Municipal Information and Coupon Ads
September 9th, 2007Ok, I’ve been away.
In fact, at the moment, I feel totally out of it.
And seeing my paintings hang in a major New York gallery turned out to be way more than “nice.”
(painting hanging in New York gallery… see previous post)
And so far, I haven’t been able to get any “read” yet on the mayoral debate that I missed (how shocking) last Thursday night, September 6, 2007.
I hate to say it, but my guess is that a good 87% of Newburyport, MA didn’t know that the debate was even on, or if they did, they didn’t much care.
(Is this “cynical” of moi? How awful.)
I sat next to a woman on an early bus ride into Boston.
I’m taking it that the she was from Newburyport, because she had a copy of the Newburyport Daily News. The woman opened up the Daily News and proceeded to read the coupon ads with great intent and interest.
I was fascinated by this. I never read the coupon ads. I always chuck them.
She did eventually turn from the intent reading of the coupon ads and skimmed the front page of the Newburyport Daily News.
I, her seat-mate, then asked her who she was going to vote for mayor of Newburyport, MA.
The answer was something to the effect of, “I have no idea.”
This is my guess.
The woman who I sat next to, and most of Newburyport, MA, if asked to, could not name the 5 candidates running for the corner office.
If they have noticed the signs out around Newburyport, MA, they might know a name, but have no clue about anything that mayoral “name” might be about.
If presented with the name “Moak,” they might say something like, “Yeh, that sounds familiar.” If asked to name the Newburyport City Councilors who already exist, my guess would be a response like, “We have city councilors?”
My point being that most of the electorate, unless it an issue that directly effects their lives or their pocket books, has “no clue.”
So my question is, how do those of us who are hooked on politics get people’s attention, aside from suggesting that their taxes get raised and plunking “inappropriate” building projects in their backyards?
The coupon ad thing had me thinking. Maybe that’s where to put pertinent municipal information, next to the great super-duper price of hamburger or maybe discounted socks.
Mary Eaton
Newburyport