Michael Burgess

Name: Michael Burgess

Position Running For: Director, Ross Point Water District

Phone: (208) 773-3572

Address: 2083 N WESTWIND DR, Post Falls, ID 83854, United States

Website:

Twitter:

Email: sitientes@gmail.com

Tell us a little about yourself and your family, how long you have lived in the area and your occupation.

I am an oldest child, born at Sacred Heart Hospital in Spokane. I was raised in Opportunity WA., now a part of the City of Spokane Valley. In grade and high school I worked part time for my father doing piece work in his shop. I earned my own way to go to Gonzaga College Preparatory School for two years, to go to Conservation Instructor Training at Philmont Scout Ranch at Raton, New Mexico, and to attend the 1969 National BSA Jamboree at Farragut. …about your family...: My Bride Renee and I will celebrate our 44th wedding Anniversary this year. We are blessed with five self driven responsible adult children. We scrimped and scrapped to pay tuition for private schools for 26 years, and then I told Renee it was her turn to go to college. …how long have you lived in the area… : I left a rewarding job and extended family and friends to take a job here in March of 1993. My family followed from western Montana that July. We are going on 32 years living in the same house, in the Ross Point Water District in Post Falls. …and your occupation: I “retired” as a specialty materials machinist, after 24 years, from Honeywell Electronic Materials, a division of Honeywell International.

1. Do you have experience as an elected official and if so, what was your position, and how would you describe your voting record?

Not as defined by statutes for public office. I held the office of president and the office of vice president in the Sunrise terrace II Homeowners Association near Kalispell Montana, which was not like an Idaho statutory public entity for water purposes, however its particular existence was to manage the water system for 32 lots. As president I was responsible for timely water samples for insuring safe drinking, monitoring the indicator light system for outages, remedying issues, arranging servicing or repair, and collaborating with the secretary and treasurer to educate new lot owners about their share of the fees. … and how would you describe your voting record? I voted regularly in the statewide and national elections from the first time I was eligible. I became regular in the off elections after returning from college and from summer jobs to establish residency upon entering the work force full time. When first moving here in North ID I had to judge others opinions on the down ballot offices. Without a source of knowledge of the candidate’s track records I many times had to leave parts of the ballot blank. On account of those memories, upon election as a precinct committeeman, I compiled a voter guide to help my precinct neighbors have something to use as a baseline, as a starting place. It was a daunting effort to sort out fact from fiction, especially in the last two weeks of every election. My personal efforts gave way to promoting our Rating and Vetting system where there are more eyes, ears and memories with which to gather and sift.

2. Please tell us about your activity as a Republican. Have you previously voted for candidates of other parties? If yes, explain.

I was a politically precocious fourth grader when the L. B. Johnson campaign smeared Barry Goldwater at the close of the 1964 campaign with the TV ad of the little girl picking off flower petals with a nuke exploding in the background while airing words of a Goldwater speech. That manipulative event ended my patriotic innocence. Our nation was in a far deeper struggle than we understood. In subsequent elections my siblings and I helped our mother stuff envelopes for republican candidates running against the future U.S. Speaker of the House, Democrat Tom Foley. When B. Obama was running for re-election in 2011 I wanted to be able to face our future grandchildren. I wanted to be able to say what I did to help try to save our nation. All politics is local so I called up our committeeman, Mr. Bob Whitehead, and asked what I could do to help. Eventually I was elected to fill his precinct 28 seat when he resigned. Despite the very fast growing precinct and the often adjusted boundaries, I have been re-elected every election. I was asked to run for Vice Chair of what was then numbered as Legislative District 3. I was elected vice chair for two terms, and then was elected for District Chair for two terms. I declined to run a third time due to family medical issues, and to devote more time to help with the five year effort to found the new charter school in Post Falls, Kootenai Classical Academy. I also have chaired the GOP County Legislative Committee, and was appointed to fill the vacancy on the IDGOP redistricting committee left by the passing of Kathy Sims. I am presently the Secretary of Legislative District 5. I was elected to serve as delegate to five IDGOP conventions. I have also served a term on the early Rating and Vetting Committee. I have no ambition to do these things, but when I am asked, or see a need to step in the breech, I do as far as I am able. …Have you previously voted for candidates of other parties? If yes explain. : In the early 80’s I cringed as I voted for a Mr. Keedy for Judge, who had a stellar reputation but was running unopposed. At that time Judges in Montana ran as partisans. He ran as a Democrat. I came to regret that.

