Name: Darryl Moss
City of Residence: Creedmoor, NC
County of Residence: Granville
Employment: Former Mayor of Creedmoor
Appointed by: Governor
Appointment Date: January 2020
What are activities or leadership roles you provide for the community?
I am a lifelong resident of Creedmoor, NC. I began my career in public service when I was elected to the Creedmoor Planning Board in 1987. In 1989, I was elected to Creedmoor’s Board of Commissioners. In 1999, I was elected as mayor of Creedmoor, where I served until 2017.
What is your connection to rural, tobacco-dependent or economically distressed areas?
Creedmoor, my hometown, is in the heart of tobacco country in southern Granville county. Interestingly, I never worked in tobacco. My mother worked for Granville County Schools, so my summer jobs involved cutting grass, washing and waxing floors, and washing windows at schools in Creedmoor.
When I was elected in 1989, Creedmoor was basically a dead town. 80% of our storefronts on Main Street Creedmoor were vacant. When I left office in 2017, 100% of our storefronts were occupied, we had built two malls and from 2000-2010 grew our population by 82%.
We focused on doing the basics well – public safety, community and economic development, transportation infrastructure, protecting the environment, and finance, administration, and intergovernmental relations.
The turnaround strategy was to capitalize on our proximity to Raleigh, Durham, Research Triangle Park and Raleigh-Durham International Airport. Our marketing pitch was you could live in the country and have access to the big city in 20 minutes.
It worked!
How does your personal and/or professional life complement Golden LEAF’s mission and priorities?
My life’s work has been to figure out how to keep my community safe and to make it a great place to live, work, and play.
What are you most excited about seeing happen in economic development in rural NC in the next 5-10 years?
I would like to see Golden LEAF helping expand access to high speed internet into rural communities. Working from home, remote learning, telehealth and small business are 100% dependent on having this capability.
What do you want people to know about the Golden LEAF Foundation?
To understand the mission – Golden LEAF’s mission is to increase economic opportunity in North Carolina’s rural and tobacco-dependent communities through leadership in grantmaking, collaboration, innovation, and stewardship as an independent and perpetual foundation.