This year Donnie Blake, Kevin Pass, Garry Wheeldon, Roy Rich and Dr. Chris Christensen attended Legislative Day on March 1, 2010.  There is a picture of us caucusing the day before we went “over on the Hill” to visit our Senators and representatives (Legislative Day Photos).  That is Washington talk for getting in a cab and going over to the Senate and House office buildings.

It is really impressive to me to see the workings of government and to see that most of this important work is being done by lots of ordinary people who want to do something great for our country.

We first visited Senator Jim Bunning’s office.  Senator Bunning was getting a lot of flack because he objected to unemployment benefits being automatically being extended for people who had been out of work for over a year.  His office phones were ringing off the hook and all his staff people were taking calls from lots of people who where not happy with his actions.

We got to meet with a young woman staff assistant and she was obviously distracted and distressed by the calls.  We met in this little tiny room and had only a few minutes to tell her of our concerns.  I told her, “We’re in the pest management industry and our industry is doing very well.  We are trying to expand our number of workers and we cannot get qualified or high quality employee applicants because the unemployment benefits are so good.  We need good employees and will pay them but there are few applying because they do not need to work. 

The young staff assistant looked at me in surprise and exclaimed, “You mean you approve of the Senator’s vote?”  I responded, “Hell yes we do!!”

That was when I realized that these trips are really important.  Our Senators and Representatives do not know what we are thinking and feeling or how the policies they develop affect our industry.  They need our input. 

If you have not gone on this trip, you really need to think about doing it.  We have one of the biggest delegations from Kentucky… and there are only five of us.  Think if we had ten or twenty active pest managers meeting with congressmen and women from all over our state.  What an impact and what a service to them and to our industry.