Public Service Recognition Week is May 7-13, 2017

The week honors those career public servants that keep our local, county, state, and federal services running year in and year out. The Democrats of Indian River join our nation in saluting our public servants who work on behalf of the American people.  These folks are our teachers, our policemen, our sanitation workers, our air controllers, our clerks at the utility department, our corrections officers, our public defenders, our environmental protection officers, our mosquito control staff, our military, defense civilians, our emergency technicians, our park rangers, our climate change scientists, our cancer researchers.  Look around.  These are our neighbors who care about what they do and care about their country and their community.  They are Cub Scout leaders, soccer moms, lay clergy, food bank workers, little league coaches, and Save the Lagoon volunteers.  They are our fellow residents.

2018 Budget Cuts

And, yet, with chants of “Drain the swamp,” the extreme Trump Administration would lead us to believe that public servants are not like us and are not needed.  Trump’s fiscal 2018 budget would seriously undercut or eliminate many federal agencies, resulting in the loss of critical health, education, and environmental services.  At a recent County-wide Listening Session held by the Young Democrats of Indian River, speakers pointed to deep funding cuts in our own community based on the Trump budget that would affect many residents.

Bill Posey Refuses to Attend Town Halls

Perhaps it is not the career public servants that need to be scrutinized more but our own elected officials who shirk their responsibility to represent their constituents and instead vote along Party lines against the will of the people.  Nothing can be more true about our own Congressman Bill Posey of Florida’s 8th District, who consistently votes with the Republican majority in the House of Representatives.  He voted against the Affordable Care Act and refuses to call for an independent prosecutor to investigate Russia’s tampering in the United States’ presidential election.  He refuses to attend Town Hall Meetings or other resident-generated events where Indian River citizens can engage in a dialogue on issues that concern us.  You can see video on YouTube how his local office in Brevard County even refused average citizens entry.  This does not feel like representation or public service.  Indian River County needs our voices heard and it’s not happening now.

2018 will be a year for change with the national election and an opportunity for all Indian Rivers voices to be heard.  The Democrats of Indian River work on behalf of working families.  We work to preserve democratic principles.

Join us.

Be part of the solution.