Tag: citizenship

Categories
culture politics

Speak Up

I loved seeing How to Get Involved in Political Process at KSL. It talks about how to go beyond voting and pontificating to actually making a difference politically. There are many ways to be involved between the voting and serving in an elected capacity. If you really want to make things happen you can look into being a delegate or a lobbyist. (I know – lobbyists have a bad reputation among some groups.)

Other than primary elections, political analysts say it’s one of the simplest ways to effect politics on the ground level, where anyone can help determine who gets a party’s nomination for president.”Anybody can file to become a delegate,” said Craig Axford, Democratic National Committee party organization director for Utah.

. . . To become a delegate that goes to the national convention, first you have be chosen as a county delegate at party caucus meetings or neighborhood precincts, then get elected as a state delegate. . .

Both parties will hold their caucus meetings March 25. The only difference between the two parties is the Republicans will pick county and state delegates at the same time.

If a particular bill is more important to you than a specific candidate, then maybe becoming a lobbyist is more for you.

I also learned a lot from a presentation at the American Solutions conference by Stephen Goldsmith titled Citizenship and Local Government: You Can (and Must) Make a Difference. (download his presentation and the transcript of the Q&A portion of the session.)

The overall lesson from these seems to be that we have to speak up to affect change. Anyone who tells you to pipe down does not trust democracy. Just remember that speaking up does not mean shouting down those who disagree with you. People should express their diverse opinions. If you think the prevailing message is not accurate then track down the facts and learn how to make yourself heard. If after you do that people vote differently than you, they are only exercising the very freedom that made this country great.

Categories
culture politics

A New Generation?

I had not planned to write anything particularly focused on the anniversary of 9/11. Certainly I am not surprised by the number of people who are writing about that. When I read The September 11 Generation Doesn’t Forget it got me wondering how much of the attitudes in that article were real and how much they were based on perceptions from a partisan standpoint. I also wondered if we had really gained a new distinct generation. If anyone has read The Fourth Turning they would recognize the significance of that.

I was disappointed to see that the inappropriate attitudes among liberals that were portrayed in the article were not merely the fancy of a conservative writer. I saw some clearly inappropriate posts on a “progressive” blog here in Utah. I won’t link to the post because any coverage that post gets is more than it deserves. In fairness, that same blog later posted a much more appropriate dissenting opinion. (I won’t link to that either because it leads so easily to the other post.) I’m not ignorant that there is plenty to criticize in our current administration, but some kinds of dissent are more destructive and less acceptable than others.

For an example of what I consider to be the best kind of commemoration for this date see SLCSpin. Like others have said – get out and vote today. Exercising that American privilege is the best commemoration of any important event in American history. For anyone in Lehi, you can learn about the candidates (if you have not already) from Utah-Candidates.com.

Categories
Local politics

Reality Check

Last night I went to a UDOT open house for the East-West Connector project. This has been informally known as the 1000 South boulevard and was previously part of the Mountain View Corridor project before being broken out into a separate project. I suspect that the people working on this project for UDOT already know this, but they and the public need to recognize and reconcile themselves tot he fact that there is no alternative on this project which will satisfy everybody. Planning and building this road needs to move forward not by compromising to hurt as few feelings as possible, but by building whatever is best in the long-term interests of the area.

That’s easy for me to say since there is no way the road can be built in such a way that it will inconvenience me. It can be built badly to inconvenience everyone, but it cannot be built in such a way that it would inconvenience me particularly. No matter how well, or badly it is built there will be some people who it will inconvenience particularly – the only question is who, how many, and in what ways. Those who are in danger of having to relocate, or of living very close to the new road can do a great service to everybody if they will come with an attitude of “how can we make this the best for everybody,” rather than an attitude of “what will cause me the least inconvenience.”

On the other hand, those of us who will not be directly inconvenienced by this need to be understanding of the fact that this will have some immediate negative consequences on some people. We should take that into consideration when we select an alignment.

I heard someone who lives near some of that land that Lehi City had already preserved for this road who wished that the land owners in the area would refuse to sell so that the road could not be built. I’m sure she recognizes that not building the road is not a feasible option considering our current traffic situation. As a distant neighbor I need to recognize that her wish is normal and rather than telling her to pull her head out of the sand I should help advocate for anything that might make this new road better for her and her neighborhood.

One thing to advocate for, which won’t help her neighborhood now but will help other neighborhoods in the future, is a more comprehensive master plan for the city which will preserve transportation corridors earlier and be more strict in adhering to the master plan. Initially Lehi City had planned for this road to run at 700 South. The result is that 700 South is much wider than it needs to be for a 25 MPH road. If they had set the speed limit higher (40 or 45 MPH) people would not have placed houses right on the road and they would have been able to use the original route

Categories
Local politics

Going Public

Rather than waiting for everything to fall in place first, I went ahead today and set up Utah-Candidates.com. That was the site I was inviting candidates to participate in. The invitation still stands, but I purchased the domain. If candidates and citizens are interested I will keep the domain and use it in the various elections each year. Right now it only includes the candidates for Lehi City Council but I have sent invitations to a number of cities in the area and will continue to invite candidates and cities to participate (so long as it’s manageable).

I hope this proves to be a useful resource for our elections – especially the smaller ones, like city and county positions, where candidates are on smaller budgets and where the resulting officials are closer to their constituents.

Categories
life Local politics technology

Open Invitation

As I was researching the candidates for Lehi City Council this year I found a site that had information on most of the candidates. The site was run by one of the candidates and some of the other candidates chose not to participate because of that. I thought it would be beneficial to create a site that would provide a neutral place to learn show candidate profiles (provided by the candidates) and links to their websites. This would help prevent the mental runaround:

“Was it yes2george.com or vote4george.com or am I mixing up the sites for George Perkins and Mike George? Nevermind, I’ll stick with the flyers.

