To our Oregon friends: spread the word about this candidate and her weak stances on immigration:
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Senate candidate brings passion for service to race
Published: May 7, 2008

By Sean C. Morgan

Of The New Era

Sarah Arcune, 46, of Stayton has a passion for service, and that's why she's running for state Senate District 9, she said.

"I'm running for this position because I care about our community," she said. She enjoys helping people whether by volunteering or helping out of her own pocket.

She has the experience she needs to make an effective senator, she said. She served as a volunteer legislative aid and alternate chief of staff for legislators in the 2005 and 2007 legislative sessions to gain valuable experience and form the relationships necessary to do the job.

She has worked for senators Gary George, Charles Star and Ron Mauer and representatives Jeff Kropf, Kim Thatcher and Donna Nelson.

"Anyone who runs for public office should have a service mindset," Arcune said. "I have an untiring desire to serve."

To prepare to serve, she attended the Oregon Republican Leadership Institute, one of 20 chosen to attend among 200 applicants, she said. She also has attended Chemeketa Community College, Merrit-Davis College of Business, Linn-Benton Community College, Oregon State University and Mojave Community College in Arizona. She has spent about 3½ years attending college, and has been a medical assistant, phlebotomist and traffic control flagger. She is currently employed by Wilco farm supply in Stayton.

She is active with the American Red Cross Disaster Action Team, Willamette Chapter, and the national certification agency for laboratory personnel.

She has served with a number of service agencies, including City Team Ministries in San Jose, Calif., the Salvation Army, Optimists International and the Statehouse Toastmasters.

"I have fresh ideas and would like to hear your ideas so they can become mine," Arcune said. "I want to be personal and touchable to my constituents."

She urges anyone to call her toll free at (877) 899- 8155 or (503) 931- 1114.

Among her ideas, she supports adjusting the welfare to work system, she said. She wants to "allow single parents to work or attend school part time. This change would allow a measure of independence while allowing them to care for their families.

"Many would be more motivated to work if the welfare system would meet them halfway."

On immigration, "I'd like to see an interstate compact with the country of Mexico," Arcune said. "We really need their cheap workforce for our benefit. We need to keep track of who's coming in and who's going out."

With strict enforcement over who comes over the border, Oregon could support immigrants as well by having low-income housing available, "especially when they come to work for us. When the harvest is over, send them back."

After they leave, while they're gone, the housing could be used to help homeless families, so no one gets left out in the cold during the winter, Arcune said.

Arcune is also "definitely pro-life," she said. "We need to protect our teen daughters."

Teen girls are vulnerable, Arcune said. She said more centers need to be opened to help girls in need so they don't abort their babies, places where they can find support and counseling to encourage them to be pro-life.

"A baby doesn't have a voice," Arcune said. "I'd like to be a legislative voice for that silent voice."

Among other legislative ideas, she recently observed the opening of the Center for Family Success, a resource center in Salem housing representatives for 26 agencies to assist newly released prison inmates, Arcune said. The center is open during the day, but she would like to see something open all day, seven days a week, where they can call and talk to trained counselors for anything they need if they're going through something. She would call the program "Checkmate."

And she would like to introduce a program to provide diabetics with vouchers, a program that would work like WIC for women and children, she said. Through the program, diabetics could get assistance purchasing the foods for their specialized nutritional needs.

Arcune believes she can help timber communities, like Sweet Home, land big businesses to reinvigorate their economies, she said.

Although, she said, bureaucracy and corruption keep those big corporations away from the state.

If that could be reined in, "we would be more affluent. We would be more successful."

"I would go personally to talk to big businesses in California," Arcune said, and she would attempt to recruit them to Oregon.

She would ask communities, such as Sweet Home, to decide what kind of jobs and businesses they want, and what kind of opportunities are available to companies, and then she would go looking for it, she said.

http://www.sweethomenews.com/news/story ... ry_no=8152