Church Chat! Get out and Vote, Mat-Su!
Posted by Jeanne Devon on Monday, October 1, 2012 · 4 Comments
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It’s a little more than a month until the general election in November, but for the Mat-Su Borough, election day is also tomorrow! I saw this message from Michelle Church and I asked her if I could repost it here. I hope all you Mat-Su folks remember to get out and vote tomorrow. The results will hinge on a very few votes, so turnout will make the difference.
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The woman’s shoulders shook and her hands clenched. Her ragged voice broke as she testified to the Assembly about a land use conflict. I sat there in the audience chairs and I felt her anxiety, distrust, disbelief and pain. How many times has this happened to people of the Matanuska-Susitna Valley? They buy property, build a home out of pocket or finance their life away. Their investment is then fractured by a conflicting land use (gravel pit, sex shop, 100 foot cell tower, liquor store, pig farm, race track, etc.) that causes their dream to crash. The woman’s property value plummeted and her retirement hopes vanished.
This feeling of being wronged by one’s government is an epic fail. And avoidable. My opponent stripped back the few restrictions which would have prevented this fail. So, yes, a tower or gravel pit could be your next neighbor.
And the whole thing is amplified by a callous indifference by the Mayor and the Assembly. There is a cold, empty chair where the woman’s Assembly person is supposed to sit. He is in China. Again. His long-distance voice occasionally crackles with condescension from afar on the intercom. But there is no face to the man who holds this Assembly District 3 seat. In fact, at times there is not even a nameplate because he is so frequently absent.
This story is real and it has been played over and over again. And this is the reason I am running for this Assembly seat. I will be there.
I would love to visit China, someday, but it will be on my own dime and when I am not a public servant. Instead I visit Sweetie Pie Street, Rough Cut Circle, Chickadee Drive — all in the Assembly 3 District.
It may be nice to live like my opponent, in a mansion on Morning Mist Drive, but instead I live in a Colony Farm house with my family, 131 chickens, 2 turkeys, bunnies and a great family and cat. While my opponent was repeatedly listening (maybe?) to an assembly meeting from a hotel resort overseas, I was jammed in the audience chairs at the Mat Su Borough Assembly meeting.
I don’t begrudge anyone with a job overseas. But I do begrudge a “public servant” for not serving, for not acting for the people he represents, for not being physically present at more than half of the year’s challenging meetings.
I have put in 920 hours in my campaign, visited at least 745 homes, met hundreds and hundreds of people, and stopped in 31 neighborhoods. I have seen your gardens, petted your dogs, listened to your views, smelled your barbeques, and this is what I have learned: You care about your home, whether it is a fabulous mansion or a small A frame. This is your investment. And I care about keeping it safe. Please share this message near and far. And thank you for reading this story. Please vote for Michelle Church on Tuesday.
Sincerely,
Michelle Church
Candidate for Assembly District 3
Matanuska Susitna Borough
[And just in case I have to say this]
Paid for by Michelle Church for Assembly, PO Box 1145, Palmer, AK, 99645
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Comments
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I had a chance to meet this woman.
Her opponent IS ALWaYS GONE.
My sister, who lives in Ms. Church’s district, got confused as to who he actually is. She realized she didn’t know what he looked like. (Yes I made her do a lineup… snicker.)
The Mat Su borough is no mans land. Anything goes. Dig a gravel pit, watch the surrounding area water table flow into the pit and flip the neibor a off when they complain about having to drill a new water well.
It makes no sense to ignor land use planning like the borough does.
I know the borough employees use their time to respond to land use conflicts. And the borough gets no money for such things as gravel pits. The gravel pit trucks use the roads, cause harm to area water wells…
Basically it’s a mess and what does the borough do? Spend time and money answering to the mess. How stupid is that?
Appropriate land use planning isn’t a highway to hell. It is a quality of life issue.
A vote for Ms. Church is a vote for a higher standard of public service. A vote for the other “human” means Made in China is front and center and public service is for sale.
From the looks of the gear shift knob and steering wheel,the young lady appears to be sitting on an M or an H Farmall. Throttle lever definitely appears to be McCormick. I did not know Alaskans had tractors. Learn new stuff all the time at the Mudflats.
‘Course we have tractors, mike! They are pulled by teams of huskies.
Yes, indeed, Mike, and she knows how to operate it, too! I wished today that I was in her district and could have voted for her. She’s smart, does her homework, thinks beyond the moment, lives here all the time, and actually cares about others. I’m anxiously waiting for results.