News Worthy Moments

This latest election did something that political experts said would never happen.

A write in candidate not only got voted in, but received the top votes!  And people are noticing.  In fact, we've been in the news quite a bit since our humble beginnings.  

The first major event residents put together was the Park-n-Protest.  Concerns about a new development called The Lofts at Deer Run brought this forward.  This development of 74 units on under 3 acres of ground had only one parking spot per unit.  Residents, realizing this meant that additional cars would defer to parking on 2700 E, had concerns.  South Weber residents have proven they don't sit idly by.  And so we didn't just complain about our concerns.  We demonstrated it.  

The goal was to put 74 cars on the road to show the dangers that would come with on-street parking on 2700 E.  It was very clear even just a handful of cars was a cause for concern.  The road is narrow and the line of site is limited.   But we didn't just put 74 cars on the street.  We put over 130!

Channel 2 News heard about our event.  You can read their news story here, or watch it below:




Residents Paul Sturm and Corinne Johnson pose for a photograph with the Standard Examiner.  News of the Lofts Development came about when Paul noticed some people and activity on the lot and asked what was happening.  What started as 2 concerned citizens turned into a Facebook group of more than 1,000 followers and the formation of a non-profit organization called The South Weber Preservation & Conservation Advocates (SWPCA).

The Standard Examiner also came out to show our story.  You can read their story here.

But it didn't stop there.  A petition went around and received over 1,000 signatures from people who have concerns about the Lofts Project.  In addition to that, because of what was demonstrated at the Park-n-Protest, we were able to meet with the city's public safety committee to address parking concerns.  We were able to talk about 2700 E as well as other areas in the city where on-street parking could become a safety hazard.  It was decided that a recommendation to red stripe the curb on 2700 E and other areas of the city will be done in order to keep our residents and streets safe.  You can read more about that on this blog post here. 

The next big event residents wanted to put on, sponsored by the SWPCA, was to inform citizens about a proposed road called South Bench Drive.  South Bench Drive was confusing for many people, and it was hard to understand it fully.  And so a virtual viewing tour was put together and held at our Family Activity Center.  We had over 150 people attend, many of which had never heard about this road.  The goal here was simply to inform the residents so they could get their comments, concerns and questions back to our city officials.   You can view the South Bench Drive Virtual Tour, including drone footage of our beautiful city and interviews with residents, below.  

Our next big win was when we got final numbers in for the survey results.  In the past it was considered wonderful if the city received 25 comments, this time, we got 489!

The city officials were listening - it was hard to ignore!  Changes were happening as more and more residents got involved.  Our meetings were full, sometimes needing to be changed to other locations in order to fit us all.  Our city officials were getting more emails than they were able to keep up with at times (but they did keep up with them!).  Conversations and discussions were taking place, questions were being answered and concerns were being addressed. 

 Election time got its own set of attention.   The standard examiner, learning of my write-in candidacy and that my mother was also running for office in her city (with the same concerns about over development) decided to do a story about us.   You can read more about that story here.

Election Night was a bit crazy when the Davis County Auditor and Clerk's website went down during the final countdown.  That paired with other websites recording different numbers, many South Weberites were left sitting on the edge of their seat wondering what happened.  In the morning it was determined to be a close race.  KUTV seeing the success a write-in candidate had, and that there were still votes to be counted came and did a story.




Thursday we all waited while the final ballots were counted.  Finally about 3:00 pm, results were posted.  Not only did a write-in candidate get elected, I took first place! 

#SWmorethan1000!

There was much celebration this day!! My phone was immediately blowing up with messages from people who I have worked side by side with over the last few months.  We studied the topics, we read the minutes and listened to the audio.  We asked questions, we attended every single meeting and had many additional meetings in between.  We walked the streets of South Weber to make sure every household knew what was going on and helped get them informed.   It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it.  We worked so hard.  And life has taught me that sometimes hard work doesn't pay off the way you hope it will.  But this time it did.  One person summarized it perfectly, "I knew it would feel good, but I didn't realize it would feel this good!"

The governor's office heard about my win.  I was asked by State Senator Todd Weiler to have an interview on 860 AM talk radio.  You can hear that interview below.  



Right off the bat he says 

"Let me tell you I kind of am a nerd on Utah politics.  I don't think this has ever happened before.  In fact, I consider myself pretty knowledgeable, if you would've called me a couple months ago and said I'm thinking of running a write-in campaign what would your advice to me be, I would've said 'don't do it. You will lose.  Write-in candidates always lose."   

I don't write this post to boast about what happened.  I write it because if you look at everything I posted above, we were against unsurmountable odds.  'There is nothing that can be done' and 'it will never work' was something we heard a lot.  But we kept working and we kept trying.  We have been told that we would never make a difference.  Well, we did.  And we will keep making that difference.  

South Weber - please understand that as much thanks as I give to you (which is an infinite amount) I give you that much plea to keep at it.  Don't get complacent, don't get comfortable.  

Get Involved,  Stay Involved. 

I love you South Weber! You are my people!