Hello:

 I welcome this opportunity to provide public service to Chesapeake by running for city council.

I am an MBA and a CPA with 25+ years of corporate financial experience and 15+ years of Fortune 500 management experience. I am a VP with a government contractor in Chesapeake.  I know how hard it is to make payroll and pay taxes. During college, I worked for two years as a student intern in the legislature.  I have prepared hundreds of budgets.  For the last 12 years I have served as a Boy Scout leader.

Most voters in Chesapeake are fiscally conservative and socially moderate. That matches very well with my overall political philosophy.  I am MODERATE and pragmatic and have new ideas on how to help make our city government more efficient and effective.

Education is a vital topic to me and Chesapeake.  My twin sons graduated on June 15, 2007 from the Chesapeake school system.  Max graduated from Great Bridge High School and David graduated from Oscar Smith High School in the International Baccalaureate (IB) program. They're both Eagle Scouts.  Max joined the Corps of Cadets in the Virginia Tech Navy ROTC program and David is  attending Virginia Tech on a University Honors scholarship. 

Chesapeake needs to create additional vocational-technical training and academic academy opportunities for our youth.  We need to resolve school overcrowding, expand our pre-kindergarten and full-day kindergarten programs, improve our high school graduation rates, and increase our teacher's salaries to bring them in line with the national average.

We need to address the transportation problems in the Tidewater area before gridlock damages our economic growth and reduces our quality of life.  Transportation is a city, state and national problem.  Please refer to my website page labeled "Transportation" for an in-depth discussion of the issue.
 
We need to have a fair and reasonable tax system that avoids loopholes favoring one group over another.  I will work to plug the tax loopholes and help keep taxes under control. The property tax needs to be as low as possible so that our senior citizens are not forced out of their homes.

On the other hand, we do need several major capital improvements in Chesapeake.  Even with the Grassfields High School completion, we still need to build two more new schools,  an additional high school and a middle school, to reduce crowding.  We need to replace the Dominion Boulevard Steel Bridge and the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) needs to widen or replace the I-64 High Rise Bridge.  All those schools and bridges are incredibly expensive.  The rapid increase in steel and concrete prices has caused huge problems within the city’s and the state's capital budgets.  During the next several months of the campaign, we’ll be talking extensively about fair and reasonable taxes and our need for new schools and bridges. 

Chesapeake is blessed with access to water and parks.  As the city grows, we need to maintain the city’s livability by preserving our open spaces and green belts.  It is not necessary to cut down every tree along the 168 Bypass.  We need to preserve the scenic vistas of the city, so that it continues to be an attractive place to live.  Uncontrolled growth is not in the best interests of Chesapeake and its citizens.

We need to find ways to reduce the number of teenagers being killed in automobile accidents.  About 6,500 teens are killed every year due to traffic related accidents.  The number one killer of teenagers in the USA is automobile accidents.  On July 2, 2007 the Virginia AAA again emphasized the urgency of improving the driving skills of our teenagers and said that, on average, every week in Virginia three or four teenagers lose their lives in automobile accidents.  Locally, we have recently lost several great kids in car wrecks. We need to do something now to improve teen driving safety.

I need your vote and I promise to work hard in the Chesapeake city council to represent you.

Sincerely,
Mick Meyer
Chesapeake