Kathy Greggs stood outside City Hall clutching the framed plaque like precious cargo that later Monday evening she would present to Mayor Mitch Colvin.
You couldn’t have pried it from her grasp.
“We’re presenting this plaque in honor of Ted Mohn,” Greggs said on behalf of the Fayetteville Police Accountability Community Task Force, speaking to Colvin after Monday’s council meeting concluded. “He taught us a lot while he was here as a City Council member. We’re going to miss him. He also went out to the community organizations and assisted them in the process of understanding what the City Council really does.”
Mohn, who died at age 59 on Aug. 13, served three terms as a councilman, representing District 8 in west Fayetteville from 2007 to 2011 and from 2017 to 2019 as mayor pro tem.
He earned the respect and admiration of Greggs, who is co-founder and executive director of Fayetteville PACT, circa 2015.
“I cried when he died,” says Greggs, 46. “I couldn’t believe it. I cried the whole day.”
Mohn, she says, was there to give her direction on Fayetteville PACT and how it should go about dealing with city issues of equity, equality and social justice in the community. She says Mohn was always ready with wisdom, even after he left the council in defeat to then-challenger Courtney Banks-McLaughlin.
They shared a common bond, from their military careers to their concerns for a better city.
Mohn served 22 years in the U.S. Army, including deployments to Operation Desert Storm, Bosnia and the post-9-11 invasion of Iraq. He retired as a chief warrant officer. After retirement, Mohn worked as a civilian contractor on Fort Liberty, where he prepared military units for overseas deployments during the Global War on Terrorism. Greggs was in the military for 15 years, including deployments to Afghanistan, Africa and Serbia. She was medically discharged as a sergeant first class after being wounded.
“I admired the hard talks he had with me,” Greggs says. “We would talk about the military and how to lead troops in battle.”
He taught her, Greggs says, about the inner workings of city government, to include access to public records requests, city archives and addressing the council on police accountability.
“You know, to look at it and approach it on the inside of what they can do and what they can’t do,” she says. “He was reasonable and open to reason.”
Kathy Greggs will tell you Fayetteville PACT is a better organization today because of Ted Mohn.
“I loved Ted Mohn,” Greggs says, “like a brother in arms.”
He not only guided Greggs in how to approach the City Council about community policing concerns, she says, he encouraged her to consider filing for a council seat in her district.
“Ted always told me he wanted me to run,” she says. “He said, ‘You listen to reason.’ He said, ‘Don’t go in like you are high and mighty’. He said to at first observe and learn.”
Planning election candidate forums
Mohn was working with Greggs in presenting candidate forums this election season.
“We had set up a meeting to meet up to talk about having a candidate forum,” she says. “We were going to get pamphlets. We were going have it at the recreation center at Seabrook, at two libraries and one in Hope Mills. He was going to moderate the forums. We were going to have a committee to do the questions. At the end, we were going to doing education on redistricting maps.”
Ted Mohn would have been a superb forum moderator. He would have asked the right and the pertinent questions regarding city issues from community crime, juvenile curfews, homelessness, downtown parking and where candidates stand on policing to the Fayetteville Public Works Commission to the removal of “All Black Lives Do Matter” that today is a part of the historic downtown Market House.
Mohn suffered a heart attack and a stroke in July while traveling through Indiana on a trip to visit family in Chicago and Wisconsin, according to his family. He remained hospitalized until his death.
“I just feel so bad, because I was on the phone with him while he was driving,” Greggs says.
A memorial service with military honors for Mohn was held on Oct. 15 at the Bill Crisp Senior Center in west Fayetteville. Among those in attendance, Greggs says, was state Sen. Val Applewhite, state Rep. Frances Jackson, former state Sen. Kirk deViere, Mayor Mitch Colvin, former Mayor Nat Robertson, council members Courtney Banks-McLaughlin, Kathy Keefe Jensen, Deno Hondros, Mario Benavente, Shakeyla Ingram, former Councilwoman Yvonne Kinston and Fayetteville Police Chief Kemberle Braden.
Greggs says she wept through much of the service.
Epilogue
Kathy Greggs presented the plaque from the Fayetteville PACT to Mayor Mitch Colvin after Monday’s meeting was adjourned.
“We appreciate your outstanding support and leadership you have provided to Fayetteville PACT,” the plaque read. “Soldier for Life.”
Colvin accepted on behalf of the council.
“Miss you, Ted,” the mayor would say.
The plaque, Greggs says, will be given to Ted Mohn’s family.
Bill Kirby Jr. can be reached at billkirby49@gmail.com or 910-624-1961.
