The Perfect Storm

Wow! it's amazing how time flies by when you're busy. The election is only a week away.

The last time I posted, I realized how much time I really spent volunteering with different projects concerning the underprivileged in the community. I didn't want to paint a picture of that being the only thing I do.

I wanted to write of other things concerning local politics, but i had an internal conflict with my frustration for local government and my personal pledge to myself not to say anything negative about others.

It was that same frustration that eventually led me to stop going to city council meetings. I found myself struggling to keep from gasping in shock, rolling my eyes or shaking my head in disbelief at what i was seeing, hearing, and witnessing in that room.

It's also the same frustration that motivated me not to complain, but to do something about it. It's what led me to run for city council.

The past month or so I've been reading and talking to folks about the way things are going with the city council, and I've been feeling a little discouraged and sometimes wondering what I was doing. Was it going to be worth it? Could I begin to make a change?

This was during the time when mayor Garner went around the council and straight to the board of works to change the hiring conditions for fireman. It was about the same time that one week the council voted not to give the mayor more money to pave roads until he had a list of streets or some type of plan, then a week later the mayor comes back without a plan and they still give him the money. Where's the conviction? If you have none, then why delay it a week? If you have some, then why not stand by it?

It was then that i started thinking about the perfect storm. Not only the thought of the city council and the mayor similar to the destructive storms that come together to do more damage, but I also thought of the Andrea Gail in the movie The Perfect Storm. I picture the tiny ship against a monster storm and enormous waves.

It's not the impossible odds or the adversity of the conditions that inspires me, it's the direction the ship is heading. It's moving forward. It's not turning around. It's not running from the storm for safety, it's driving through the storm to get back to where it belongs.

If you've ever had the opportunity to sail in heavy seas, than you know that you can't do it alone. It takes a crew of like-minded, focused individuals who can concentrate on the task at hand and move the boat forward. The captain of a sailboat only has as much speed as the sail trimmer can give him.

My goal is to hopefully be a member of a crew of people who want to move New Albany forward, even if it's through the storm to get where it needs to go.

This election isn't about me, it's not about the 2nd district. It's about New Albany as a city from downtown to the suburbs.