Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Rodgers Ready To Serve

By JOHN MILLER

A year of running for office has finally ended, and ended successfully for Sandra Rodgers.

Tuesday, Nov. 5, she was chosen to be the newest member of the Arkansas House of Representatives from District 28, soundly defeating her Republican foe, Tim Cornelius, in Nevada and Hempstead counties.

Now, she's ready to start serving the people of the district, and is working on two bills to be introduced when she arrives in Little Rock. These bills deal with the state's criminal code, with one for adults and the other on juvenile crime.

"I'm so glad it's over with," she said. "I finally got the totals about 8 a.m. Wednesday (Nov. 6), but we'd stayed up till around 3:30 a.m."

Rodgers split election night between her house and the Democratic headquarters.

"We saw the trends developing after the first few boxes," she said, "and started feeling better."

Now, Rodgers will undergo freshman orientation at the state capital, and has already been attending some committee hearings the legislature has been having.

During her campaign, Rodgers didn't take donations of more than $100. In fact, she turned down some donations because they were more than $100.

"I'd like to thank all those who voted for me," she said, "who supported me from the beginning and helped with the campaign.

"I thank Tim Cornelius, he was a worthy opponent and ran a good, clean campaign. I appreciate his efforts."

Rodgers had a special thanks to her mother, husband, Danny, and children for their efforts during the campaign.

With the election over and won, Rodgers said she will now do everything possible to help build the economy of Prescott and Nevada County, along with the rest of the district.

Rodgers said during the campaign people provided her with information on issues important to them. While she was unable to examine it while knocking on doors, she has, since the election, been going through it to get ideas for bills to be introduced into the House.

Along with the two bills she has ready on the criminal code, she is examining data on mineral rights.

At this time, Rodgers said, if a person buys property, the seller can retain the mineral rights almost forever. She would like to see these rights revert to the purchaser after 20 years if there has been no activity on the land.

Additionally, she is looking over information provided by the silver-haired legislature on senior citizen issues.

Most if this information, Rodgers said, deals with Medicare, health insurance and prescription medication costs.

However, before worrying much about her new job as representative, Rodgers took advantage of deer season by heading to the woods Saturday, Nov. 9, the first day of modern gun season.