Veteran, former tax collector Aaron Roper announces run for Selma Mayor

Aaron Roper said he wants to be the next mayor of the city of Selma, and he said he has plans for city finance, public safety and economic development.

Roper graduated from Selma High School in 1996. Right after graduation at age 17, he enlisted in the Army and stayed there for 20 years. While serving in the Army he also attended Excelsior College and earned a bachelor’s in business management and an MBA in human resources.  

During his military service, Roper said he did six combat tours between Iraq, Afghanistan and Kuwait. Roper worked in logistics and operations distribution and retired as a First Sargeant.

After retiring from the military, Roper worked as an operations manager for Amazon in Miami. Amazon promoted him and sent him to their facility in Atlanta where he was in charge of inventory control and quality assistance. While in Atlanta, Roper said he created a logistics company that delivered over 80,000 packages in a day. 

In 2020 Roper said, “I decided I wanted to work with veterans. And I realized Selma was an underserved area, so I wanted to move home and fill that gap.” He started the nonprofit organization Vets Helping Vets, which meets the first Saturday of each month. Since its inception, thousands of vets from all over the country have received the help they needed to get the benefits they have earned.

Roper bought a building on Franklin Street in Selma and started another business called The Anchor. His home was a few blocks north on Franklin Street. When the 1923 tornado destroyed his home, Roper said he bought another home in town because “Selma is home, so I decided to continue to invest my life here in Selma versus leaving."

Roper has some experience at Selma City Hall. He was the city tax collector and was in charge of merging the tax collections of the city of Selma and Dallas County to make the system easier for taxpayers. Currently he works for a company called 7 Principals, which helps veterans.

One of the first actions Roper said he would take if elected mayor is to “order a review of all finances and the process” for money that comes into and out of city hall.

Public safety is another priority, according to Roper. He wants to strengthen the police department, and he said he wants to use hard data to pinpoint what crimes are happening in which areas. Much of the information could be reported by appointed “community ambassadors.”

With that information, a public safety score card can be created for each ward. “With this we can publish monthly safety updates via social media or city app,” an app which Roper said is also one of his goals if elected.

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The online public safety score card would also report the number of dilapidated buildings and the number of piles of illegally dumped trash in each ward. It could also report crimes or even car accidents.

Roper said the score card would improve efficiency. “Instead of sending police everywhere, this allows us to identify the hot spots and send what we need there,” Roper said.

Roper also said he wants to create safe zones with increased lighting and visible signage. He said he wants to partner with local organizations of all types to hold community care nights where community members get together and have food and share time together.

As for economic development, Roper said one of the first actions he would take is to create a small business zone mainly for new businesses that can’t afford a storefront.

“People would come there, set up and sell their products,” Rober said. “It doesn’t matter if they’re selling candles or selling chickens.” The entrepreneur would have to have a business license and follow city ordinances, but Roper said this would help upstarts “incubate” their businesses.

Roper said he would also like to create a development council for both businesses and neighborhoods that would streamline processes and help guide businesses get permits and licenses.

Roper has many other ideas he wants to implement to make Selma government more efficient and to help bring business and economic growth to the area. He pointed out that all of the plans he has will cost no money. “The city app will cost something, but everything else is going to cost only time and community involvement,” Roper said.

Other candidates who have announced are entrepreneur Havard Spencer, Selma City School Board President Johnny Moss III, former City Council Administrative Assistant Temekia Sykes and Jamal Jabbar Sanders.  

Candidates running for municipal offices in the August election can share campaign information like this by emailing platform details to news@blackbeltnewsnetwork.com