Palm Beach all my last two years of high school.

Jonathan Breeden: I gotcha. And then you went back to New York for a little while, but you ended up back in Florida and you became a police officer.

Adele Walker: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Tell me a little bit about that.

Adele Walker: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: Why did you become a police officer?

Adele Walker: It has always been my dream. I have four new uncles that are New York that are retired New York City police officers. My brother’s a retired New York City firefighter, so we’re a family of service and I’ve always just wanted to be a police officer. It always been my dream since I was a kid.

Jonathan Breeden: So, where were you a police officer and, I mean, what were your jobs?

Adele Walker: I was worked on the road, road patrol and I worked for the town of Palm Springs, [00:05:00] and then I also worked at the town of Lantana.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. Well that’s cool. That’s cool. So did you have to like chase people down and cuff ’em .

Adele Walker: Well, absolutely. I sure did. Sure did.

Jonathan Breeden: I gotcha. I gotcha. So, when and how did you end up moving to North Carolina?

Adele Walker: Moved to North Carolina in 2010 ’cause my ex-husband had received a promotion out here in Raleigh and I’d always wanted to live in the mountains.

I figured we’re closer to the mountains here, so we came out in 2010 with my children, my four kids.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. And where did you live then?

Adele Walker: First went to Carry and then I found Johnston County. So 2014, moved to Johnston County and we lived in Clay, lived in Clayton, lived a little bit all over, lived in Garner.

Lived here in Garner Clayton.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. So when did you, so you, so since 2014, except for, I know there was a, a brief period, you were somewhere else. You pretty much [00:06:00] lived in Johnston County,

Adele Walker: correct? Yeah, 2018 to 20. I also did try going back to Florida. Went to Sarasota and realized that I did not like Florida and I was a JoCo girl. So moved back to Johnston County and haven’t looked back.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. So is that when you moved to Selma?

Adele Walker: We purchased our building in 2021, my husband and I. Okay. While we were traveling, we took a, we took a one year hiatus and purchased an RV and traveled the US in our rv and

Jonathan Breeden: Oh that’s good

Adele Walker: when we purchased the building in Selma and then we came back and built the building ’cause it was just, it was a, it was a gut job in the building in Selma.

Jonathan Breeden: I got you. So y’all both, that’s where the antique shop is now?

Adele Walker: Antique shop is downstairs and we have a, an apartment upstairs.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. So you live in the store?

Adele Walker: We do. We have a 2,500 square foot apartment, three bedroom, two and a half bath upstairs on top of the store.

Jonathan Breeden: So you really do live in downtown Selma?

Adele Walker: [00:07:00] I do, yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Oh my goodness. I did not know that. That’s interesting. Well, that’s definitely gonna make you an advocate for downtown.

Adele Walker: Absolutely.

Jonathan Breeden: If you live there and your business is there.

Adele Walker: Correct.

Jonathan Breeden: So when did you become a realtor? I know you worked with Real Broker LLC.

Adele Walker: Yeah, I became licensed in December of 2015.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. And is, where’s your office for that?

Adele Walker: In Selma as well? I have my office right in my building where my antique store is.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. All right.

Adele Walker: Everything is one stop shopping.

Jonathan Breeden: One stop shopping. That’s awesome. That’s awesome. Well, that’s great. That’s great. Alright, so we’ll ask a couple realtor questions. I love realtors. What is the number one mistake you see buyers make when they’re coming into your office to buy something?

Adele Walker: They think they can get the world for a little bit of money. They don’t realize, I have to show them reality, what they can actually afford. They have to sometimes be willing to take less than what they actually want.

Jonathan Breeden: I got you. Well, I mean there’s that and, [00:08:00] you know, home prices, particularly Johnston County have been going up. Interest rates are still six point a half, 7%.

Adele Walker: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: You know, so that’s tough. So, all right. What would be one thing that a seller could do to make their home more attractive to a buyer?

Adele Walker: Carb appeal is number one, I would say. And also making sure that their home doesn’t have any type of odors. I’ve had a lot of those.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. Pet odors.

Adele Walker: Pet odors or cigarette odors. You definitely wanna make it welcoming. Welcoming. When people walk into your home, the first thing that they smell is definitely something that’s good.

