Marshal Millay

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
04/06/04
P.O.C. Tamara Millay
314-721-3960
tmillay@earthlink.net


MISSOURI LIBERTARIAN WINS TWO ELECTIONS, ONE OFFICE

GREENDALE, MO -- It was a quick, dirty, guerilla campaign, launched the day before the election in order to maximize impact and leave opposition no time to organize -- and when the polls closed and the votes had been counted, this small Missouri city apparently had a new marshal: Libertarian Tamara Millay.

"The board of alderpersons had placed an issue on the ballot to eliminate the position of city marshal and replace it with an appointed compliance officer," says Millay. "A few rumors were floating around as to why. For me, the bottom line was that an elected official is more accountable and responsive to voters than an appointed one."

Millay took advantage of the fact that the proposition to eliminate the office coincided with the election of the ! office itself -- an office for which no candidates had filed. On Monday, fliers went on every door in Greendale, asking voters to defeat the elimination proposition and write in Millay for the office of city marshal.

"Because of the rumors, we weren't certain whether or not there would be any organized opposition to Tamara's campaign," says Thomas Knapp, Millay's partner and campaign manager of her bid for the Libertarian Party's 2004 vice-presidential nomination. "We decided to do a two-day campaign: Fliers on Monday, poll work on Tuesday."

Unofficial results from the St. Louis County Board of Election Commissioners show that the elimination measure, Proposition B, went down by a vote of 93 to 54. Write-in totals have not yet been reported, but Millay was the only declared candidate and the only one with volunteers working the polls.

Now, she just has to do the job. Initial descriptions indicated that the marshal's office would require 120 hours of po! lice training. However, since the marshal has no arrest authority -- the office deals generally with ordinance violations that are ticketed -- it seems that she will not be required to become a Licensed Peace Officer under Missouri law. "I regard my job as being to work with the citizens of Greendale to resolve ordinance issues, rather than to write tickets and collect fines," says Millay. "The city code is draconian in certain respects. I can't change that, but I can try to minimize its negative impact and serve my fellow citizens. An appointed compliance officer would, by the nature of the job, be accountable to the council instead of the voters, and would justify the position by bringing in revenue."

Millay, 37, is chair of the St. Louis County Libertarian Party and a past candidate for US House and US Senate. She launched her vice-presidential bid last October. The Libertarian Party is America's, and Missouri's, third largest political party, with more than 600 electe! d and appointed public officials nationwide.