Wednesday, July 3, 2013

Washington County Tea Party Meeting — June 29th 2013

GUEST POST by Larry Lundin (President, Washington County Tea Party) — 

The meeting started with a presentation by Elizabeth Allan Hodge on the Patriot Academy. She emphasized standing up for principles and that is what the Patriot Academy teaches. The Tea Party passed the hat and collected $202 to sponsor Rachel Neckels of Midvale for the scholarship to attend the Academy August 13-16 in Boise. The total cost of the Scholarship is $650. The Washington Republican Central Committee and the Tea Party will put up half of the $650 and Rachel will come up with the other half. Rachel will be well versed on the Constitution and what our Country stands for when she gets through with the School.

Steve Ackerman, a Professor from Boise State was our next speaker. He spoke on Obama Care and how it is going to be a very costly endeavor to implement and how we need to do everything possible to nullify it. It has to start with electing the right people to office.

Russ Fulcher, Senator from Ada County was introduced next and gave a short talk on how we need to develop our natural resources and affirm Capitalism. I hope to see a lot more of him and I would like for everyone to take a good look at him because he may be throwing his hat in the ring in the Primary for Governor. He was asked if he would have promoted the Affordable Health Care Act like our present Governor and he responded with a resounding "No."

Jim Chmelik, a County Commissioner from Idaho County and expert on Government Lands, gave the next presentation. He painted a very clear picture of why Idaho and the rest of our Western States should be working to obtain the US Government lands as stated in Article 4 Section 3 of the US Constitution. 63% of the land in Idaho is owned by the US Government and it has been sorely mismanaged the last few years. The radical environmentalists have pretty well put a stop to logging and grazing so more and more fuel has been allowed to build up and burn. Jim thinks that a gradual process of turning over some of this land to the State it could be managed much better and with more revenue to the State and Counties without the huge fires we have been experiencing.

The next speaker was Bob Forrey. He is an expert on the Idaho Department of Lands. He presented a list of businesses and properties that the Land board owns that are in direct competition with private businesses. If you didn't know, the Land Board is managed by Gov. Butch Otter, Attorney General Lawrence Wasden, Superintendent of Schools Tom Luna, State Controller Brandon Woolf, and Secretary of State Ben Ysursa. Bob related his displeasure with the board's insistence in competing with private business and the land swap of Land on Payette Lake for a Building in Idaho Falls that left a million or so on the table.

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