And I, you know, staging your home is really good. You could use your own furniture to stage. Less is best just showing people the, able to see the size of their rooms with less furniture.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. You know, I had, I was actually told that when I went to sell [00:09:00] my house, April Stevens was helping made me sell my house in 2010 and my wife and I had gotten married, so we’d combined houses.

Adele Walker: Okay.

Jonathan Breeden: So like we took her couch and her living room furniture and put it in the dining room. So we had a dining room, but we didn’t really actually have a dining room.

Adele Walker: Right.

Jonathan Breeden: You know, and, and the first thing, April Steven said to me, one of our now county commissioners was, you gotta get some of this furniture out of this house.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: And I’m like. She’s like, it’s not gonna sell. Like I go get a storage unit or something, but you’ve gotta get some of this furniture out of this house.

Adele Walker: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: And, and I, she was absolutely right about that, so. Alright, so, what, tell me a little bit about the antique business you have. I love to go antiquing. I’m a sort of an old soul. I love downtown Selma. Not been antiquing there in a few years. Did go there. Few years ago with my in-laws and stuff, but, so, so what kind of antiques do y’all specialize in?

Adele Walker: So, I have to say that this business actually started because of my husband. [00:10:00] When I met my husband, he purchased storage units and he had his garage full in Clayton when we met.

And I am totally decluttering. I do not like, do not like garbage. So. I was moving to Florida, we were dating, and I told him, I said, if you’re gonna follow me to Florida, I’m not taking any of this junk. So I posted on Facebook and while he was at work, got rid of everything within a couple of hours for free.

Jonathan Breeden: Oh.

Adele Walker: Emptied his garage. So that’s how you know he absolutely loves me. We moved to Florida and when we moved to Florida, I started working as an assistant manager at the Goodwill in Florida. Started realizing that Sarasota’s Goodwill is one of the highest, over a million dollars just in a couple of months at their stores.

So I actually went home and told my husband, I think I have, may have been [00:11:00] wrong about your junk. Let’s look into this storage unit stuff again. Show me how you buy. And then we opened a store there in Florida. I wanted to get back to Johnston County. So we closed it and I said, well, if we move back to Johnston County, let’s look for a place we don’t have to pay rent.

Let’s buy a building. And that’s what we did. And that’s how it all started. It started with my husband. So we buy storage units and you never know what you’re gonna find. We have found lots and lots of antiques. We buy really good storage units. We find a lot of other stuff as well.

Jonathan Breeden: Oh man.

Adele Walker: Very unusual things.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, I used to love the show’s, storage Wars.

Adele Walker: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: I watched it religiously.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: I think I’ve seen just about every episode.

Adele Walker: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: And I know that some of that was staged.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: But some of it was real.

Adele Walker: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: I don’t know how much was staged and how much was real.

Adele Walker: Yeah, yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: But

Adele Walker: yeah, a lot of it is, is staged. But if you know how to buy the [00:12:00] unit. It can be really good.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, I did hear that sometimes the producers would hide stuff in the units

Adele Walker: mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: To make it more interesting.

Adele Walker: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: But sometimes they would buy units and there’s nothing in ’em

Adele Walker: Correct.

Jonathan Breeden: Of any value and they would lose money.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: So, they were an interesting, you know, and, and I, you know, it, it was a TV show.

Adele Walker: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: But the people that were in it were real storage buyers. Yes. You know, and I think as they had to create more and more episodes, maybe it got more and more.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: You know, they would put stuff in it, but still, I, I found it to be fascinating. You don’t have any idea what you might get.

Adele Walker: Yeah, we don’t, we actually, we buy them online and you don’t, you just see pictures of it.

Jonathan Breeden: And you know, oh, you don’t actually go and be in, you know, be like, we do it online, you know?

Adele Walker: No, we do it online from pictures and you know. Knock on wood. We’ve never purchased a unit that’s made us lost money.

We have. That’s impressive. We’ve had a unit that was actually straight even that was our worst [00:13:00] unit. That was straight even. But we haven’t lost money. And we actually

Jonathan Breeden: That’s impressive.

Adele Walker: The Florida units are much better. We actually found $4,000 cash in one unit, so that was very

Jonathan Breeden: Oh my goodness. That’s awesome.

Adele Walker: Yeah, it was awesome.

Jonathan Breeden: That’s awesome. So then you have to. I guess get somebody to haul it up here from Florida if you’re gonna sell it in Selma.

