Meet candidate Hershey

For four years I have fought for you, the people of Glenwood. I have fought to ensure a more responsive government, a government that listens to you. I have fought for maintenance and repair of our roads and city infrastructure. I have fought to prevent unfettered growth including the Donegan project. I have fought to keep assets like our airport. I have fought to preserve our character and community while remaining tourist and business friendly.

Council is not a school dance planning committee. There should be vigorous debate and opposing views. For too long we had a council that was unified in overspending rather than focused on our citizens. They might have all agreed but they did not fix streets and they did not listen to the electorate. They spent millions beautifying a small area downtown while neglecting everything else.

We need business and prosperity in our city, but we also need to fix our roads and sidewalks. We need to make sure our utilities work and ensure you and your property are safe and protected. These are the “quality of life” services that the government must provide.

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I ran for Council to represent you, not entrenched special interests. I don’t have a business motive or political agenda; my only purpose is to serve and fight for you.

If I am the sole vote on any one issue, to not raise taxes, to not waste money, then so be it. I am conservative and responsible with your tax dollars. In creating debate, in being the voice of dissent, I hold our government accountable to you, I raise crucial questions, and I help ensure that your money is not wasted.

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It is not my job to get along and vote with the majority. Being a collaborator is not good governance. Without dissent there is no in-depth review of matters. Without discussion your voices are ignored. I don’t work for city government, I don’t work for the chamber, and I certainly don’t work for Council. I work for you. And with your support I will continue to represent you, the citizens of this great community. Once again, I ask for your vote.

Tony Hershey, Glenwood Springs City Council Member

Sumner’s our choice

We’ve known Sumner Schachter for over 20 years. He’s our neighbor on Blake Avenue. 

Sumner has vast experience serving on many boards, listens well, is articulate, thoughtful, concise, and is fiscally responsible. He’s just the kind of person we need to help guide our city into our future. Vote for Sumner this April.

Murray and Diane Reynolds, Glenwood Springs

Zalinski for at-large council

Level-headed.

Fair and balanced.

Passionate yet able to negotiate.

These are but a few of Erin Zalinski’s qualities she brings to the council chamber.

I’ve known Erin since the opening of TreadZ on Cooper Street some 15 plus years ago. I watched how they grew their business using sound business principles with a strong focus on building customer relationships.

I believe a vote for Erin will ensure a sense of cohesiveness returns to the council.

Suzanne Stewart, Glenwood Springs

Schools admin housing assistance questioned

Curious to know where your tax dollars might go? Come to the school board meeting on Wednesday, March 15. 

I strongly encourage you to familiarize yourself with the latest “Down Payment Assistance Program” proposal made and supported by a majority of the Roaring Fork School District’s Board of Education, which, in its current form, seeks to provide up to $500K in down payment assistance to one single employee, the Superintendent.

Currently, RFSD has 66 rental properties and 14 deed-restricted properties; for 800 employees. A majority of the school board is proposing that up to $500,000 be made available to one, singular employee, the RFSD Superintendent, to help the person in that position purchase a home in this valley.

Our current superintendent has been employed in our school district for 8.5 months. We have devoted teachers who have proven their dedication to our students and communities for six, nine, 12-plus years who have rented housing in Silt, Parachute, Gypsum and beyond without being afforded the same opportunity of down payment assistance — for any amount. 

At the time of writing this letter to the editor, the public has not seen the anticipated financial impacts of this decision. If you would like the board to best represent your interests on this topic, please consider signing up to speak or submitting written comments before Wednesday. Use this link to sign up: https://tinyurl.com/RFSDBoardComments031523, or see the Board of Education button on the rfsd.org website to read more.

Lorri Knaus, Carbondale

More race reflections

It was with great interest that I read Edward Mooney Jr’s. recollections on his encounter with racism when he was young in his letter to the editor “race reflections” in the March 6 Post Independent. That’s because I had a similar experience when I was a boy.

I was four years old in 1953. My family took a trip to the Smokey Mountains in Tennessee. It was my first exposure to the segregated South.

We pulled into a Chattanooga rest stop. I first noticed the white and colored water fountains. I wondered if the water came from the same source. My attention was drawn to the white and colored bathrooms because I had to go. Curiosity drew me to the colored facility. It wasn’t well kept. My father rushed to pull me out of there hoping nobody noticed.

Further down the highway, there was a black family burying their dead by the side of the road in a makeshift coffin.

“Why are they doing that?” I inquired, “Why don’t they bury them in a cemetery?”

“Because white people don’t want them in their cemeteries,” came my father’s reply.

“They don’t even want them around when they’re dead?” I wondered aloud,” What kinda people are these?”

“They’re the kinda people who go to church on Sunday and worship the God of love, then spend the rest of the week hating their brother because of the color of their skin,” declared my mother who grew up having never seen a black person.

Seventy years later, racism is still rampant in this country and not just in the South. Examples of this abound and none more profound than just seven years ago we elected a very racist president, and he’s running again next year with considerable support.

But I must allow, the situation is improving. Heather Heyer, a young southern woman, put her life on the line protesting a Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017. I saw lots of young white faces in the Black Lives Matter marches of 2020. Martin Luther King’s dream hasn’t been realized yet; we’re on the way. Give it another 400 years.

Fred Malo Jr., Carbondale