Sarah Palin: A Letter From Anne Kilkenny
Sep 3, 2008
http://www.thepresidentialcandidates.us/about-sarah-palin-a-letter-from-anne-kilkenny/741/
What follows is an open letter written by a resident of Wasilla, Alaska named Anne Kilkenny.
I am a resident of Wasilla, Alaska. I have known Sarah since 1992. Everyone here knows Sarah, so it is
nothing special to say we are on a first-name basis. Our children have attended the same schools. Her
father was my child’s favorite substitute teacher. I also am on a first name basis with her parents and
mother-in-law. I attended more City Council meetings during her administration than about 99% of the
residents of the city.
She is enormously popular; in every way she’s like the most popular girl in middle school. Even men
who think she is a poor choice and won’t vote for her can’t quit smiling when talking about her because
she is a “babe”.
It is astonishing and almost scary how well she can keep a secret. She kept her most recent pregnancy a
secret from her children and parents for seven months. She is “pro-life”. She recently gave birth to a
Down’s syndrome baby. There is no cover-up involved, here; Trig is her baby. She is energetic and
hardworking. She regularly worked out at the gym.
She is savvy. She doesn’t take positions; she just “puts things out there” and if they prove to be popular,
then she takes credit. Her husband works a union job on the North Slope for BP and is a champion
snowmobile racer. Todd Palin’s kind of job is highly sought-after because of the schedule and high pay.
He arranges his work schedule so he can fish for salmon in Bristol Bay for a month or so in summer,
but by no stretch of the imagination is fishing their major source of income. Nor has her life-style ever
been anything like that of native Alaskans. Sarah and her whole family are avid hunters. She’s smart.
Her experience is as mayor of a city with a population of about 5,000 (at the time), and less than 2
years as governor of a state with about 670,000 residents. During her mayoral administration most of
the actual work of running this small city was turned over to an administrator. She had been pushed to
hire this administrator by party power-brokers after she had gotten herself into some trouble over
precipitous firings which had given rise to a recall campaign.
Sarah campaigned in Wasilla as a “fiscal conservative”. During her 6 years as Mayor, she increased
general government expenditures by over 33%. During those same 6 years the amount of taxes
collected by the City increased by 38%. This was during a period of low inflation (1996-2002). She
reduced progressive property taxes and increased a regressive sales tax which taxed even food. The tax
cuts that she promoted benefited large corporate property owners way more than they benefited
residents.
The huge increases in tax revenues during her mayoral administration weren’t enough to fund
everything on her wish list though, borrowed money was needed, too. She inherited a city with zero
debt, but left it with indebtedness of over $22 million. What did Mayor Palin encourage the voters to
borrow money for? Was it the infrastructure that she said she supported? The sewage treatment plant
that the city lacked? or a new library? No. $1m for a park. $15m-plus for construction of a multi-use
sports complex which she rushed through to build on a piece of property that the City didn’t even have
clear title to, that was still in litigation 7 yrs later–to the delight of the lawyers involved! The sports
complex itself is a nice addition to the community but a huge money pit, not the profit-generator she
claimed it would be. She also supported bonds for $5.5m for road projects that could have been done in
5-7 yrs without any borrowing.
While Mayor, City Hall was extensively remodeled and her office redecorated more than once. These
are small numbers, but Wasilla is a very small city. As an oil producer, the high price of oil has created
a budget surplus in Alaska. Rather than invest this surplus in technology that will make us energy
independent and increase efficiency, as Governor she proposed distribution of this surplus to every
individual in the state.
In this time of record state revenues and budget surpluses, she recommended that the state borrow/bond
for road projects, even while she proposed distribution of surplus state revenues: spend today’s surplus,
borrow for needs.
She’s not very tolerant of divergent opinions or open to outside ideasor compromise. As Mayor, she
fought ideas that weren’t generated by her or her staff. Ideas weren’t evaluated on their merits, but on
the basis of who proposed them.
While Sarah was Mayor of Wasilla she tried to fire our highly respected City Librarian because the
Librarian refused to consider removing from the library some books that Sarah wanted removed. City
residents rallied to the defense of the City Librarian and against Palin’s attemp