Adele Walker: We did. Yeah. Well, yeah, we haven’t bought it. We, we haven’t bought any from Florida in a long time.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: Because we’ve had so much luck with actually people who, when they pass away and they know I’m a realtor, their families contact me and we’ve actually been ended up buying homes now.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: We’ve done a lot of stuff for people.

Jonathan Breeden: Oh, cool. Cool.

Adele Walker: We’ve bought collections of things.

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Adele Walker: From people that have passed away.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, that’s awesome. Well, the one thing I want people to understand is Goodwill is not a charity, right. It is a for-profit company. I think based in Chicago. I’m not like we got Goodwill at 40 42.

I give stuff to Goodwill, but But don’t kid yourself. It is [00:14:00] not a charity, it’s a for-profit company as you’ve talked about.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: I’m not saying they don’t do good work.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: But it’s not a charity, you know, we now have, yeah. The Durham Rescue Mission over here at 40 42, and it is more of a charity than, than Goodwill.

So I would definitely say visit that it’s in the old Badcock Furniture business building. Right. Right behind the cookout and the Just Tires and the Panera Bread

Adele Walker: mm-hmm

Jonathan Breeden: here at 40, 42, 40 Veterans Parkway, 40 36, whatever you want to call it.

Have family law questions? Need guidance to navigate legal challenges? The compassionate team at Breeden Law Office is here to help. Visit us at www. breedenfirm. com for practical advice, resources, or to book a consultation. Remember, when life gets messy, you don’t have to face it alone.

Jonathan Breeden: So anyway, let’s talk a little bit about why you wanna be mayor of Selma. I mean, it’s seems like a not the most glamorous job in the world. So why do you [00:15:00] wanna be mayor?

Adele Walker: Being mayor definitely was not something in the books for me. I had no desire at all to run for any political office. I enjoyed the behind, the scenes, helping the politicians go out and helping them get elected. That’s what I did. But what I found in our town that things were being done that were, unethical, immoral and there was a lack of compassion in our town.

So what I found, people were sitting around at the coffee shop on a given day just complaining, complaining and talking about what the administration was doing and everything. And I just said one day, why are we just sitting around here at a coffee shop complaining? Why isn’t anyone doing, why don’t we actually talk about it? When I started talking about it, I actually got a phone call from one of the residents. Adele, you need to stop. Be quiet. Don’t say anything. You’re gonna make us look bad.

No, that’s not making you look bad. It’s trying to make a change. If you don’t speak up, you’re not [00:16:00] going to make a change. I was tired of just sitting around talking, you don’t need to be talking about someone behind their back. Let’s bring it out publicly. So that’s why I jumped in and said, I’ve gotta do this.

No one else is gonna do it. People are gonna keep complaining and,

Jonathan Breeden: alright, so what are, what are some of the things that you want to do if you’re elected Mayor of Selma?

Adele Walker: Number one is looking to our infrastructure, our pipes. We have clay pipes in the majority of our town. And I found that out when I built my BU building a month after building my building, there was sewer coming into my building, spending nearly a million dollars building my building, and I’ve got sewer coming. Why find out that the town pipes, which the mayor, the current mayor, continues to say it’s not the town pipes, but it is the town pipes main line had broke, the clay pipes broke and the sewer was coming into my building.

So that is number one. I. There’s other people’s homes that this has happened [00:17:00] to. I wanna fix that. I wanna make sure that our infrastructure, we have roads that flood, I’ve spoken to a resident who’s lived in town for 20 years. Her home has flooded three times in 20 years. There’s no reason for that. The excuse is, it’s always been that way.

Well, I don’t like that excuse. Right. We, you make changes.

Jonathan Breeden: So the pipes I mean, the town doesn’t just have the money to fix the pipes. I mean, it has a little bit, but a lot of that stuff comes from the state.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: When it becomes major projects like that.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: Now the town of Selma was awarded some money from the state to move a pump station to help Eastfield.

So that is happening right now. Larry Strickland got that money for the town.

Adele Walker: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: Do you know how much money it would take to fix these clay pipes?

