Read why progressive Balsz School Board Member Christina Eichelkraut is supporting Sam Stone for City Council
I'm voting for Sam Stone for Phoenix based on how Sal DiCiccio's office was run under him as Chief of Staff. Before you @ me about irrelevant things that don't actually impact you or your neighbors' lives in any way, allow me to explain.
First: No, I don't like Sal.
Second: I deeply despise Kari Lake for so many reasons.
But this is a City Council runoff election for my district. So excuse me while I vote based on the actual obligations and responsibilities of that office.
Here's what I know and have experienced when Sam was chief of staff of Sal's office:
• Calls were answered, as were any questions regarding policy or bureaucratic processes. Even if I was working for something I knew Sal would vote against, the staff Sam hired, and often Sam himself, never failed to help facilitate any steps or answer questions to help me achieve my goal. I was never treated with anything but the utmost professionalism. It was governance, not partisanship, and it was deeply refreshing.
• Sam has repeatedly found creative ways to get funding into neighborhoods because he's even more of a nerdy policy wonk than I am. I never have to break down acronyms with him and he knows the city code and most expenditure avenues stone cold off the top of his head. He has helped me on numerous ocassions to more effectively advocate for my neighbors. More so than Gallego's or any Democrat's city council office ever has.
• Sam's office under DiCiccio was the ONLY City Council office that clarified the citizen's petition process for me and gave me the right numbers to call to get that going. (Though shout out to Deb Stark who, while in office, met with me about it and at least got it heard by the subcommittee.)
• Sam actually lives in my neighborhood. We don't agree on A LOT of things (we've gone 10 rounds at least on public transit alone, and I've told him I'd never vote for him for any office above City Council, which I wouldn't), but we do agree on governance over partisanship and the baseline infrastructure needs of south of Thomas (you know, not Arcadia; we exist!).
Sam knows the actual nuts-and-bolts mechanics of how to achieve actual municipal improvement.
I have yet to see or hear anything specific that indicates Robinson does. No one here ever even heard of him until the mayor picked him to run. I haven't heard of Robinson personally knocking on a single door here,and believe me I asked amd people tell me when they get a knock. Every time I've heard Robinson answer a question at a forum or in an interview, I hear a lot of platitudes about policy that wouldn't happen on the municipal level anyway and a lot of knowledge about one single city department. That's not gonna cut it for me, not with everything myself and my neighbors need.
So I'm going to vote for the person who knows what a community block grant is and can actually get those funds where they're needed. That's Sam at the end of the day.
I know we live in an age of zero tolerance for partisan ambiguity (or, as I like to think of it, actual policy and action analysis versus tweet-based voting), but in case anyone hasn't noticed, voting based on personality and perception hasn't actually achieved anything or move us forward. Maybe we do something different and vote for people who know how things work and get stuff done?
Christina Eichelkraut
Balsz School District Governing Board Member