Lefty-Turned-Limited Government Advocate: Sandy Harmon
You'd never guess it now, but Sandy Harmon began his political career as a Lefty.
"I started out in politics by campaigning for JFK and later LBJ," Harmon said. "I was a young, dumb Democrat, swallowing the lines of bigger government being better. I was caught on the horns of a dilemma, though, as what I was believing flew in the face of what our Founding Fathers held dear."
He said he eventually outgrew these "statist beliefs" and began writing speeches and ad copy pro bono for various Republican politicians.
"Eventually I realized that there wasn't a dime's worth of difference between the parties and became a Libertarian," he said.
Harmon also soon realized the importance of local government, and that citizen vigilance in holding elected officials accountable is crucial to protecting freedom from even the lowest station of government.
Harmon, a resident of Tonopah, NV, had been attending Town Advisory Board meetings, through which he observed a complete lack of local rule. Though the Advisory Board met twice a month, when citizens could voice their opinions, the Board would ignore citizen input when they made recommendations to the Nye County Board of Commissioners.
Harmon put an end to this by helping pass an initiative measure that changed Tonopah's government format from a Town Advisory Board to a Town Board, giving local citizens a real say in their own government as well as the means to hold their local elected officials accountable.
"Such boards touch people most closely, at their homes and businesses," Harmon said. "The representatives are local people, who can be approached and spoken to without layers of bureaucracy to keep citizens from their representatives."
This was far from the end of Harmon's community involvement, however. After observing the newly-empowered Board for a few years, several board members encouraged him to run.
"My interest was primarily due to seeing that even at the local level, idiots and self-serving people would get themselves elected and then do nothing for their town," he said.
Unfortunately for Tonopah, Harmon lost the first time around. A year later, however, a seat opened up and Harmon became the first libertarian ever appointed to public office in Nevada. While in office, Harmon kept a close watch on the budget (down to every last expenditure), visited every town building to see what taxpayer dollars were funding, and asked tough questions of public employees who didn't seem to be pulling their weight.
"Right off, I saw how some people held these jobs only to make themselves important, or to help fill the empty space in their pockets," Harmon said. "Many good people would take these unpaid, thankless jobs, usually leaving after a term or two-while the power-mongers and less-than-scrupulous would hang on forever. One by one, the good guys were leaving the Board and I was becoming a lone voice, crying in the wilderness."
Even before Harmon stepped in as the lone voice of responsible government, serious damage had been done-in a town of 3,200 people, the ever-increasing budget had already passed a whopping $1 million.
"We were supposed to provide necessary services, but were a source of employment for the unemployed who had been born here," he said. "Most natives believed that they had some sort of God-given right to the publicly-supplied feeding trough."
At the end of his term, Harmon left his post, but Tonopah citizens-taxpayers and voters represented by Harmon and his responsible government stance-hounded him for not staying on. So, after a hiatus of many years, he returned to his position.
Unfortunately, even more damage had been done in his absence: the budget was in shambles, the convention director had run off all convention business (and therefore, much tourism revenue) while still earning $70,000 per year, and the fire department volunteers were leaving, one by one, because of the attitude of the two paid employees.
"Obviously, my warnings in the past had been written off as the deluded ramblings of Chicken Little," he said. "Now the piper had to be paid."
So, Harmon rolled up his sleeves and got to work.
He got the ball rolling to turn the fire department into a volunteer organization, and he also built consensus among board members to cut the convention director position from the budget. However, when it came time to approve the final budget at a town meeting, and Harmon made the motion to eliminate the position, the convention director-and all the cronies he could round up-threw a fit, shouting accusations that Harmon was "out to get him."
"I sat there for 90 minutes, while being accused of everything but hiding Jimmy Hoffa's body," he said. "[We] were threatened with recall, lawsuits, etc. Much of it was a litany of who was born here and when, as though that made all the difference in the world when it came to fiscal responsibility."
Frightened and outnumbered, Harmon's supporters backed down-and the motion failed. However, the opposition wasn't finished yet. A few days later, they launched a recall campaign against Harmon.
The opposition had 45 days to circulate petitions, and they needed 25 percent of those who voted in the last general election. They did the best they could-they lied to citizens, and they had slanderous pieces printed in the local newspaper. But, when it came time to turn the paperwork in, they hadn't collected even 40 percent of the required amount of signatures. Having failed to rouse support behind their baseless claims, they eventually gave up and the convention director resigned.
Now, Harmon is finished with his service in elective office, but far from finished serving his community.
"I still perform considerable volunteer work for the town," he said. "Each job done saves the budget, and the taxpayers, that much more money. I recruit others to do the same, as do I still try my best to talk good people into running for that miserable job. I also contribute and volunteer for other campaigns."
"I do this because our country has been taken over by bureaucrats and self-serving lifetime politicians," Harmon continued. "The precepts laid down by the Founding Fathers have been thoroughly trashed by those who mouth promises to follow them....As more and more political power became centralized, our rights, our liberties, freedoms, and 'pursuit of happiness' have been eroded to nearly nothing but a memory."
Harmon firmly believes that strong, responsible local governments are the key to combating this strengthening attack on liberty.
"This can only be accomplished by people who are willing to take on the dirty, thankless, and unpaid job of ensuring that our local governments and school boards remain strong and honest," he said. "They need to watch for any signs of encroachment on our rights, especially in such areas as taxes, eminent domain, restriction of property use and rights and any other action attempted by those who would control our lives for 'our own good.'"
Residents of Tonopah can be glad that Harmon is one of these people, and join him in his efforts.
His advice to those willing to service in elective office of some capacity? Learn all that you can about the job and about the community's needs, build alliances with other honest citizens who can show up and help during times of strife, build up thick skin-you'll need it, and leave the job knowing you are a good citizen doing the same thing as those who founded and maintained our country.
We need more people like Sandy Harmon-here's to him.
