Hello Tea Party members: I am out of town speaking at a conference on behalf of the tea party movement. I am in a hotel in Ohio that has only liberal stations and no Fox. It also has 5 stations in Arabic. Our carrier in Jacksonville does not have these stations so it was interesting to see them.

I feel so alone here without a Conservative tv station. I have been listening to the liberal stations for the last 2 hours as I worked and I must tell you - "We don't think alike!"

They really have a very different view of life and they twist and turn our feelings and our words. No wonder our world is in such a mess. And - the anger they express is amazing. Of course, they will say we are angry and extremists so this is a no win situation. I'm beginning to wonder if we will be able to come together on issues. It will take a lot of work and a lot of people willing to put themselves out there to have the conversations.

Speaking of conversations, the Leadership Council reached out with City Council President Jack Webb and had a meeting with him regarding our concerns with the City Budget. We did that because we had concerns. Not because we wanted to cause trouble - because we had concerns about raising our taxes during this economic downturn. We did it professionally. We asked Jack to confirm our concerns in writing and we collaborated with him to ensure our message and his answers were right and correct. He was a real pro and we appreciate him meeting with us.

We held a press conference. We published what our concerns were. We let our membership know about the concerns uncovered by some in the tea party movement.

The City Council will meet tonight to discuss the budget. The TU has reported that some prominent people in Jacksonville are lobbying on behalf of the mayor's budget. See article here: http://jacksonville.com/news/metro/2010-09-13/story/jacksonville-ci...

We are curious why they would do that as we hoped business owners would appreciate not paying more in taxes. We thought they would appreciate the people standing up and asking our government to do the deep cuts that we are doing in our homes and our businesses and they have probably done in their own businesses.

We are all new to this political game and we are not sophisticated like they are in these tactics. All we care about is having our voices heard and having the City government do their job. That is to keep taxes low while funding what they need to fund and not funding what they can cut. Why is that bad?

It's bad because they see things differently than we do. It's bad because those who have been in charge in Jacksonville do not like it when others question their reasoning. We are good people. We are concerned citizens and we have a right and a civic duty to stand up when we feel government spending is out of control.

I will be in Ohio tonight and wish I could be there. There will be others from the Leadership Council there. Please go to the City Council Meeting and express your concerns about the proposed property tax increase. Here are the details of the meetings:

http://www.coj.net/City+Council/default.htm

Do so with professionalism and with facts. Here is the handout we gave during our press conference. CityCouncilMemowithNotesIncluded.pdf

If you want a free tee shirt “Don’t Raise My Taxes” please come by the office and pick one up. You can call the office to ensure some of our volunteers are there to help you with the tee shirts -- (904) 683-3945.

You are smart people and I am honored to work alongside each of you to win this battle. We must do this to ensure long term financial stability in our homeland.

May you be blessed and may you be wise in your words and your behaviors. I know you will be because you always have been.

Thank you for all you do and God Save the USA,

Billie