Rick Larsen is a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for the 2nd District of Washington state, representing San Juan as well as Skagit, Whatcom and Island counties. Rick held a virtual town hall meeting by phone and internet on Saturday, February 15 which I attended, and I’m glad I did. Rick focused on addressing the concerns of his constituents through Q&A. At one point he announced that there were 13,000 participants on the call, and 800 questions in the queue to be asked – obviously we didn’t get to them all! Questions ranged from what can be done about the dismantling of USAID (not much at this point); what is the current state of the budget proposal from congress (the Republican majority is proposing a budget deficit of $4.5 trillion, budget cuts of $1.5 trillion, and the difference will be in taxes cuts largely to the wealthy and corporations), and what will Washington state do if there is an earthquake or tsunami in the next 4 years without FEMA (we’re on our own…). There were also questions about Medicaid budget cuts, executive orders and the judiciary, “special government employees” without security clearances accessing the US Treasury payment system, tariffs and inflation, changes to environmental regulations, defunding the Department of Education, non-binary gender passports, decimation of the FAA…the citizens on the call had serious concerns and great questions, most of which don’t have clear answers at this point. My take-away from Representative Larsen is that we all need to provide feedback to our representatives and to the White House regarding the major policy and programmatic shifts that are happening with the new administration. Public opinion matters, and your voice counts! You can reach out to the White House at (202) 456-1111 or https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/; Representative Larsen and Senators Murray and Cantwell can be reached via their webpages as well. Participate in Democracy!

Tom Reynolds

San Juan Island