It's Almost Time To Vote

Tomorrow is the day! Get out and vote and let your voice be heard. It is your right and your responsibility to decide who will represent your thoughts, feelings and actions on the issues that are effecting your community.

Thanks everyone for all the positive support that you have given me during all this hard work. See you at the polls tomorrow!

Campaign Website Updated

I got a chance to put some more info up on my campaign webpage. I updated the Issues page so everyone can see what my stance is on things. For those of you that like one stop shopping, I have reposted them here for you. Thanks for your time, and remember to vote on Feb. 27th!


Effective Management
I can communicate with people from all backgrounds and develop a consensus that everyone can agree on. The city council needs to have a single goal that everyone is working together to achieve. My management experience in the military and in the aircraft industry has taught me to take everyone's input and develop a plan that everyone can agree on. My greatest skill that I have developed in Supply Chain Management is to learn how to talk a common language with every organization. I want to bring that skill to the city council to focus everyone on making Wichita the best city it can be.



Responsible and Focused Government
I am an advocate of civic and personal responsibility. I believe the city council needs to be accountable and transparent to the citizens through a more effective use of our tax dollars and by ensuring projects are completed on time and on budget. The city has given tax abatements to companies that have not provided a return on the tax dollars invested. Instead, we should be supporting economic development that is in line with our future goals such as revitalizing real estate in the heart of the city, businesses that offer different services than the ones we have available, and the attractions that will help retain the young talent in the city.


Developing Wichita
I support both residential and business development to draw people back to the center of Wichita and support a higher level of cooperation and communication between city, county and Wichita education leaders to better the community as a whole. Wichita is losing residents to the surrounding areas at a growing rate. The reasons given most often is because of the public school system and the availability of housing in the middle price range. This migration to the suburbs is reducing our tax revenue which continues to reduce our ability to develop. The city needs to support revitalization in the core of the city, not continuing the urbran sprawl that is bleeding off our most valuable resource... people.


Economic Diversity
I feel that the key to a strong economic future is attracting more diverse businesses to Wichita while continuing to support the strong manufacturing industry. I feel this can be done by providing a foundation for other industries in the region and supporting better education to develop the future generations into a more diverse and productive workforce. We need to attract firms that specialize in back office work, such as payroll, human resources, financing companies that are already outsourcing and keep that work here in Wichita. We also need to focus on bringing more of the technology sector to Wichita that will compliment our manufacturing industry. Bringing customer support centers, internet data centers, telemarketing, warehousing and distribution centers to Wichita can help us diversify the workforce and provide more and different opportunities to the young talent in Wichita.

On The Campaign Trail

Today I attended an open forum for the Waste and Recycling Coalition with most of the other candidates that are running for the City Council positions. Counting me, there were 4 of the 6 candidates for the District 2 seat. The two that were missing was the incumbent, Sue Schlapp, and a strange fellow that does not seem to agree with most of the world, let alone the city. It was an interesting meeting and was a great way to see the views of the other candidates. One thing that really got me was something one of the candidates for District 5 said. He stated that one of his goals was to turn Wichita into a premier retirement community. Now I have talked about this jokingly before. However this guy was sincere and from his tone, it sounded like the best thing since sliced bread.

It is this mindset that I am trying to change. That is one of the main reasons why I am running for City Council. That statement discounts every person in this city that plans on remaining in the workforce for more than 10 years. I will not let the tired and complacent take over this town and let it coast away into retirement. Wichita is a vibrant and creative place; we are not ready to sit down in an easy chair and accept whatever the future may throw at us. There is an amazing amount of change looming over the horizon and we will miss the opportunity in those changes if we are sedentary. Please pay attention to those that want to take leadership and then sit down in the middle of the road. On Feb. 27th make sure you vote for someone that is looking toward the future, and not sleeping on the past.

As always, keep spreading the word and show your support by getting out to vote for me on Feb. 27th! Thanks for the support!
Wenke for Wichita City Council">

New Website Is Up!

Sorry for the lack of posts lately, but campaigning is busy work! It has been great getting out and talking to all kinds of people and the excitement and opportunity that you hear from everyone is wonderful! To help get my name and message out there, I created a new website for the campaign with some help from my friends. Check out www.VoteWenke.com and get the details about me, the campaign and where I stand on the issues. Any feedback is appreciated so please feel free to drop me a line. The website is also perma-linked under the Links section on the right. Please show your support and send this on to everyone you can. The opportunity for positive change is out there for us to take advantage of! Let's not let that chance slip us by! And don't forget, GET OUT AND VOTE FEB 27th!!!

Thanks everyone!
W.

