Measure E

As you know, I am a mother and activist.  My priority is to empower my children and my community.  I come from a family with decent law enforcement representation but from backgrounds that may not necessarily, at times, give law enforcement the benefit of the doubt.  My grandfather, who is part Native American, is suffering from dementia and my grandmother is in the fight with him.  As some of you have come to know; a fight it is.  My grandfather was a cop in Texas, Dallas area.  One of his good friends was in the motorcade when Kennedy was shot.  You want to talk about heated and controversial… He had some stories.  The fact that this man is soon leaving my life has been difficult.  This is the man that I respect more than anyone.  As far as I know, he is a man who did what was right no matter what the cost.  Always!  And I am losing him.  He was about community and making things right.  I attribute my stubbornness to him and at the end of the day am grateful because I may be someone completely different if it were not for my grandfather.

When I think of our community, it’s safety and ability to move forward; I question it.  Am I sold on all aspects of Measure E?  No.  I have issues with the oversight committee and am weary that a scheme to contract out is in our midst, but guess what?  We, the people, control that.  We stay engaged and question what that oversight committee is doing because some are appointed by council.  Keep in mind that through the power of election and recall process (even though tough), we have the power to remove councilmembers; if necessary.  The oversight is our job and we must do OUR job.  In all honesty, we are at that point.  We are suffering and as much as we do not want to admit; we need this tax.  Just think, by spending money in Hemet, even the criminals are helping fund this tax measure.  

Not long after my oldest was born, we lived off $15/hour.  Our money went to groceries and necessities; mostly items that are not taxed by this measure. We made it work.  When I first moved out to Hemet, I lived in county territory.  We moved out to a home in city limits about a year and a half later.  Have I seen the difference between city and county services?  Yes!  Am I willing to pay a tiny bit more knowing that I am contributing to building services as opposed to barely maintaining them as we have witnessed with neighboring cities? Yes!

Keep in mind that we have a Police Chief that has been extremely resourceful in keeping the crime at bay.  Please listen when I say that we are at a point and we are in for a reality that I am sure no one wants to see if we postpone an increase in PD.  Now, is this increase going to eliminate our homelessness? No.  Law enforcements job is to deal with those who are in violation of the law.  Per our Police Chief, only a small piece of that pie are, in fact, criminals and need to be reprimanded.  Those who are not a part of the criminal element, we, as a community, need to step in and develop solutions to point those on a path for success.  This may be some form of housing that residents in turn volunteer and contribute their time to local businesses and community building.  These are solutions that we need to build. This is not law enforcements job, even though, we tend to assume that they take on the social issues.  

The reason we need this tax measure is the same reason that a portion of us, but not all, can put our children to sleep at night and not worry.  I do not want any parent worrying that something can happen to their children.  Knowing that we play an active role in promoting safety and allowing quality resources to respond when needed, is essential to the safety of our children; our community. My girls are three and six years old.  I want to know that real crime is being handled in our city.  Truly handled. 

I am releasing this as Passover commences because if there is anything that this holiday teaches me it is that we are in charge of who we are and how we move forward.  The fact that we have the ability to be heard and say that we want to make sure that we can increase services that promote safety is, in fact, empowering. 

Melissa Diaz Hernandez

Building Hemet

I live in Hemet.  I work in Hemet.  My daughter goes to school in Hemet.  I raise my children in Hemet.  This is my home; my community.  When I was in college, I decided that if I ever had children I would raise them to know what it is and means to be an active/engaged citizen.  Agree with it or not, my girls have been with me to community/organization meetings, walked in parades with our Congressman, helped decorate campaign headquarters and made cards and helped with donations to those in need.  I will always be a voice for those whose voice is compromised.  I will always fight to make things better because I refuse to be any less of a women and I refuse to be any less of a mother. 

So, when I look at this election cycle and the wide span of opinions/positions on popular topics, I have to step back.  Just our presidential race alone is bringing out ‘true colors’.  And I say that because for the first time in many, many years, we are seeing a true voice.  People who truly are themselves are coming to the political forefront and those who have been a part of the political agenda are finally being seen for who they are; unauthentic and bought.  So I ask anyone who reads this, is it more important for a community leader to take a collective voice and engage the community dialogue including the ideas and opinions of others so that an idea can work because we have covered all the bases or is it more important to go with a narrow, less engaging voice that worked for a time but currently seems stagnant and failed the community as a whole?  Our communities are growing, expanding and changing in ways that some communities have yet to acknowledge. 

I get concerned when I see annoyance at community empowerment.  I get concerned when I see interest but a true lack of action.  In order to build this community back, we need more than a tax measure.  Yes, this will help significantly but we need to make sure that we can in fact sustain what we implement.  We need to fight for a better school system. Better schools build better communities.  We need to fight for more economic growth and enhancement.  We need to fight for a vision that we have yet to see.  We need to fight for a better ‘us’.  Superheroes (as much as we all want them to) are not going to come in and Save Hemet.  We have to do the saving and Save Hemet ourselves.