3. What is the purpose of government?

Human Nature has not changed. Man is still prone to err. The most important single function of government is to secure the rights and freedoms of individual citizens. The rights and their purpose are from God, not from the government. The government does not have the legitimate power to take away what it didn’t give. The ultimate purpose of rights is to be able to freely fulfill our obligations to God, to our families, and to our neighbor. There are no jewels more wondrous in eternity than those where souls at some cost to themselves chose to cooperate with God’s enabling grace in an act of virtue that required faith. No amount of AI can perform such an act of virtue.

4. Describe why you are running for this particular office. What are your qualifications? What are your goals?

For years I have been under the impression that Ross Point Water is not a public entity, but was rather a far larger version of the homeowner’s organization I had been an officer for in Montana. I once visited the office of Ross Point Water and made inquiries. They were happy with the board and their relationship with it. I found nothing online mentioning scheduled public meetings. I found no hint that it was a public entity. Now it seems there is a serious question about that. …What are your qualifications? What are your goals? : If it is supposed to be a public entity following state statute, then the board will need elections and will need people with experience in open meeting law, and some modicum of parliamentary procedure understanding. I helped the seven other founding directors of Kootenai Classical learn by baby steps how to start to swim in parliamentary procedure and then to prepare to be governing board directors operating under public open meeting statutes. I am far from an expert, but if this is a need I will be happy to partner to get it corrected. If there are better qualified candidates for this board, I have plenty of other responsibilities, but I may be one of the right persons in this moment who could help get this straightened out, and, it affects me. It is the system that serves me, my neighborhood, much of Post Falls and Kootenai Classical Academy. I have served a much smaller system, and I now have some open meeting statute experience. As for oversight experience on budgets, as the Chair of the KCA construction committee I verified adherence to the budget and signed off on millions of dollars in materials and labor in the construction of the Academy. What’s more I have coordinated with some of the best practice, best reputation subcontractors in the region who were very carefully chosen by the general contractor for integrity over price (which proved out to be cheaper in the long run). I have DIY’d most of my home watering system and appreciate the importance of backflow control for the integrity of the water and our health. I engaged the supervisor of the work crew at Ross Point Water in three water related upgrade endeavors over the years and found him very helpful each time. He was an “apprentice“the first time. I have a history of stepping up when better people are not yet confident to try. Others become encouraged when they see another of good will but less ability doing what needs done. My goal is to step up and in so doing draw others whose yet to be discovered talents will make me expendable. It has turned out that trying to make oneself expendable is a valuable thing.

5. Describe experiences where you are or have been engaged such as non-profit organizations, clubs, churches, boards, commissions, etc., where you have been of service to others.

I was a cofounder of Kootenai Classical Academy. We were counseled that you have to be crazy to take it on, and you have to be crazy to give five years of your life to persevere to get the charter and then get it to its opening. Petitioning for and winning State Charter approval under the severe constraints of the Covid era was a monumental task. When reputable teachers quit their steady jobs to come teach, and pull their own kids from other schools to put into yours, you realize how important it is to have perseverance to get through the fragile and stressful journey. The process to opening a school on time repeatedly appeared to reach dead ends. Now it is a gift that can keep on giving. I have served in men’s spiritual/ service groups at my church, and was previously a coordinator for a mission venue it served in Montana. I had previously coordinated the hands on construction of the cement foundation of the venue. In Post Falls I was a volunteer member of the Men’s Schola that sang Gregorian chant at High Masses, weddings and funerals for a number of years (my voice has changed). I was a facilitating taxi-parent and security guard for both the CDA and the Spokane Youth symphony’s practices for almost a decade. I assisted the coaches of track and cross country teams for three years as well. I team taught the International Bow Hunter Education course for the State of Montana for five years before moving here. That is a smattering of my non political volunteering.

