Working for the People.

Because of the difficult economic challenges facing the Upper Peninsula and Michigan today that need immediate, undivided attention and endless effort by leadership to address, I have decided to run for the 109th District House of Representatives seat.

We cannot wait to find better solutions for the hundreds of mining jobs our region is set to lose, continue to restructure our public education system without input from those professionals that are doing the job, rely on others for our energy needs or pass bills to fix our roads and infrastructure with money that isn’t there. Skilled labor and public education are the pillars of economic success that Michigan was built on and they are high priorities in states with economic prosperity.

Now is the time to look at the structure of Michigan’s Headlee Amendment (1978) and Proposal A (1994) and ask ourselves if they are working the way we intended them to. If not, we need to find better ways to restructure Michigan’s tax collection and distribution of funding to allow for more regional and local control. Less money should go to Lansing where Legislators and lobbyists have too much power and influence to push special interests that often represent the minority.

Michigan is at a critical point in history where elected officials need to step up and represent the voice of the people when solving these complex economic issues at hand in order to move our state forward. Voting with common sense and respect for how we spend taxpayer money is desperately needed.

I have always voted with fairness, transparency and consistency as an elected official and I believe I have the moral compass, work ethic, education and integrity that is needed to represent our district at this time. I look forward to working for the people of the 109th and the challenges and opportunities still ahead of us. Together, we can build a better Michigan.

Jobs and Economy

The attack on labor in Michigan has to stop. Without highly skilled, educated employees who are paid a working wage, we will continue to see limited investment by business and industry to create economic growth in our state. Worker security in both public and private sector jobs in Michigan is falling rapidly, and our ability to compete globally with other states who have higher numbers of educated and trained workforce employees shows...

Education

Labor and Education are the pillars of economic success, not the problems. We need to invest more in education so that our graduates can stay in Michigan, find good jobs and invest more back into Michigan’s economy...

Headlee Amendment and Proposal A

With the passage of the Headlee Amendment in 1978, Michigan shifted much of the local and regional control of our taxes to Lansing. What was supposed to keep ‘Big Government’ spending in check by limiting local property tax increases and specifying that state revenue cannot grow beyond 9.5% of total personal income has left huge deficits in our economy. For fiscal year 2013, Michigan’s revenue was $6.5 billion below that limit. Collectively, state revenues have been more than $90 billion below that limit since 1979...

Energy

The one challenge the Upper Peninsula must get right in order to keep our economy competitive in today's global market is energy. I strongly believe that creating energy independence in the U.P. will be a key component in how we steer our economic future for the next 30 years. By diversifying our energy portfolio and adding wind and solar to our current mix of coal and gas we would create additional job opportunities and reliability...