This letter is to share the horrific assault on free speech and democracy in the Town of Hope Mills.

I recently helped organize a Candidate's Forum Meet and Greet for those running for office in the Town of Hope Mills. I responded to an online post asking for volunteers and decided to help. Little did I know what a firestorm of discourse I would create! 

With all good intentions, I joined Hope Mills residents Harriet Horner, Sally Bailey, and Phyllis Hales to organize a Candidate Awareness Campaign for Hope Mills's citizens. We organized it, prepared the five questions to be presented to the candidates, promoted it, and distributed a general information flyer to local business. Collectively, we paid for everything.  

The discourse and firestorm started when we asked Meg Larson of the HopeMills/CumberlandCountyMatters Facebook site if we could post Forum information on her site. Larson insisted that she wanted to know who was hosting the event and who would be the moderator. To my surprise, the following comment from Meg Larson was emphatic: "I'm not supporting anything that has that racist piece of sh** involved!" 

I advised her that we were still looking and deciding on that, and Up & Coming Weekly newspaper and Bill Bowman were not even a consideration. This is when I realized there is a small but vocal faction of discontented Hope Mills residents (The Chatter Group: former Hope Mills Commissioner Meg Larson, Lisa Carter Waring and Mike Smith, (who is not a resident of Hope Mills) that share several unscrupulous common bonds: They have all have weaponized social media sites specifically designed to disparage Hope Mills progress and defame Jackie Warner, undermine her leadership and disseminate information to their online audiences that are anti-media, anti-Up & Coming Weekly newspaper, and anti-U&CW Publisher Bill Bowman — honestly, we had no idea this was going on. 

This is when I began receiving mean, hateful, and threatening texts. I was told in no uncertain terms that: "Everyone (Larson, Smith & Waring) has already stepped up to do something better for this community. Now that you [the committee of concerned residents and forum organizers] have gotten involved, it somehow negates the decades [of work] that some of us have done." 

Larson refers to the ongoing attempts to undermine Mayor Jackie Warner's leadership and diminish her accomplishments as Mayor over the years. Larson also accuses Mayor Warner of creating the Candidates Forum for her benefit. Nothing could be further from the truth. I believe the assault on me and the event was caused because the Chatter Group perceived that Mayor Warner engineered the Forum to garner support for her reelection. This is not the case. 

To mitigate the rumors and accusations and set the record straight, I attended the Board of Commissioners meeting on October 16th. I spoke directly to the Mayor and Town Commissioners about my concerns and the hateful way our committee was being treated for trying to do something valuable and good for the entire community.  

It was also disappointing that the next day, Commissioner Joanne Scarola conducted an online "fireside chat," advising everyone on the chat that our event was thrown together haphazardly [sic]and poorly executed. This seems like highly unethical behavior by a Hope Mills Town official. 

She identifies herself as a member of the Chatter group. The response to our Candidates Forum by Mike Smith, Joanne Scarola, Meg Larson and Lisa Waring has been so outrageous and unprofessional that I can only believe it is an ongoing attempt to discredit me, the Forum committee and Mayor Warner.  

To sum it all up, I genuinely believe that initially, they were so frightened and distraught at the thought that Mayor Warner and newspaper publisher Bill Bowman from the Up & Coming Weekly were behind organizing the event that they panicked and attempted to destroy it by discrediting its organizers. This is sad and alarming. 

Until now, we had no idea this systemized misinformation network and unethical behavior was happening in our community. Now, the Candidate Forum committee and I have experienced it firsthand while exposing those individuals who have weaponized social media sites into a three-tiered network of lies, slander, and misinformation: Mike Smith: The Hope Mills Bee, Meg Larson: Hope Mills/Cumberland County Matter and Lisa Waring: The Hope Mills Chatter. 

They discredit Bill Bowman and his weekly newspaper and vigorously work against Mayor Jackie Warner's success, progress, and achievements, those who support and admire her, and those who genuinely love the Hope Mills community. The proof is the quality of life we experience daily living and working in the lovely Hope Mills community.

 

           — Cindy Hamilton, Hope Mills