How To Get Elected. Part 1

Monday - Jan 22nd
After months of discussions with my friends and family, I have decided that I would like to have my own voice in my local government. So after work, I ran down to the Wichita City Hall and went to the city clerk on the 13th floor. I filled out a few forms, wrote 2 checks, one for $10 and one for $35 and I was on the primary ballot. That's it. It took me about 15 minutes (including the snap shot the clerk took for me) and $45 to become a candidate. I walked out of city hall very proud, this is my first time running for an elected office. Even though it was 5pm, my day was just beginning. I ran home, formulating plans as I drove, and grabbed a quick bite of dinner and my school books. Monday night is Micro-Economics and it was the first day of class. The professor makes us mingle for an exercise and I use the opportunity to introduce myself as a candidate for the first time. There is an excitement in those words, every time I say them. It motivates me even more to be successful. After class, I took 5 minutes to ask the professor a few questions about her thoughts of the Wichita economy, what she says validates my months of ramblings. When I get home, I stay up til 1am studying the incumbent's record for the last 4 years and to find any information I can. The hard work is just starting.

Happy Birthday Ethan!

Congratulations to my cousin Jill and her husband Kevin on the birth of thier first baby on Saturday Jan. 27th. Ethan Craig is a beautiful healthy baby boy that I got to spend some time with yesterday, and he is absolutely peaceful. Mom and baby are resting peacefully at Wesley, stop by the birthing center if you can and give them your best wishes!

Jason Wenke Announces Bid for City Council District 2 Seat

Wichita KS January 24 2007

Jason Wenke is now a candidate for Wichita City Council for District 2 after filing with the city clerk on Monday. Jason was born and raised in Wichita until age 14 when his family moved to Halstead Kansas where he graduated high school in 1993. After high school, he worked and attended college until joining the US Navy as an aircraft mechanic at Tinker AFB in Oklahoma City. After 3 years he was promoted to an E5 and ran the high-tempo Airframes shop during his last year of service. Jason returned to Wichita in 2000 after he was honorably discharged and was hired on at Raytheon Aircraft as a line assembler. He has continued successful employment in a number of jobs from the shop floor, to production control and is now a part of Supply Chain Management. He is a member of APICS Wichita, a production and inventory control certification association. Jason is currently working toward his degree in Business Management at WSU. He is also an active member of the Young Professionals of Wichita as part of the Leadership Link action team.

Jason is an advocate of civic and personal responsibility. He believes the city council needs to be accountable and transparent to the citizens through a more effective use of the tax dollars and by ensuring projects are completed on time and on budget.

Jason supports both residential and business development to draw people back to the center of Wichita and supports a higher level of cooperation and communication between city, county and Wichita education leaders to better the community as a whole.

Jason feels that the key to a strong economic future is attracting more diverse businesses to Wichita while continuing to support the strong manufacturing industry. He feels this can be done by providing a foundation for other industries in the region and supporting better education to develop the future generations into a more diverse and productive workforce.

As part of the city council, Jason would like to develop economically viable attractions. He feels this can be done by working to make the current attractions self-sufficient and also developing innovative entertainment destinations that the community will support.

See the annoucement in the Wichita Eagle here

Disconnected

Some may have noticed that I haven't been online for a few days. The cable company has been having issues that got fixed Friday. After that, we come to find out that my modem went bad. So now I have a new modem and I'm linked back up with the collective, obviously :)

I did get about half way thru a pretty good book in my days of information exile. It's called the culture of fear. It makes you think about the trash that you read and hear on the news. Check it out. The Culture of Fear: Why Americans Are Afraid of the Wrong Things

Thinking About Freedom

A while back, I watched a documentary about why the United States has become such a war prone nation. It began with the farewell speech of president Dwight D. Eisenhower when he left office in January 17th, 1961. I went and found the whole speech here (link) so I could read all of what he said in his own context. In my opinion, it speaks volumes on the state of our country today. If you get a chance, watch the movie "Why We Fight" to learn more about our wars. For now, arm yourself with a bit of knowledge of the past. Here is Eisenhower's speech in it's entirety. I've highlighted some of the parts I thought were important.

Eisenhower's Farewell Address

My fellow Americans:

Three days from now, after half a century in the service of our country, I shall lay down the responsibilities of office as, in traditional and solemn ceremony, the authority of the Presidency is vested in my successor.

This evening I come to you with a message of leave-taking and farewell, and to share a few final thoughts with you, my countrymen.

Like every other citizen, I wish the new President, and all who will labor with him, Godspeed. I pray that the coming years will be blessed with peace and prosperity for all.

Our people expect their President and the Congress to find essential agreement on issues of great moment, the wise resolution of which will better shape the future of the Nation.

My own relations with the Congress, which began on a remote and tenuous basis when, long ago, a member of the Senate appointed me to West Point, have since ranged to the intimate during the war and immediate post-war period, and, finally, to the mutually interdependent during these past eight years.

In this final relationship, the Congress and the Administration have, on most vital issues, cooperated well; to serve the national good rather than mere partisanship, and so have assured that the business of the Nation should go forward. So, my official relationship with the Congress ends in a feeling, on my part, of gratitude that we have been able to do so much together.

II

We now stand ten years past the midpoint of a century that has witnessed four major wars among great nations. Three of these involved our own country. Despite these holocausts America is today the strongest, the most influential and most productive nation in the world. Understandably proud of this pre-eminence, we yet realize that America's leadership and prestige depend, not merely upon our unmatched material progress, riches and military strength, but on how we use our power in the interests of world peace and human betterment.

