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Charles D. VonCannon has announced his candidacy for re-election for County Commissioner to represent the Third District of Carter County.
Presently a board member of East Tennessee Christian Home, VonCannon suggested and helped organize the annual fundraising benefit dinner.
He also serves as a board member of the Elizabethton/Carter County Foundation which merged with the East Tennessee Foundation. He is the only active member of the original group. VonCannon also organized the golf tournament, which for years was the only fundraising event for the group, which donates funds to Carter County non-profit projects such as improvements to the Roan Mountain Community Park, bike trail signage in Hampton, various S.A.L.T. projects, the sheriff’s garden, and many others projects over the years.

VonCannon is a past board member for Habitat for Humanity and has participated in building 14 homes, to which he has given over 3,000 hours of volunteer labor.
He is a member of a group that picks up trash along a section of Route 400-Watauga Road, and was the only active group until recently.
The commissioner is a long-time Carter County Cattlemen’s Association member and helped East Tennessee Spay and Neuter with fundraising at Tractor Supply.
VonCannon is one of the founders of the Central Community Neighborhood Watch. He provided space for storage for ARM, Chamber of Commerce stage, Carter County Music Program guitars and Habitat for Humanity building materials.

As a community member, he suggested a clean-up of Sinking Creek and organized and worked to clean the stream and banks with the Carter County Sheriff’s inmates.
VonCannon is past president of the Carter County Christian Men’s Fellowship and a past president and member of the Elizabethton/Carter County Retired Teachers Association. He is currently a member of the National Education Association, the Tennessee Education Association, and a member of the Upper East Tennessee Human Development Agency, which provides funding and services to Head Start and other school services, as well as commodities distribution. The agency, which sponsors home winterization projects in Carter County, contributes approximately $1.2 million to local county projects.
Elizabethton High School Bartleby Project to assist a group in identifying and formulating business and industrial projects in an entrepreneurial setting.

Elected to the Carter County Commission in 2010 after losing badly in the 2006 race for Carter County Mayor, VonCannon has been a leader in recycling projects. “I did point out that we should and could bale plastic in our recycling effort and as commissioner, I followed up on a concern that the 66-passenger school buses weighed more than the load limit of the Smalling Bridge. Hopefully, my experience has been helpful on the committees to which I am assigned,” the long-time commissioner said.
A Carter County native, VonCannon is a U.S. Navy veteran and a member of West Side Christian Church, where he teaches a Men’s Bible Class. He formerly served as a production superintendent of American Bemberg, Vice President of Manufacturing of Lehigh Cordage, and is the owner of Bemberg Industrial Center, which currently leases 17 spaces.

VonCannon formerly served as Carter County Director of Economic Development; Director of TN Industrial Training Service, which involved training for 2,200 plus employees at Smyrna-Nissan Plant, and served as Assistant Director of Industrial Training for the state of Georgia.
He is a former teacher at Central Elementary; Boones Creek High; Adjunct Instructor in Management at Tusculum College and Georgia Tech; and Dean of Continuing Education at Trident Technical College, N. Charleston, S.C.

VonCannon’s goals for Carter County as a commissioner are:
• Common-sense, well prioritized projects and long-range planning
• Efficient management of your tax dollar
• More grant funding for infrastructure projects
• Continued support for improving our schools
• High tech, environmentally safe jobs