We are all getting tired of the large amount of written, viewed and audible noise surrounding the upcoming election.  In truth, I hesitate to add my words.  I hope my letter of support for Jan Dodge is as positive and as unbiased as is the candidate.

Jan has spent her first term in the house trying her best to be a servant, not a ruler.  She has added her voice to bipartisan bills to support the Downeast Correctional Facility, to add to the Maine Learning Results and to fund municipal broadband access.

Of  course she supports bills sponsored by many colleagues of her own party,  Which legislator does not?  But rather than list all the bills which Jan worked to pass, I will focus on the three which she fostered as a freshman legislator and then add generalizations.  She supported anti-food shaming, worked to allow active teachers to sit on the State Board of Education and worked on a resolve to study the use of adjunct professors in the college system.  Jan used her insights as a former educator to pass bills.  Not everyone knows everything about everything, not even a representative.

Most important to me is that when I scan the list of bills which Jan co-sponsored, two observations are clear:  1.  Jan supported bills sponsored by Independents and Republicans.  2. The words add, allow, strengthen, support, expand, aid, and protect occur over and over. So many of our current politician are now engaged in the practice of remove, suspend, tear down and eliminate.  It is easy to destroy, harder to build up. 

I am reminded of a character in South Pacific, Emile DeBeck.  When asked for his aid in targeting enemy planes and boats in the Pacific, He says, “I know what you are against.  What are you for?” 

Jan, in her first term, has been for education, the disabled, the workforce, those in corrections, the aging, and minors.

I know what many in government are against. Read any headline or watch any news show.  I also know who Jan Dodge is for. She is for us.

J. Michael Lawson lives in Belfast