Last night at the Bald Eagle Volunteer Fire Company, Rep. Larry Sather hosted a spaghetti dinner fund raiser for his re-election campaign. More than 100 people enjoyed an evening of fellowship and had the opportunity to chat with Sather concerning issues that affected them.
“This is a way to get re-aquainted with the constituency of northern Blair County,” said Sather. “It is a fund raiser, but it also is a great chance to meet and greet people who want to share their concerns.”
Congressman Bill Shuster made a brief appearance with Sather at the dinner.
“It is great to be here,” said Shuster. “Larry is doing a great job for us in Harrisburg. We have a governor that is pretty tough to work with, but Larry is working hard to take care of the people in central Pennsylvania.”
Sather, a longtime volunteer fireman, was pleased to be able to have the dinner at the Bald Eagle Firehall.
“We try our best to have events like this at our local fire companies,” said Sather. “We believe in the mission that they do and events like this give back and help them serve the community better.”
In its seventh year, Sather’s spaghetti dinner isn’t your traditional fund raiser with a fiery speech of why the candidate should be re-elected, but a nice sit down family atmosphere.
“I think others in elected office should start taking this approach,” said Sather. “You can accomplish a lot more when you drop the formalities and just talk to someone one-on-one. People are more likely to open up and tell you what is on their mind if you are talking as people, not representative to voter.”
Issues such as the re-opening of the paper mill, volunteer firefighter funding and health care were brought up with Sather by people throughout the evening.
“We had many people come up to me and say they were happy that we got involved in the re-opening of the paper mill,” said Sather. “The economy is the number one concern among the people. The Tyrone and surrounding area is looking forward to the day when the 170 people are hired and the mill becomes operational again.”
Governor Ed Rendell showed support to Sather’s initiative for volunteer fire departments across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
“The governor and his team were very supportive of the referendum for volunteer fire fighters that passed last November,” said Sather. “He placed the $25 million for volunteer fire companies, EMS and first responders into the budget that was passed last spring. Fire companies should be getting letters on how that funding is being distributed by the end of this month.”
Sather also fielded questions about the medical malpractice crisis that has hit Pennsylvania.
“The ‘sue you’ mentality is partially what is causing this crisis,” said Sather. “This will continue even with the tort reform and medical malpractice legislation we have passed goes into effect. There are doctors and hospitals that are teetering on the bubble waiting for the issue to be resolved. The federal government has allocated $900 million for Pennsylvania over the next two years and about $400 million has been given to the state already. The governor hasn’t released that money and says he won’t until other issues are resolved.”
One of those issues is education.
“We go back into session on September 9 and hopefully some changes have been made in attitude on both sides,” said Sather. “The leadership on both sides of the aisle have been working together and with the governor’s team and hopefully reason will prevail and the education legislation will be resolved.”
