Editor’s Note: These are part of a series of Camp Verde Town Council candidate essays that will be published over the next weeks.
While this newspaper has graciously advised and encouraged all candidates to use all 750 permitted words for this personal essay, my preference is to make this short and concise.
I am Jackie Baker, candidate for mayor of Camp Verde. I’ve lived here for 33 years, been a council member for nearly 18 years and volunteered in many capacities over all those years.
My work career was more than 20 years in property and casualty insurance, both in Texas and Arizona. Included in that career were years as agent and sales supervisor, plus an education in that industry. In addition to a work career, as happens with many of us, I have been wife [widow now], mother and grandmother, all titles of which I’m very proud. As the wife of a career U.S. Air Force master sergeant, I have lived through and experienced many of the issues and sacrifices that have always faced our military and their families. That Air Force career did allow us to be stationed in several different states as well as tours in Japan and Thailand, the latter his being an adviser to the Royal Thai Air Force.
During my time on Town Council, I have served as liaison to the Northern Arizona Council of Governments including past service as secretary/treasurer and Vice Chair of that regional council. I’m also an elected trustee for the Arizona Municipal Risk Retention Pool [AMRRP, the insurance pool for the majority of municipalities in our state], having been re-elected to that board for several years. These years of experience have provided hands-on government knowledge and contacts that will prove invaluable in dealing with the many needs and issues that our town government must resolve.
Economic development to increase our needed revenues is an immediate and ongoing process. While we have put measures in place to attain our goals, the current process is not gaining much ground. Raising taxes to provide additional revenue to meet spending is not the answer; living within our budget is. We must budget responsibly by addressing and reducing our current debt to revenue ratio; an A- bond rating is absolutely unacceptable.
Finally, I have been blessed to have the opportunity to be your representative on our Town Council for these many years, and I will be very honored and proud to be your voice as mayor. We have the best of all worlds right here: Best location, beautiful climate, precious river, our priceless history and more importantly, our wonderful citizens who are always ready and willing to help their neighbor and our town. Always striving to do more for all, we do it as a real team here in Camp Verde, and aren’t we the lucky ones?
