BEHIND THE
CROS S WOR D P UZ Z LE & WOR D S E A RCH
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A P R O J E C T O F S P A R K C E N T R A L’ S W E S T C E N T R A L P U B L I S H I N G U N I O N A T L E V E L U P A F T E R S C H O O L
NO COST
• West Central, Spokane, Washington, USA, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way Galaxy • December 2020 •
Issue No. 8
W H Y K I D S S H O U L D H AV E M O R E
LEADERSHIP OPTIONS
INAM Audubon Elementary
I had the idea of kid president because there are so many things that kids can’t do. For example kids can’t go somewhere by themselves, or get a job, or drive, or vote for their country or state. I interviewd Karen Stratton, a Spokane City Council Member who thinks that there should be some leadership for kids. INAM: How long have you been on the City Council? STRATTON: I was appointed in 2014 and then I ran for office in 2015. I’ll be done—I can only have two terms—I was just reelected last year, and I’ll go until 2024. I think I have three years left. And then I can’t run again, so I’ll have to think of some other business or something to keep me busy because I’ve really enjoyed working with my neighborhoods. INAM: How does Coronavirus affect your work? STRATTON: Well, as you can see, I’m working from home. I try and go in the office once a week, but I really don’t need to. Everything I need I have at home. Where it’s really affected me is that we’ve lost some of the one-on-one communication with my neighborhoods. I believe Spokane has 28 neighborhood councils, and they meet once a month. In my district there are nine of them, so every month I go to nine neighborhood meetings. It’s great because you get to talk to the people who you represent, who you provide services for. And that to me is the best part of this job, is that I get to be out and working with people in West Central, in the Audubon-Downriver neighborhood, the EmersonGarfield neighborhood, and we talk a lot about their
services and their parks, what we can do to help their parks stay safe, what we can do to get them involved in city government and local government, and what we can do for kids. We’ve had lots of issues this fall and winter over at Audubon park. They weren’t watering it—we didn’t have the staff to water—so we had neighbors going out to water. I keep track of the splash pad over there, and if there’s a problem I can call the Parks Department. But that’s where it’s had a negative effect, it’s a lot harder now to reach out to people and to have that one-on-one because I think that’s what you need to be successful in being a council member. INAM: Why is there no real Kid President in the whole world? STRATTON: Well there should be. There should be. And I’ll tell you something, we only had one son, and he’s now grow-up, he’s 24, and he lives back East. But I love the way his generation thinks. And I’m a big believer that when we finish our jobs here, that we hand it down to the next generation, and I am anxious and excited for the next generation to take over. I think that your ideas are so much more compassionate. I think there’s a lot more energy in the generations under me that are willing to see some change that we have got to make not only in this country, but where we live. But I encourage, I don’t care how old you are, to get involved. Talk to your parents and have them take you to a neighborhood council meeting. Listen to what’s going on. Share your advice or your ideas. Because that’s what it’s going to take to make us, I think, a better
Photo of Inam interviewing Karen Stratton on Zoom country. That we’ve got to start listening to our younger people because you’re being raised in a world completely different than how I was raised, and I think that it’s going to be—my son went to a college and their motto was go out there and change the world—and I really believe that it’s the younger people that are going to change this world, so you should always take advantage of every little invitation to get involved in something. INAM: I think there should be someone who decides for the kids, who is one of the kids. STRATTON: I agree with you. And what we try and do, just so you know, we do have a group that is connected with the City, it’s called the Chase Youth Commission. And those are all youth that sit on a commission...
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