Uzbekistan RPCV John Smart in race for Park Falls School Board
Read and comment on this excerpt from a story from the Park Falls Herald on Uzbekistan RPCV John Smart who is in a race for Park Falls School Board. Mr. Smart has been a frequent contributor to discussions on this message board. In 2001 he questioned Senator Fiengold of Wisconsin about Peace Corps issues in a public forum and raised the nomination of Gaddi Vasquez to the Senator. Senator Fiengold subsequently voted against Gaddi Vasquez in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Good luck to Mr. Smart in his race. Read the story at:
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Trimner, Smart face off in only contested race for Park Falls School Board
The Park Falls Herald
Last Updated: Thursday, March 27th, 2003 02:41:18 PM
PARK FALLS -- A race for a one-year term is the only contested contest in the Tuesday, April 1, election for four positions on the ballot for the Park Falls School Board.
Brad Trimner and John Smart are vying for a one-year term to complete the term to which Helen Fries was elected in 2000. Fries resigned in 2002 when she and her family moved from the area.
Smart was born and raised in Park Falls and graduated from Lincoln High School. After years in business and other pursuits in other parts of the country and abroad, he has returned to Park Falls.
After spending two years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he studied in New York and was a theater actor there before a long career in advertising sales and marketing.
He worked for the Italian government as a a marketing consultant for crafts development and also worked in Sweden.
Smart served in the Peace Corps for three years in Uzbekistan (1995-98). His principal project was to work with the local crafts community in marketing, and he also became involved in education.
He taught economics, which he said was a relatively unknown subject in that country, which had been a part of the Soviet Union, and said he also had to teach English, which he said was a third or fourth language for many of his students.
âIt was just great. I absolutely loved it,â he said of the teaching experience.
Upon his return to Park Falls, he offered to serve as volunteer in the schools and began tutoring and working with students. He has becomed a licensed teacher and is in his third year as a substitute teacher.
âBecause I spend a lot of time in the schools, Iâve really become involved in whatâs going on,â he said. âI think it can be helpful, working with the teachers and with he students. I think thatâs a valuable thing to bring to the board.
He said the school board and area municipalities will be dealing with serious budget issues.
âIâm concerned about what kind of decisions are being made by the board under those circumstances,â he said. âI think I can be a different voice on the board because of my experiences. I can inform my decision making on a lot of levels.â
âI donât think thereâs anything more important that we do than educating our children,â Smart said.Uzbekistan RPCV John Smart talks to Senator Feingold about Peace Corps Issues at Senator's listening session
Read and comment on this excerpt from a story from the Park Falls Herald in which RPCV Uzbekistan John Smart questioned Senator Fiengold of Wisconsin (shown in the photo above) about Peace Corps issues and raised the nomination of Gaddi Vasquez to the Senator. Senator Fiengold subsequently voted against Gaddi Vasquez in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Read the full story at:
* This link was active on the date it was posted. PCOL is not responsible for broken links which may have changed.
Uzbekistan RPCV John Smart talks to Senator Feingold about Peace Corps Issues at Senator's listening session
December 6, 2001
John Smart, chairman of the Price County Democratic Central Committee, said of the issue of lower prices for pharmaceuticals in other countries that while he was in the Peace Corps in Uzbekistan, he regularly obtained a prescription drug for 25% of the cost for the same drug in the United States.
Smart also raised an issue pertaining to the Peace Corps, entirely separate from health care. He objected to the Bush Administration's intent to appoint Gaddi Vasquez, chairman of the Orange County, CA, board until resigning when the county went bankrupt, as director of the Peace Corps. Asked to elaborate after the session, Smart said that after his resignation "just short of a recall," Vasquez donated $100,000 remaining in his re-election campaign fund to the Republican Party. Smart said Vasquez has no qualifications for the job, and his appointment as Peace Corps director would be entirely a political payoff.
Feingold said one of the problems was that some past Peace Corps directors weren't particularly well qualified either, but Smart said that was no justification for appointing someone unqualified for the position now. Feingold said he would be looking closely at the proposed Vasquez appointment.
Although Smart was generally complimentary of Feingold's performance in the Senate, he complained that presently there was no "loyal opposition" in Congress, and he criticized Feingold for voting to confirm the nomination of John Ashcroft as attorney general. Click on a link below for more stories on PCOL
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This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Uzbekistan; Politics