Newaygo County Public Opinion

Are You There Representative Fox?

2/18/2025

Rep Joseph Fox taking in a Grant School Board meeting August 2023

Since Near North Now began publication in 2016 we have on occasion reached out to our State Reps for their input on issues as well as posted their viewpoints on the same. Jon Bumstead and Scott VanSingel were always pretty responsive to our requests which makes it all the more puzzling that despite our efforts we hear nothing but crickets when we attempt to contact current Rep Joseph Fox.

Feb 17
Good morning.
Would you care to comment on the decision by House Republicans to not take up the bill aimed at increasing transparency by opening lawmakers and the governor to public records requests?
Rep Fox
—--------------------

Feb 12
Good morning Joseph
Any comment or viewpoint on House vote to withhold funds for cities and universities who do not cooperate with ICE?
Rep Fox
—-----------------------

Feb 6
Can you share with your constituents your views of the GOP plans to withhold earmark funding for cities and counties if their law enforcement agencies don’t enforce or uphold federal immigration law?
Rep Fox
—-------------------

Jan 14
Hello Joseph
Possible to get a few words from you regarding the tipped worker legislation and efforts to resolve it?
Rep Fox
—-------------------------

And these are just the most recent.
Ok. Perhaps our efforts haven’t reached him in his email. Maybe he doesn’t have time as he said during his first election when we posed questions to he and his Democratic opponent:
“Sorry, I will not be able to respond to these questions. I have some other commitments that take priority at this time”
This was after having re-sent the questions and his asking for another day or two on a couple of occasions.
It might be his reluctance to comment on any ‘hot button’ issues, preferring to fill his social media with the statements created by GOPHouse.Org
Or it could be he saw the sign saying ‘NNN Everything Woke’ that once was part of the stream of electronic mumbo jumbo gracing a local eatery for far too long and wishes to not associate with anything that could be construed as ‘Woke’.
Whatever might be his resistance toward answering us, it is regrettable he has chosen to disregard our attempts, even after we sent this:

Hello Rep Fox
As a local media outlet reaching up to 10,000+ readers we're curious as to why you are choosing to ignore our requests for your input on issues that affect our readers (and your constituents). If you find this too cumbersome let us know and we will pass along to them your reluctance toward replying. Ignoring us just seems a bit rude.
And once again...
Rep Fox
-----------------

We have decided to go forward and assume Rep Fox is being selective as to his media outlets.
And also hold out hope that the next person who represents the people of our county will be willing to, at the very least, communicate with us.

Ken DeLaat, Publisher
Alexis Mercer, Editor

3 Comments

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Sally Wagoner

2/20/2025 08:39:41 am

Ken et al at NNN: thanks for letting us know of your attempts to obtain comments from our Representative Joe Fox. It helps us community members and constituents know how responsive, or not, our elected officials are.

Frankly, I felt the term “Woke”, as coined by certain political parties as negative, to be something of a badge of honor. I don’t see “woke” as elevating one group and demeaning another (ie the woke are better and the rest are not).

I see the term as “awakening” to, or better yet becoming aware of, the plights of others or situations that previously had been hidden from general, public knowledge. To listen and learn, and to work together to level the playing fields for everyone.

None of the attempts to hear everyone or fix everything will ever be perfect. But being “woke” to me means opening our eyes, minds, and hearts to others who feel they are being oppressed, held back, not heard, or discriminated against for whatever their reasons, and then taking action, or supporting actions, that address them.

So this “wokeness” goes in all directions: liberal to conservative to radical right or left. We all have issues, and all want to be heard and responded to.

Human nature, as we have evolved over the millennia, has relied on the large swings of the pendulums to try to create balance and equity among our peoples and populations. But hard and broad swinging pendulums create chaos, wars, and suffering.

Even now, here in our own country, the pendulum is swinging hard by the votes of those who felt oppressed by our country moving more toward inclusivity of all who dwell on this Earth, and actions to protect the Earth upon which we live and rely for our survival. Those votes have led to drastic disruption within our government, our Democracy, and our place among our global neighbors.

Sometimes people feel that we need to break everything down in order to rebuild it “better”.

The problem with breaking down our Democracy from the inside, as what seems to be happening now, is that the ones who will suffer the most from a government “apocalypse” are the working class, middle class, the marginalized, and those who are having to to work so hard to keep their heads above water for their families.

The billionaires and millionaires who are now dictating the course of our country will not be the ones who suffer - they will make sure they have what they need to keep and expand their bank accounts and lifestyles.

With all the supposed billions $$ that are being “saved” by the apocalyptic and reckless actions of DOGE (which by independent sources are severely over inflated due to counting savings that are not actual), the potential returning of these savings to the American Public will be a whopping $11 each.

This severely swinging pendulum is also turning our European and Canadian allies and global neighbors against us, against U.S. Our current administration’s blaming Ukraine for the war that began as an invasion by Russia is putting our own country, our own citizens, at risk for future global backlash.

Suddenly dismantling USAID and retracting food and medicine from populations that we help, not only for humanitarian but for security reasons, will also retract support for the U.S. from allies.

Supporting dictatorships such as those found in Russian and Hungarian leaderships, are turning our own Democracy toward autocracy, where The People ( ie All People) within our country will not have a voice or true vote.

What would happen if another 911 event hits the U.S.? Will the global community pour out their support for US as it did in 2001? Or will they agree with our current administration’s stance that we stand alone, and just take care of ourselves?

An “awakening” is needed now by us all. We need to be “woke” to how the actions of our administration will only bring that pendulum swing to a crashing outcome that will hurt our country, and especially our working class, middle class, and marginalized communities the most.

Let’s “wake up” to stop the dismantling of our Democracy. Let’s “wake up” to the pendulum that is swinging toward supporting billionaire dictatorships abroad, and here in our own country. Let’s “wake up” to making strategic changes that come from listening to all of our people, and working together in our local and federal governments.

It’s time for us all to be a bit more “woke”, and demand of our government and representatives to stop the chaos. Bring back our Democracy.

Stephanie Zinn

2/20/2025 11:47:18 am

Atta Girl, Sally!

Debi Church

2/20/2025 07:55:12 pm

Boy he was like a bad rash that just wouldn’t go away when he was trying to get elected. Guess now that he is elected he doesn’t feel the need to respond.

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