Greg Lopez Speaks Locally: “It’s About All Of Us”

by Fred Hernandez
R ick Castor, campaign coordinator, announced the start of the meeting at 6 p.m. on June 13th at the Lange Hall of the Lutheran Church on 3rd Street in Westcliffe by calling Pastor Adrian Washington to the podium. Pastor Adrian, Custer County representative of the LOPEZ FOR GOVERNOR campaign, gave a prayerful invocation followed by the Pledge of Allegiance.
Immediately thereafter, the energetic candidate, Greg Lopez, was up and running with one of his familiar mantras: “It is not about Denver or Boulder, it is about all of us” referring to the 64 counties that make up the Centennial State, a nickname resulting from becoming a state of the Union in 1876, one hundred years after the nation was founded. It was a good-sized audience of about seventy-five enthusiastic citizens eager to hear from Mr. Lopez about his plans and platforms. The only veteran among all those vying for the position, Lopez, who became the youngest Colorado Mayor (City of Parker) at age 27, recounted his experiences not only as a mayor but as City Manager as well, a position which involved him in all aspects of managing government offices and programs. Passionate about small business, a former director of the Small Business Administration, reminded the audience that there are about 500,000 small businesses in Colorado, employing more than one million workers and, to help them, he “will remove regulations that strangle small business” which comment brought a round of applause. His other passion is education and the need to get those who are graduating from high school “job ready”. Not everyone has to go to college and get a diploma to be successful. Those with technical skills make a very good living as plumbers, electricians and professionals in the food services industry to name a few. He firmly believes a person should not allow anyone else to define them and that they are in control of their own success. Another round of applause from the floor. He spoke of his humble beginnings and of the truly important values his immigrant parents instilled in him which is what drives his motivation to give honorable service to others. He mentioned the budget of the state as being thirty billion and how important it is to manage the people’s money properly. On that note he brought up the subject of PERA, the retirement benefits fund for over five hundred thousand current and former government employees. The entity is managed by a board of trustees composed of sixteen individuals eleven of whom are benefit receiving members; clearly a case for potential conflicts of interest. He will take a close look at this particular area of government which currently has a substantial deficit. The two-hour meeting, which began with a light but delicious dinner, was punctuated by applause from an appreciative audience and ended on a high note with Lopez taking questions from the floor. In closing, the deeply spiritual candidate told the story of the day he made a promise when his wife of thirty years asked him to always be a man of great integrity. He made the same promise to the audience as he reminded them that “the hand of God is on his campaign”. So to candidate Lopez we say “win this for all of us”.