I Don’t Hate America!

A week ago today Bill Habedank of Red Wing experienced one of the main consequences of having Rep. John Kline in office: zero constituent service.

Habedank and others tried to visit Kline’s office last week and he tells his story in a letter to the Red Wing Republican Eagle:

You are told no one is ready to discuss your issue even though you called ahead. The young lady has you fill out a form.

As 13 of us wrote down our issue and contact information, each knew that was as far as this would go. Why? Because that is what happened all the other times you have done this.

Treatment is the same whether you visit, send an e-mail or call. You are always treated courteously, but you could (or should) get that treatment in any office. You came to be heard even if your message was contrary to the representative’s views. That is his job.

This wasn’t the first time he had to deal with this runaround.

We asked when we could speak with someone of authority. We are told the congressman’s and his assistant’s schedules are not to be revealed, so it becomes a guessing game. We are then told issues of this magnitude are best brought to the Washington, D.C., office.

I did that last March. I asked at least two weeks in advance to meet with Kline. I did get an appointment and get beyond the front desk. I had a 20-minute meeting with a young man in Kline’s plush office. As I relayed my issue, I found the man to be slightly argumentative. Is that his job?

You would think if Kline is unable to hold a decent town-hall meeting his taxpayer funded staff would at least show an effort to listen to constituents. I have an experience lobbying Kline in Washington D.C. as well and while the legislative assistant with whom we met wasn’t argumentative, it was clear from the start of the meeting that the congressman’s position on higher education (the issue about which we were lobbying) had already been established.

Steve Sarvi was able to teach democracy over in Iraq; it looks like we will have to elect him in order for Second District citizens to be able to see it in action here in America.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 20th, 2007 at 2:53 pm and is filed under John Kline, Congress, Steve Sarvi, 2008. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.