Editorial

An Opinion

It was a long, hard fought election that took 2 elections to declare a winner.  I lost by a mere 9 votes in the run off after tying my opponent in the general election. While I was a candidate for Simpsonville City Council, Ward 2, my opponent and her supporters attacked me on lack of involvement in Simpsonville even though I had only lived here for a little over a year when I decided to run for Council.

After a heart breaking loss I decided that I was still going to find a way to serve this city that I truly love. I wasn’t going to crawl up in a corner and go away. So, I applied to serve on several different committees that had open seats.   You would think with more than 15 open seats and less volunteers applying for these seats that there would no way that I would be declined by City Council.  Well, you guessed wrong.

I was blown away at the hypocrisy.  The very people who attacked me on not serving, now are the very ones denying me the right to serve.  This is wrong on so many levels.  For a small town to have all 7 Council members from the same side and to now black ball anyone who stands up against them is corruption at the highest level.
Do we really want to live in a city where one can be denied the right to serve the city due to an ideology?

Do we want to live in a city where a mayor denies one’s rights to serve because they ran against a candidate that she supported?  So, how did this happen?  People didn’t vote….plain and simple or they didn’t care.

The people of Simpsonville need to wake up!!  Citizens don’t vote and then sit back and complain about what’s going on.  Do something about it.  You will have another chance in 2 years when 4 of their seats are up, including  the mayor’s seat.

Get passionate, get informed, show that you care about your city, do your homework on the candidates and plan on going out to the polls and have a voice.  Again, I only lost by 9 votes.  Maybe some of you reading this stayed home. Maybe you could’ve made a difference.  “It’s too cold” or “my vote doesn’t matter” or “the lines are too long” or “I don’t know the candidates” are all just poor excuses. We as Americans should all exercise our rights to vote. Some have paid the ultimate price so you could and still some will stay home.

You will more than likely be able to pull the lever for me again soon along with other good citizens who love this city.  Thanks for all of those who supported me and voted for me and those of you that are still supporting me.

In Christ,

Aaron Rupe

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