6. Do you describe yourself as fiscally conservative? Please, elaborate.

Yes. I am the child of Great Depression children who believed and lived personal responsibility. They made do with a little and showed you can be happy without riches. They would not agree to fill out financial aid verification forms for us kids to apply for grants to help with college, or to qualify for scholarships because they insisted “we need to pay our own way, or don’t do it”. I paid for two years of private high school and for five years of college without incurring debts. I assure you it was painful. It is painful to see what other people waste and throw away. I find it rewarding to repurpose things to fix or invent other things. There is a precedent; God salvages willing people all the time.

7. Do you consider yourself as socially conservative? Please elaborate.

Yes. It is appalling that a majority of candidates don’t know what this question is asking. If a person conserves all things fiscal, and conserves little else, there is no integrity. I strive for the right to life from the moment of conception to be conserved. I conserve the right to defend our life, and the lives of others. The power of the second amendment is the physical potential to use arms in defense. The more the potential, the less likely the potential has to be exercised. Restricted access of arms increases the likelihood of an occasion for someone to need defended. I also conserve the necessity to be educated in the proper use of arms. The purposes of God given rights are to free us to fulfill our obligations to God, our families and our neighbors. These rights need conserved against the chaos of imagined realities, such as gender inventions. The U S. Constitution was written by and for a predominately or nominally “Christian people” and will not function if such become a minority. I conserve the right for parents to educate their children where they can find the truth, voting for that truth with their feet and their means of sustenance. Strictly speaking, from the stand point of God, error has no rights, but we as a people are generally divided as to what is error. Nevertheless, it is a great thing, an expected thing that an individual chooses to serve the truth freely without being constrained to do it. There is no virtue in the constraint. Constraint can’t achieve a loving service of God. I conserve the need of a limited safety net, which should always be as local as possible. Helping the needy and assisting good causes on ones’ own is virtuous. The government exacting taxes from you to do most or all of these things on our behalf diminishes the thriving of virtue. The thriving of virtue is God’s greatest work in us, when we willingly cooperate with Him. It is our very purpose of existence. I conserve the principle of Subsidiarity, which is”that government is best, that is closest to those it affects”.

8. Describe which party platform best aligns with your positions on public policy (Republican, Democrat, Libertarian or Constitutional Party) and where do you disagree with that platform.

The platform of the Idaho Republican Party best aligns with my positions on public policy. Where do you disagree on the platform? Its references to rights of God are rather quiet, but that is more a reflection on the dispositions of “we the people” of our country in general. To that, rather than make a criticism of it I am looking in the mirror and saying to myself; “Michael, the true statesman values principle over popularity, and works to create popularity for those principles which are wise and just”.

9. Do you have any history of tax liens, criminal record, bankruptcy or conflict of interest that may affect your future decisions or desirability to be voted into office?

No. I would recuse myself from voting on a water issue concerning the school if one should come up.

10. Describe how you will make yourself available to your constituents and vote as their representative with FORTITUDE, adhering to the values and answers you have stated above.

I have been sought as a mentor at times in how to represent others. I give the advice of what drew them to me. Know and perfect your principles. To learn what you think, write the principles out. It works. Speak and vote according to your principles, not according to the vying tribes that want you on their side. They are like shifting sands that move all about with the wind of the moment. If you seek information during debate to help you apply the right principle they will see that. They will even consult you for advice more freely even if you didn’t vote with them on their pet issues. Following principle will bring you interior peace. If you realize a mistake in applying the principle, they will be happy to know what you were thinking, because it shows…you were thinking. A feature of open meeting law is that all the board directors must have access to the same information that will be leading to a decision in real time. It is best to submit questions that could lead to specific decisions to the board as a whole. Unfortunately, at this writing there is no public access to determine if a process exists yet for the Ross point Board. There are usually provisions in the Bylaws for nuances such as where special problems could have information gathered by a subcommittee that will report findings back to the board at a future meeting. For now, or prior to possible election I will be available with contact information on my home phone, and request that you and leave a message stating who you are, your purpose and your contact information. If it looks like I didn’t employ a principle stated in this questionnaire I want to know about it and self correct. Sometimes the noise of an immediate lesser good obscures a greater longtime good.