I am new to this forum and have a lot of catching up to do. I do not live in Ward 1 and I don't personally know either of the ward 1 candidates. I agree that Mr. Armbruster has done little to nothing during his time on council. If I am wrong then I hope someone will enlighten me.

My question though is what does the council representative from your ward have to do with the "milk jugs, pop cans, and plastic water bottles strewn everywhere."? Isn’t that the responsibility of the citizens that live in that ward? YOUR NEIGHBORS are the ones that make your ward look bad. If the residents’ don’t care enough about where they live, (or care enough to vote) how do you expect ANY representative to fix those problems?

I keep hearing about the apathy in this city. I then hear about how awful it would be to have a bunch of representatives from ward 3 on council. It appears to me that ward 3 is the only ward that really cares about the city they live in. Every ward has people that care, but not enough of them. All you have to do is drive around this city, with no knowledge of ward boundaries, and it is evident who cares and who does not. I do live in ward 3. I care about what my house, my street, and my neighborhood look like. Fortunately, so do most of my neighbors. I don’t expect Josh Laubach (who I voted for) to have any impact on what my neighborhood looks like and I didn’t expect Tony Marconi to either.

I do not live in a rich neighborhood. I live in the house I grew up in. I bought it from my parents when they moved to Florida 5 years ago (at market value). My house and neighborhood was built in 1964, we moved into it 4 years later, it is not new or extravagant. I am not part of any “ol boys network” and don’t know anyone that is.

I look forward to participating in these forums.