Good Governance Matters

My children and I love listening to audiobooks in the car on long drives. We recently finished Bill Nye's "Everything All At Once," and in the opening chapters Mr. Nye expressed ideas echoed in lessons from my parents and grandparents in my youth. Ideas like, everyone knows something you don't know. Ideas like, treat everyone with respect.

It was affirming to hear those articulated again, because these echo the requests I heard when I considering a run for office, too. In speaking with voters as a new municipal chair last year in a town governed by members of a different political party, asking what neighbors and residents wanted from new representatives, I kept hearing the same concept from local friends across the proverbial political aisle. "Respect."

As a voter, as a mother, as a 15-year resident of Lake Hopatcong and constituent in the 26th Legislative District, I believe that I too am deserving of representatives who respect my family and me. I believe we deserve accountability, transparency, responsiveness and good governance. I think it's important that people have the ability to open up conversations on impactful issues with accessible representatives who come into those talks with an open mind, humility and grace, and welcome new information that might acquaint them with information or perspectives perhaps previously not considered. I also believe voters like us deserve the respect of candidates who present their positions well, and who respect our capacity as decision makers in our own lives to make good choices on who we feel would best represent us in public office.

All of this contributes to why I am running a clean campaign.

As an environmental advocate, a grassroots organizer and a mother of four running to advance clean energy jobs, protect clean air and clean water, improve our healthcare and legislate with empathy and fiscal responsibility, I know that good ideas by virtue of their merits alone don't always make it into policy. It takes advocacy, education, collaboration, good faith efforts, patience, persistence, the will of the people and more to get important initiatives passed, and sometimes even with all of that, red tape and corruption can slow or stall the process of excellent ideas. So we also need to elect people who can work together, meet people where they are, listen with intent to understand rather than to respond or attack, and adapt to changing working conditions where necessary while still getting meaningful work done. We need people who are unafraid to speak up, willing to own their humanity and admit a mistake, and humble enough to regard constituents as equals rather than subjects.

I’ve been working on some of these initiatives for the last few years anyway, before running for office. I am a trained Climate Reality Leader and an Honorary Adviser to the United Nations' NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-NY. I talk to school children about the sustainable development goals and facilitate conversations around questions like, "How will we protect clean water?" and "How can we stop bullying?" and "What problems might you like to solve as you grow up?" I am on the steering committee of the Jersey Renews coalition, which is an excellent exercise in good governance. The group includes a diverse range of advocacy groups, businesses and unions representing different views in clean energy transition talks, working together in good faith on solving problems while keeping as many people at the table as possible. I'm the former Environmental Director with Action Together New Jersey, where we ran heavily-advertised online town halls with our Senators and members of Congress during evening hours when people could tune in after work, taking questions in advance and live during the broadcast, giving constituents answers on policy issues. Those aren't all of the hats I wear, and there's more information on my website at ClarkeForAssembly.com, but I share this to point out that I'm walking the talk on good governance principles and environmental advocacy already. This contributes to why my campaign has picked up so many key national, state and local endorsements.

Candidates should demonstrate the way they would govern in the way they conduct their campaigns. I've already been attending town halls, public events and forums, taking meeting requests, taking calls and trying my best to deliver meaningful answers on the issues. I'm also going to finish the race in a manner my children would be proud of - with respect for our constituents and their capacity to choose representatives based on positions and issues, on actions and advocacy, and on key votes where applicable. We can tackle "everything all at once," together, as long as we meet each other with respect and listen to understand each other. Should you choose to vote for me on November 5, that's the way I would govern as well.