She’s Got What It Takes

Kari Birdseye for Benicia City Council

By Betty Lucas, Benicia resident, July 3, 2022

As a Benicia newbie, moving to this wonderful city in 2019, I recall being shocked by the negative advertising filling my mailbox during the 2020 city council campaign. The tone of such a small-town election seemed to be the antithesis of living in such a welcoming community, where drivers downtown stop for you, even if you are not in a crosswalk.

I was later appalled to learn this negative advertising was from a Political Action Committee (PAC) most of its nearly $250,000 coming from Valero. The PAC seemed dedicated to attacking nominees they want to keep out of Benicia’s city council, and flooding our community with praise for the candidates they want.

Fast forward to 2022 and the same thing seems like it will happen again. Continue reading Betty Lucas: She’s Got What It Takes →

Kari Birdseye for My Kind of World

A warrior for wellness and an anchor for hope

By Roger Straw, Benicia resident, June 19, 2022

I’ve given my life to causes of freedom, justice, peace and public health. In the years after my retirement, that last cause, public health, has expanded to an understand that human health is totally dependent on the health of this big blue ball of a planet that we call home. The earth itself is sick, and it threatens to get worse.

Also in the years since my retirement, I’ve increasingly understood the critical importance of thinking globally and acting locally.

For me, this means I am already hard at work to elect Kari Birdseye for Benicia’s City Council this November.

Kari’s professional life has been stellar in seeking the good of our planet and the security of all life that shares air, water, time and space here. She is a warrior for wellness and an anchor for hope.

You don’t get too many like that in your own small town.

Kari is a kind and gentle soul. She is a mom and loving spouse, a longtime resident of Benicia, a trusted friend to many in our community, and a tireless worker for our schools.

Kari is chair of Benicia’s Planning Commission, serving on that Commission for 7 years. She showed leadership on that most important of our city’s appointed bodies when Benicians rallied against Valero’s dangerous and dirty plan to bring crude oil by train across California’s mountains and into our small town. The Commission studied the issue in depth, listened to the concerns of the public, and stood Goliath to the massive influence of Texas billionaires. I believe Kari was a key factor in stopping crude by rail here in our hometown.

Speaking of Texas… as of right now, the so called “Working Families” Political Action Committee (PAC) reports that it has a fund of $232,386.88 which it will spend here in Benicia to elect its favored candidates to our City Council. We can’t stop that. Federal law permits corporate Texas giants to spend as much as it wants on whatever it wants. The PAC’s $232K is nearly 7 times what a Benicia candidate can spend under Benicia’s voluntary campaign expenditure limit. And the PAC will surely be expanding its war chest beyond that $232K, as it did in 2020 when it spent over a quarter million dollars.

Big Oil will try again to buy our 2022 election – will try. But Benicia voters will have the last word, because THIS is a cause of freedom, justice, peace and public health, right here in “B Town”. We will think globally, and act, very much locally.

Make a commitment today. Sign up now to endorse, place a yard sign, contribute financially and volunteer. Visit KariBirdseyeForBenicia.com.

Roger Straw
Benicia

More letters, news & links about Kari here on the BenIndy

And best of all – Kari’s website!