I’ve been going door to door in my re-election campaign since the start of petition passing in early June. By my calculations, I’ve knocked on about 3500 doors. I figure I’ll hit about another 1000 or so in the final month.
Going door to door is the best way to get to know your constituents. It also gives you the opportunity to connect with people you’ve known in a different capacity — sometimes many years ago.
A few weeks ago I was walking up a driveway and saw a name that sounded familiar. John (I’ve left out his last name for privacy reasons) opened the door. I introduced myself and asked if we traded beer memorabilia over 30 years ago.
Sure enough we did and John asked me if I wanted to see his collection. He had all kinds of trays, draft knobs, old bottles in packaging that looked like it just came from the grocery store and a bunch of other stuff. His collection was in a league far superior to mine.
I spent about 30 minutes with John and felt like a kid in a candy store. A lot of his collection had pre-prohibition items and it was all Rochester-based breweries. He even had a Dickens Beer can (a product Genesee made for a really short time), something I had only seen in pictures.
It was great to see him and talk about old times. Moments like this are one of my favorite parts of campaigning and I thank the voters for the honor of allowing me to serve them in this capacity.
I had the chance to catch up with an old friend of mine, Ron Good earlier this summer. The occasion was the annual legislators and supervisor’s lunch.
I first met Ron in the summer of 1985 while we were both volunteering on a political campaign. At the time I had no idea I was talking to a living piece of Rochester history.
Ron was a pleasant man. We made small talk and each went our separate ways.
Later that summer, someone suggested that I read the book, The Remaking of a City, Rochester 1964-1984, written by Lou Buttino and Mark Hare. The book chronicled the changes in Rochester from the period just before the race riots to 1985.
I was always interested in history and given that I had just completed my internship in Assemblyman Roger Robach’s Albany office, this book really captured my attention.
Many of the people in the book were people who were still active in government, or were people I remembered from television while I was growing up.
One of the people the book mentioned was Ron Good — he was the first African-American elected to the Rochester City Council and one of the first African-Americans elected to the Monroe County Legislature.
I had the opportunity to work with Ron on several projects later in my career. He is warm, gracious and a real class act. He is a man of tremendous achievement in and out of politics. I have great respect for him and consider myself lucky to have had the opportunity to know and I consider him a dear friend.
Unfortunately I don’t get to see Ron as much as I would like, but when I do it is always a special occasion.