Adele Walker: Larry Strickland had actually told me that over $20 million was given to fix the pipes.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: Okay. I don’t know exactly where that money is.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: We don’t know where that money is. Yesterday at the town council meeting, there was a someone from Withers [00:18:00] Ravenel who claimed that they received a $1 million grant to fix some pipes, and she’s. Spat off some streets that were fixed, but I still like to know where those other, the other 20 million is.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: We, so that is one of the things I wanna go in. I wanna look at the books. I wanna make transparency. I want our checkbook to be online, for our taxpayers to see it is the taxpayers money. Let ’em see where the money’s being spent, where is, where are we receiving the money from?

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: That pump station that I told the pump station was not, was just completed recently for all the buildings at Eastfield, right? There was no sewer system. They were doing pump and hall.

Jonathan Breeden: Right?

Adele Walker: Why were they doing pump and hall after it was built? The restaurants, they still haven’t even filed for a permit for a pump station, for the permits, for the restaurants. Why are we building restaurants when we have no sewer system?

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: And I’ve spoken to Johnston County and I have the email where it was confirmed. It still hasn’t [00:19:00] been put in.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. So you don’t think they should be building what they’re building at Eastfield right now?

Adele Walker: No. We need to get a sewer system in first. Why are we putting restaurants without a sewer system? Pump and Hall is a temporary fix. It’s something temporary for building not for that. I am all for having these wonderful, big businesses, but we need to do it proper. Just like with our pipes. We need to have a foundation first. You don’t go and build a home, and then you put in pipes after.

Makes no sense. Why is that being done?

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: How is that even done?

Jonathan Breeden: So you would be your position that they should stop issuing building permits for eastfield.

Adele Walker: So we finally have a sewer system. Yes. We need to have a sewer system. We absolutely need to have a sewer system first, and then we have our sewer system, then we can have all those great restaurants and everything else. So, and just one thing.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: There’s a lot of other issues.

Jonathan Breeden: What’s your second big issue?

Adele Walker: Our second is our electric deposits for new renters moving into town.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Adele Walker: We have. If you have no [00:20:00] credit at all, if you just graduate college, you’ve got no credit, and you come and move into our town, or you have bad credit, you need to come up with $1,800 in order to turn your lights and your water on in your town of Selma.

That is ridiculous. There’s no town that requires an $1,800 deposit if you do not pay your electric. It’s turned off immediately. No one’s gonna have an $1,800 bill in one month. So why would you do that? It makes no sense why that is being done and there’s no reason for it. I have people who have reached out to me who have maxed out credit cards to put on lights and water.

We, we don’t need to be doing that to people. That’s not right. And what was the, is the current administration’s answer when someone comes in? Well, if you can’t afford our electric, then get the heck out of Selma.

Jonathan Breeden: Yeah. Well, Selma is 60% rentals,

Adele Walker: correct? Correct.

Jonathan Breeden: So I, it’s a lot of people having to come in and turn it on and, and, and rental stuff. I know Smithfield is [00:21:00] more than 50% rentals

Adele Walker: mm-hmm

Jonathan Breeden: as well. I think that’s a little surprising to people that live out here in Cleveland and Clayton and stuff. That, that, that’s how it is. What’d you think about the tax increase? 70% tax increase on the citizens of Selma. The county reevaluated.

They raised the values of the tax base in Selma, about 70%, and the Town Council chose not to change the rate passing a 70%, which is almost doubling the town taxes on the citizens of Selma. Did you think that was a good idea? And will you continue? That increased tax rate if you are the mayor?

Adele Walker: Yeah, now, now I don’t think it needs to be increased at all. And it shouldn’t have been increased. It actually has hurt a lot. That’s, I’ve been a lot doing a lot of door knocking. A lot of the elderly have shared with me they’re on disability. It’s really hurt them. I have one family who’s gonna put their house for sale. They’re leaving Selma. They’re not renters, they’re owners, and they’re, they’re leaving Selma. It’s absolutely hurting [00:22:00] people. The money is not being spent wisely. I mean, as you said earlier, $40,000 raise to a town manager who is there just a couple of months, not even, why was she given that raise plus given time off to get her law degree? It just doesn’t make sense. There’s a lot of things that I, I don’t understand, that have been allowed being done. They’re also picking and choosing whose homes to give fines to.

Jonathan Breeden: So the Code enforcement, code enforcement, that’s a big thing.

Adele Walker: Oh, that is a huge issue.

