Young Emerging Leaders

I need to clarify the following statement made in my previous blog.

"Of course we just moved to our new house 6 months ago so except for 2 households most everyone was meeting me for the first time."

I had originally posted that we had moved to our new house about 4 months ago - not 6. Apparently my blog is being read by a far greater audience than just YEL members (who would have thought) and I received word from a concerned citizen, whom is well beyond their YEL years and whom I had never met before, and they informed me that there was a rule stating that you had to live within your Ward for 6 months before you could run for city director. Now keep in mind that I had no knowledge of this rule and that when I posted "4 months" I was merely speaking in general terms. Anyway while on the phone with this concerned citizen I explained that we purchased the house on August 15th or 16th and we did the math together. As luck would have it I passed the 6-month deadline by about 10 days from the filing deadline. Whew!

Well the call got me thinking a little bit and to prevent confusion and more calls from concerned citizens moving forward I decided to go back and change my general 4-month depiction to the more accurate 6-months.

COME TO FIND OUT a little later, the concerned citizen was actually mistaken about the rule and in actuality you just have to have lived inside the Fort Smith city limits for at least 6 months. So really this was all much to do about nothing.

However, the reason for my clarification is that by me going back and changing my blog statement it could have given the perception of me trying to hide something which is TOTALLY against everything I am running on. My #1 objective is to create a more open, honest and transparent city government that the people can be proud of and come to trust. Hopefully this amendment to my earlier blog statement will reinforce just that.

Vote Travis Stephens on Tuesday, April 8th.