My Plan

The Foundation: Being Fiscally Responsible and Proactive

Fiscal Responsibility: With current and coming federal cuts to SNAP and Medicaid, the county has significant challenges. Childcare, eldercare, healthcare, housing, and economic issues are all facing us. You can rest assured I will be just as careful with your taxpayer money as I am with my personal money. And anyone who says otherwise doesn’t know me.

My dad once told me, “You can stretch a nickel further than anyone I know!” The social worker who interviewed me before we adopted started the interview with, “I understand ‘frugality’ is one of your things.” MORE…

If I can’t afford it, it won’t land on my credit card because I put “paying interest” in the same category as “getting the flu.” My husband and I felt we couldn’t afford a mortgage, so we took a few years to build our home out of pocket; when we had the money for windows, we bought windows.

I know what it is like to struggle; I once tied my shoelaces gently so they didn’t break before Friday! I see financial struggles up close in my own family. This mindset will guide every choice I make as your legislator.

Being Proactive: The failure to be proactive causes the need to be reactive. Right now, the county is reacting to a drastic $775,000 shortfall to SNAP, a program that provides many children, disabled, elderly and working poor in our community with food. Yet this was predictable. In May of 2026, the Big Beautiful Bill Act was passed by Congress. Many voices predicted the effects from the drastic cuts to both SNAP and also to Medicaid, the worst of which were intentionally scheduled for after this November’s election. MORE…

What if before May of 2025, the county had asked our Department of Social Services for data on who is on SNAP and Medicaid in our county and then asked our treasurer to run the numbers and see the impacts of these coming cuts to St. Lawrence County? Once we saw the coming slam, perhaps our legislature could have reached out to Rep. Stefanik and our U.S. Senators and expressed concerns. Even if the bill still went through as it was, we would have had over a year to prepare for it.

If elected, I intend to focus on being proactive to prevent and be ready for such situations.

The Components: Community * Service * Solutions

Community: The challenges we face are interconnected. This will require the county to work with towns, schools, businesses, healthcare providers, and nonprofits as well as state and federal contacts. Collaboration, consensus building, and understanding varying perspectives will be required and are strengths of mine.

I have demonstrated my commitment to the entire District 7 community by listening to different viewpoints, by attending events and visiting over 2300 homes, and by beginning to build relations within the county government while campaigning. This commitment will follow me into office where I would work to build collaboration to meet challenges. MORE…

I was once in a group with differing political perspectives that met monthly to better understand one another. I remain friends with people from that group and am committed to the core goal of understanding varying points of view. As I have visited homes and attended community events throughout District 7, I have met many people with varying perspectives and note that what we all want is a strong community.

Service: My dad taught me to “show up.” In addition to attending community events, I have shown up at town board meetings in all five of District 7’s towns, including Piercefield, which according to the town supervisor, has not seen a legislator in years and does not receive an email copy of the monthly legislator’s report that other District 7 towns receive. I commit to serving all District 7 towns.

I served as union president at my school at a difficult time MORE… and met challenges by getting a grant which enabled us to organize a breakfast tour of the school for realtors to address declining enrollment. The grant paid for the school’s sign in front of the school. We led charity drives and started an annual litter pick-up on NY-56 to build community relations. I am a problem-solver.

I was also recognized twice for my service as a hospice volunteer, and I led and have been part of service groups.

Solutions:

On top of working collaboratively across the board to meet the county’s larger challenges, the following issues have arisen as I have knocked on doors throughout the county:

Bringing fairness to remote parts of the county: People in Piercefield feel forgotten, and Bob Ashton’s story of dying because he was unable to get a needed IV for an infection is a prime example of this. A neighborhood center director suggested a mobile neighborhood center that could reach out to the more remote parts of the county which, if deemed worthy, might be grant funded. MORE… She wondered if a public health nurse might be put on this unit. While a grant might cover the initial cost of this unit, legacy costs, such as ongoing insurance, maintenance and labor costs, etc, would need to be covered by the county. Piercefield gives $1.3 million to the county in taxes and gets back little more than “partial funding on one county road,” according to their former town clerk. It would seem that some of that money could be used toward the legacy costs of this unit.

Bringing fairness to remote parts of the county: A low cost solution would be to have someone from a county agency set up monthly office hours in remote parts of the county to help people find services. Agency directors have expressed interest in this.

Helping struggling families: As I have knocked on doors, I have heard from parents of autistic and mentally ill children who need support. I would like to start a support group for parents of neurodivergent children. Similarly, parents who have either fostered or adopted children also have unique challenges and would benefit from a support group. Providing a portal on the county website to provide resources for struggling parents could be invaluable. These are low cost solutions that could have great benefit for families.

Helping struggling families: Moms who have suffered from post-partum depression, sometimes for years, have stressed the need for support. Maternal health is important to our Public Health Department, and this could be a good source of support for this difficult challenge for moms.