VOTE DAY WITH BALLOT ENCLOSED

Vote day is finished with the ballot in the signature required envelope.

It took about five minutes.

Using a black ink pen I darkened the horizontal ovals for my people.

You’re doing the same for your people?

Let’s be clear who ‘our people’ are.

Our people, our American friends, are not camera chasers looking for a hot mic to sound angry.

They know their job, the one they want us to vote them into, and promise to do it to the best of their ability.

Instead of practicing their ‘face of outrage’ for their next on-camera event, our people read about the issues and find a common sense way to help.

Along with voting folks into office, 2024 ballots also asked for local funding.

It’s one thing to complain about higher prices on everything, it’s another to ignore the rising cost of government services.

 

Government Services For The Rest Of Us

Two recent incidents brought government services to the forefront.

The first was getting drilled by a car running a stop sign and totaling my good car, the car I’d planned on having the next decade or more.

Two police cruisers, three ambulances, and a fire truck showed up at the dark intersection of a three car crash.

The guys checked everyone out, no one left in an ambulance, but they were the cavalry coming to the rescue.

If you’ve never been on the receiving end of a jarring crash, here you go: It feels good living in a place where human lives matter enough to send the rescue party.

I was dazed and confused and happy to know people cared enough to do their jobs.

I’m not voting for a fireman, paramedic, or policeman, and they’re not running, but I’m sure as hell voting for politicians who keep their constituents in mind.

If Tualatin Valley Fire and Rescue needs more funding?

If Tigard needs more funding?

If the schools need more funding?

Do you want someone working in the guts of government waiting for their leaders to tell them what to do and how to vote, or do you want someone who understands the layout of community problems and brings more information to the table?

Of course there are limits to what government services can do, and vote day is the time we get to make our suggestions on how they do their job.

 

The Second Influence On Vote Day

Like we see on the news and read about, a man recently went out for a walk and dropped dead.

In most cases that’s the end of the story. Not this time.

The man didn’t stay dead because of his alert and highly trained wife who came to the rescue.

Then something dramatic happened that highlights vote day, elevates the importance of the right people in the right places.

On off-duty fire lieutenant from the local fire house heard his phone ping for an emergency.

The emergency was the man who dropped, who was also a neighbor.

The lieutenant responded. He got on the scene with the calvary not far behind.

The wife and the fireman pulled the man to a stable spot and continued CPR.

He was transported to the hospital and evaluated and fixed up.

Instead of leaving a heartbroken family behind, he made a recovery that few have a chance of making.

They just had their first Mother’s Day and looking forward to their first Father’s Day with their baby.

This is the happy ending everyone hopes for, everyone prays for, even the non-praying take it up.

There’s no substitute for being in the right place at the right time, just as there’ no excuse for the wrong person in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Instead of reading statistics and death counts and coming up with, “It is what it is,” the right people dig in so no one can say, “They would have made it, but no one cared enough.”

Vote day is the time to care enough. 

If you can’t see the reason others should benefit off your hard earned money, consider this: If your kid takes a dive and comes up short due to funding of emergency services, it’s not okay.

The same goes for the kids of strangers.

Somewhere down the road you’ll pass an accident and hope it’s all taken care of; you’ll see an emergency team in action and hope it’s all taken care of.

Vote day is where it starts, and no one is immune from life’s predicaments.

Let’s help take care of the community. Vote.

My name is David Gillaspie and I approve of this blog post, along with the other 35oo on boomerpdx.

Consider this a blogger’s love letter to you. If you visit here often, I want you coming back, I want you sending links.

This is that kind of blog, and I’m that kind of writer.

Stand up and vote like it matters.