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Senator Angus King was elected to represent Maine in 2012, as a political Independent. Bob Martin introduced Edie Smith, who spoke about the constituent services provided by the Senator’s staff. Edie introduced two guests, Dan Reardon, the constituent service representative from the Scarborough office and Ben Stanley, a senior at Cape Elizabeth High School, who is an intern taking a credit seminar titled “Senior Transition Project.” Ben will attend Williams College in Williamstown, MA in the fall.
Edie explained how Senator King directs his staff to call him “Angus.” She spoke about the uniqueness of the constituent offices and how they serve Maine people.
There are ten areas where the state constituent operations particularly excel.
10. Partnering with the Washington DC office. State and federal offices work collaboratively to help Maine people to navigate the federal government especially in areas like student loans, the FEMA flood maps, border issues and how to deal with green crabs along the coast, to name a few issues. Three constituents most often helped are (1) veterans (2) senior citizens and (3) low income households.
9. Staff works “more outside than inside.” They are split into two groups that work collaboratively with each other but have different roles. There are 7 Regional Representatives who are the eyes, ears and feet on the ground, for Angus.
8. Workload – there are 2,188 contacts each week with constituents through snail mail, emails or phone calls. A special Your-Government-Your-Neighborhood (YGYN) has hosted 709 outreach visits and are visible in all 16 counties every month.
7. Life experiences. There are three former State Senators and former mayors, city councilmen, and people who enjoy working in politics who help staff the constituent services.
6. Working as closely as possible with other members of the Maine Congressional delegation.
5. Seamless operations between state Constituent offices and the Washington DC staffs.
4. Angus loves technology! His staff being the only ones Edie knows of in the country where every single staff member has a blackberry and a laptop – so they are accessible 24/7.
3. Positive attitude. Although the staff works with people who share challenges and innovations, they go home every day to celebrate success, even when dealing with often difficult situations.
2. Political affiliations don’t matter. Angus does caucus with Democrats because he is required to do so in order to receive committee assignments. He only meets with the caucus once a week, on Tuesdays for lunch.
1. Angus King is a humble individual; he loves being a US Senator. Moreover, he loves the history of Washington DC. He loves channeling Joshua Chamberlain wherever he goes. He is a history geek and he still says when he walks in the Senate Chamber he thinks of how lucky he is to be there.
Edie said the favorite part of each week is the prayer breakfast every Wednesday morning at 8 AM. He has not missed one of them. In fact, Angus is forthcoming about how one hour each week, when the Senators join together in a spiritual, respectful and non-partisan way.
Dan Reardon spoke briefly about how the Scarborough office participates with constituent services.
Packets were made available to the Rotarians with information about how to contact the constituent services. Capitol Coffee invitations were disturbed for those who would like to attend a short meeting with Angus and the staff on Wednesday mornings at 9 AM, in the US Capitol, to enjoy homemade Maine blueberry bread.
(Picture: Ben Stanley, Edie Smith, Bob Martin and Dan Reardon.)
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