By Donna Westfall, Editor – November 17, 2021 Let's face it. When you're involved in politics that means attending meetings. Lots of meetings. There's no shortage of meetings. Whether you're an elected official or an activist, there's always a meeting somewhere. Last night, the Republican Central Committee met. I attended with the intention of saying my public comment and then going home to join my husband for dinner. That didn't happen. I stayed for the entire meeting which ran about 2 hours. Here's my public comment: "My name is Donna Westfall. 14 years ago, Doug and I moved to Del Norte County. At that time I had been a lifelong Democrat. Then I sat on the Crescent City, City Council for 4 years. My constituents came to me describing the harmfulness of fluoride. I did my research and agreed with them. I then tried to communicate that to the Democratic Central Committee. They wouldn't listen. They pretty much ignored me. Trying to deal with Martha McClure, Bob Black and Kathryn Murray among others convinced me that the Democratic Party was no longer representing me and my values. I re-registered as a Republican and will never forget Cali Martin walking over to me and very sternly saying, "I'll be watching you" as if I was a spy. We worked on putting the removal of fluoride on the ballot. It failed the first time, but passed the second time. Tonight I'm here for a couple of reasons. 1.) I want to pick up petitions for school choice and to repeal the death tax and 2.) Because I'm dedicated to no more taxes, last week I turned in paperwork to start the process to repeal the 1% City Sales Tax. We only need 49 signatures to get it on the ballot. I'm also working with others to repeal the County 1% Sales Tax and the Fire District Assessment Tax. The reasons for my public comment is to ask that you put this issue on a future agenda for discussion. I hope that the Republican Party will endorse this." Before the meeting ended, Henry Geiger asked that this be added to their next agenda. People (about 30 in attendance) came up to me and thanked me for doing this. Why did I stay for the entire meeting? There was topic after topic that was of interest. Valuable information was discussed about redistricting, about setting up tables with volunteers to get signatures on petitions, about upcoming events to meet candidates for office, about decorating for Christmas, and more. We'll go into more detail in the next article because there's action to be taken if we want to see some changes. Now Karen Sanders, Darrin Short and Angela Greenough have gotten bad press in this publication. Karen is Chair of the meeting. Darrin Short is 1st District Supervisor for Del Norte County and Angela Greenough is on the School Board. They have been called RINO's and worse. However, from what what I heard last night, it appears they are returning to traditional Republican values.