III

Throughout America's adventure in free government, our basic purposes have been to keep the peace; to foster progress in human achievement, and to enhance liberty, dignity and integrity among people and among nations. To strive for less would be unworthy of a free and religious people. Any failure traceable to arrogance or our lack of comprehension or readiness to sacrifice would inflict upon us grievous hurt both at home and abroad.

Progress toward these noble goals is persistently threatened by the conflict now engulfing the world. It commands our whole attention, absorbs our very beings. We face a hostile ideology-global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose, and insidious in method. Unhappily the danger it poses promises to be of indefinite duration. To meet it successfully, there is called for, not so much the emotional and transitory sacrifices of crisis, but rather those which enable us to carry forward steadily, surely, and without complaint the burdens of a prolonged and complex struggle-with liberty at stake. Only thus shall we remain, despite every provocation, on our charted course toward permanent peace and human betterment.

Crises there will continue to be. In meeting them, whether foreign or domestic, great or small, there is a recurring temptation to feel that some spectacular and costly action could become the miraculous solution to all current difficulties. A huge increase in newer elements of our defense; development of unrealistic programs to cure every ill in agriculture; a dramatic expansion in basic and applied research-these and many other possibilities, each possibly promising in itself, may be suggested as the only way to the road we wish to travel.

But each proposal must be weighed in the light of a broader consideration: the need to maintain balance in and among national programs-balance between the private and the public economy, balance between cost and hoped for advantage-balance between the clearly necessary and the comfortably desirable; balance between our essential requirements as a nation and the duties imposed by the nation upon the individual; balance between action of the moment and the national welfare of the future. Good judgment seeks balance and progress; lack of it eventually finds imbalance and frustration.

The record of many decades stands as proof that our people and their government have, in the main, understood these truths and have responded to them well, in the face of stress and threat. But threats, new in kind or degree, constantly arise. I mention two only.

IV

A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction.

Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my predecessors in peace time, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.

Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence-economic, political, and even spiritual-is felt in every city, every state house, and every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.

In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been over shadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.

The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded.

Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.

It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system-ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.

V

Another factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society's future, we-you and I, and our government-must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.

VI

Down the long lane of the history yet to be written America knows that this world of ours, ever growing smaller, must avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate, and be, instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect.

Such a confederation must be one of equals. The weakest must come to the conference table with the same confidence as do we, protected as we are by our moral, economic, and military strength. That table, though scarred by many past frustrations, cannot be abandoned for the certain agony of the battlefield.

Disarmament, with mutual honor and confidence, is a continuing imperative. Together we must learn how to compose difference, not with arms, but with intellect and decent purpose. Because this need is so sharp and apparent I confess that I lay down my official responsibilities in this field with a definite sense of disappointment. As one who has witnessed the horror and the lingering sadness of war-as one who knows that another war could utterly destroy this civilization which has been so slowly and painfully built over thousands of years-I wish I could say tonight that a lasting peace is in sight.

Happily, I can say that war has been avoided. Steady progress toward our ultimate goal has been made. But, so much remains to be done. As a private citizen, I shall never cease to do what little I can to help the world advance along that road.

VII

So-in this my last good night to you as your President-I thank you for the many opportunities you have given me for public service in war and peace. I trust that in that service you find something worthy; as for the rest of it, I know you will find ways to improve performance in the future.

You and I-my fellow citizens-need to be strong in our faith that all nations, under God, will reach the goal of peace with justice. May we be ever unswerving in devotion to principle, confident but humble with power, diligent in pursuit of the Nation's great goals.

To all the peoples of the world, I once more give expression to America's prayerful and continuing aspiration:

We pray that peoples of all faiths, all races, all nations, may have their great human needs satisfied; that those now denied opportunity shall come to enjoy it to the full; that all who yearn for freedom may experience its spiritual blessings; that those who have freedom will understand, also, its heavy responsibilities; that all who are insensitive to the needs of others will learn charity; that the scourges of poverty, disease and ignorance will be made to disappear from the earth, and that, in the goodness of time, all peoples will come to live together in a peace guaranteed by the binding force of mutual respect and love.

Saturday Night or Sunday Morning

It's 6:00 on a crisp fall morning
or night is the appropriate term
staring down the full moon
on my porch steps
listening to the maple leaves
fall one by one
It's an improbable time
to be contemplating the evening
or night
that is quickly shifting to morning
The full open face mocks me
almost condescending
"Do you really think
that you said something witty
or full of meaning
something worth remembering?
You're sitting here
watching the sky shift to dawn
getting covered in leaves
that don't care where they fall"
I laugh in his face
with a wink and a smile
It doesn't matter if I did
I was there the whole while
I spoke my mind
open and honest
and had fun all the time.
It wasn't a contest.
With me... or her.
Or even you Mr. Moon
so don't smirk at me
if I sit here and swoon.
Don't laugh at me
as you run from the sun
your day is over now
but mine has just begun.