I have created a basic website but I’d like to know how much interest there is for this. If you are a candidate, or know one, who would be interested in having a profile on such a site let me know in the comments. I would also be interested to know if other people would want this as a resource for information. What I do with this will depend on the level of interest generated. (I do not expect enough interest to try charging for the service – ever)

Categories
culture politics

Good Question

I saw a video clip (I believe this was from an “Ask Mitt anything” session) in which someone asked Mitt Romney how he would go about changing the culture of Washington D.C. I thought the answer was good and the question is more important than we might guessed based on the amount of coverage it gets in the media.

P.S. This is also an excuse to test the embed tag in one of my blog posts.

Categories
life Local politics State

Active Citizenship

When I think of ways that people can be active citizens in their political community the easiest action to consider is running for office. I know there are other ways to participate, but that’s the most prominent that I can think of. I was pleased today to see another great example of active citizenship. Pete Ashdown posted a letter to mayoral candidates by Tony Weller. Tony expresses his concerns and asks for feedback from the candidates in order to make an informed choice when he votes for his new mayor. He even invites the candidates to explain why they disagree with him when their position differs from his. For Tony, the key issues are related to local businesses and the vitality of downtown Salt Lake. I think any reasonable person who read the letter would have to concede that it is well thought out and respectful, just like political dialog ought to be.

The results of this kind of effort can be very rewarding. I am interested in the transportation situation currently and as Lehi continues to grow. That interest caused me to contact one of our candidates for city council to ask her for her perspective on that issue. She subsequently arranged to meet with me to discuss the issue. I’ll have to wait until the meeting to know how her position compares to mine, but because I took the time to ask I will not be voting blindly on this issue. That being said, I am starting to think that I might get even more information by querying all the candidates generally, such as Tony Weller did, rather than relying on meeting as many candidates as possible.

Categories
politics

FrontRunner ESR

This is the time when I wish I had a large audience of local residents. Utah Transit Authority (UTA) has issued a press release announcing their Draft Environmental Study Report for the southern portion of FrontRunner. Because there is no direct link to the individual press releases I will quote much of it here.

The Utah Transit Authority (UTA) has prepared a Draft Environmental Study Report (Draft ESR) for the proposed Provo to Salt Lake City FrontRunner Commuter Rail project. . . A 30-day public comment period of this Draft ESR will begin on August 22, 2007 and conclude on September 21, 2007. Written comments on the document must be postmarked by September 21, 2007. Written comments on the Draft ESR should be addressed to Utah Transit Authority, Attn: Provo to Salt Lake City FrontRunner Draft ESR, P.O. Box 30810, Salt Lake City, UT 84130-0810. Copies of the Draft ESR are available for public review at the following locations:

  • {Most public libraries in the area}
  • Mountainland Association of Governments
  • Wasatch Front Regional Council

The Draft ESR is also available at UTA’s Meadowbrook office (3600 South 700 West, Salt Lake City) and on UTA’s website. Comments may also be submitted via the website.

Two public hearing/open house meetings are scheduled to receive comments on the Draft ESR. The Hearing/Open House Meeting dates are scheduled for the following time and locations:

August 29, 2007
Westmore Elementary School
1150 South Main Street
Orem, UT 84058
4:30 p.m. – 7:30p.m.		 August 30, 2007
Sandy City Hall
10000 Centennial Parkway
Sandy, UT 84070
4:30 p.m. – 7:30p.m.

I encourage anyone between Provo and Salt Lake to look at the ESR and submit their comments to UTA. This is one of those opportunities we have to make our voices heard on a decision that will have lasting impact on our quality of life. I am definitely in favor of FrontRunner but I still plan to read the ESR and see if it raises any concerns. Then I will be submitting my comments to UTA.

Categories
culture politics

Growing Discomfort

I said before that I was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with my favorite major candidates over one issue. That issue is the issue of health care reform. Obama seems firmly in the camp of having the federal government provide health insurance for many or all Americans. I think this is a very bad idea. It looks easy on the surface, but I think it is a step towards making our government financially insolvent.

On the other hand, Mitt Romney has experience implementing health care reform as governor. On the surface his approach sounds more like the kind of thing that I could accept. That means I am more comfortable with Romney than Obama on this issue.

What this country really needs is for the federal government to scale back in many areas where it was not meant to be. We are working towards a homogeneous society where there are no substantive differences between Idaho and Florida. The strength of this country is our freedom to make choices. Unfortunately we are working to create a society where there are no meaningful choices that have not already been made for us through our laws. This is not a recipe for stability. We need the challenge of meaningful choices if we are to hope to build the kind of strong character in our citizens which drives us to do the things that make this country great.

Categories
culture life

Fireworks and Personal Responsibility

It doesn’t take much thought to realize that a hot, dry summer does not mix well with fireworks. Governor Hunstman called on cities to ban personal fireworks because of our conditions this year. The Deseret News Editorial on the idea notes that legal fireworks seldom create problems. The fact that we make laws which we don’t enforce encourages unlawful behavior. We should not be waiting for the government to tell us what is smart.

This situation, and my personal feelings leave me in a bind. Tomorrow all the cousins are getting together to celebrate and the families decided that we would purchase fireworks jointly instead of individually. None of us take the time to purchase illegal fireworks (which are expensive and pale in comparison to the professional displays anyway) but with the extreme fire season we are having this year I believe that it is irresponsible to act as if personal fireworks are some inalienable right. If it were not for the fact that our family has already agreed to do fireworks together I would choose not to do any personal fireworks this year – I’d just stick to the professional displays.