I have been helping Jenn Daniels on her campaign run for the Gilbert Town Council seat. In February, I invited many of you to my house to meet her and to see for yourself the woman whose face is on the signs at every intersection, that is before someone started stealing her signs right after the primary election.
Ms. Daniels has so much energy, a great attitude and a willingness to communicate with every resident of Gilbert. She wants to streamline and cut the red tape that keeps businesses away from our town. Gilbert is known for being the worst city to start a business in and most companies are nearly broke before their front doors even open. The process needs to be examined and Gilbert needs to start improving the process sooner than later if we are to sustain the growth and cost of this growth over the next few years. The Town of Gilbert NEEDS small and large corporations or we will likely see our taxes increase.
One last thought: Why can she handle this job being a mother of young children? First, the town council meetings are at night, twice a month. Other meetings are also held at night. Second, any woman who can handle three young boys, be on the board of a pro-family organization, being fully active in her church, being married to a man, managing a household of five, surely knows more about anger management, conflict resolution, time management, employee disagreements/strifes, laundry detail, class warfare, economic sanctions, and job security than any of the other candidates.
Just my 2 cents on the subject of experience. I believe she can handle the job just fine!
The following is an outline of her platform from her website (www.voteforjenn.com):
As a member of town council I will work hard to:
* Balance the town budget with NO NEW TAXES
Gilbert is running an 8.5 million dollar deficit. We must confront this challenge head-on.
My plan to stabilize the town budget is a four step process.
1.) Eliminate waste – this will necessitate expedient line by line critique of the town’s general fund budget.
2.) Prioritize the expenditures – define between the wants and needs of our community while sufficiently funding our core services (police, fire, streets & water).
3.) Increase the tax base – make it easier for businesses to do business in Gilbert. Change the mindset at the town level to work with local business, not against them.
4.) Save for the future – State shared revenue makes up 35% of the annual revenue budget and there is a two-year lag time on that funding. We need to be looking ahead 2-4 years and beyond to make sure that our spending isn’t exceeding our revenue.
* Create and open lines of communication within our community
There is an inexcusable disconnect between the people of Gilbert and our local government. It is essential that the council return to open and transparent communication with the people who elected them.
Want to know more or help with the campaign...leave a comment for me!