Jonathan Breeden: I know when Mayor McAllister was here, he talked about the code enforcement and putting the shine on the ma on onto Selma and how he was, he was really doing that and, and getting more involved in that.

I mean, I don’t know if you’ve seen that. What do you think about code enforcement?

Adele Walker: Oh, it, it, it’s horrible. She’s an, she’s horrible. She treats people with distain. And I, I understand. [00:23:00] The way she treats is because the administration has told her to treat people that way.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay?

Adele Walker: So I, I, I don’t 100% blame the employees. The employees walk around on eggshells. There’s been a loss of over 80 employees in the four years with the current administration, and I’ve got the list of those 80. I’ve spoken and gone out and spoken to 25% of those 80 employees, they all have the same common denominator. They left because of one reason. A couple of them have asked me if I become mayor, if I would hire them back.

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Adele Walker: I told em that’s not my job, but.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. I understand. I understand. So,

Adele Walker: yes.

Jonathan Breeden: So, what else are you planning to do? You wanna make code enforcement friendlier?

Adele Walker: Friendlier.

Jonathan Breeden: And maybe more consistent.

Adele Walker: Consistent. Well, yeah. And we don’t need to charge the fees that they’re charging. They’re charging $175 fee if you leave your lid open this much. We’re gonna stop that. We’re gonna stop that. People have trash. Their lid may stay up that open if they have an entire [00:24:00] family.

We’ve got single moms with five kids. One small trash can is not enough. And if they wanna get a second trash can they have to pay well. They’re also on a set budget as well as just like a lot of people are.

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Adele Walker: So we need to help. It’s not about giving charity, it’s about having some compassion for some of these people and at a time we need to be able to help our community.

We only have 7,000 residents. I think we can afford with our $30 million budget to actually help our people and actually be able to show some compassion in the town.

Jonathan Breeden: I got you. All right, and I guess before we get to the last question, I guess before we, before we get to the last question, what’s the other, what’s one more thing you want to do for the town?

Adele Walker: I wanna bring this together. I, I, there’s a lot of diversity and a lot of people, that, that we’ll say the north side, the south side, the east, the west, that they don’t feel included in our town. We need to make [00:25:00] everyone feel included in our town again, we’re only 7,000. We’re not a large town. My job is to, we’ll, will be to take care of Selma. No one else but Selma and I wanna be able to be that person to bring our town together.

Jonathan Breeden: All right, well, how can people reach out to you?

Adele Walker: They can go on my website, adelewalker.org. And if not, they can actually personally call me on my cell phone. My number’s (919) 763-6771.

Jonathan Breeden: Alright. And early voting starts by the, this episode’s gonna run next week tomorrow. Right. So early voting tomorrow will be ongoing as this, as this episode runs.

Adele Walker: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: And election day is November the fourth. Fourth, correct. 2025 at the

Adele Walker: Harrison Center in Selma,

Jonathan Breeden: at the Harrison Center in Selma, which is a beautiful building. I’ve been there

Adele Walker: mm-hmm.

Jonathan Breeden: Many times. It’s, it’s really, really a beautiful building.

So, if you live in Selma and you like what Adele had to say about her [00:26:00] vision for Selma I’m sure she would appreciate your vote. The last question we ask everybody on this podcast is, what do you love most about Johnston County?

Adele Walker: I love the people. People are pretty amazing, and that’s what brought me back to Johnston County.

Jonathan Breeden: And almost everybody says we’re over a hundred episodes. 95% of the people say it’s the people. I think it’s the people. Adele Walker thinks it’s the people. So anyway, we’d like to thank Adele Walker for being our guest on this week’s episode of The Best of Johnston County Podcast. Like we asked you earlier, please like, follow, subscribe to this podcast wherever you’re seeing it.

Tag us in your Instagram stories, Best of Johnston County, and leave us a five star review down below to help raise our visibility so other people will be aware of The Best of Johnston County Podcast. Until next time, I’m your host, Jonathan Breeden.

That’s the end of today’s episode of Best of Johnston County, a show brought to you by the trusted team at Breeden Law Office. We thank you for joining us today and we look forward to sharing more interesting facets of this community next week. Every [00:27:00] story, every viewpoint adds another thread to the rich tapestry of Johnston County.

If the legal aspects highlighted raised some questions, help is just around the corner at www. breedenfirm. com.