Gabby_ A Story of Courage and Hope - Alison Hanson [80]
Gabby spoke sharply on other issues, too.
She called U.S. energy policies “potentially disastrous” unless more money is invested in renewable energy. She’d point out that her district has 350 days of sunshine a year. “Every single new house constructed should have solar panels on the roof,” Gabby said.
As a member of the Space and Aeronautics subcommittee, she paid attention to the issue of safety in space, and held a hearing in April 2009, after two satellites collided. She talked about the 19,000 objects in Earth’s orbit that are tracked by the U.S. Space Surveillance Network, and the 300,000 other pieces of debris—some as small as a half inch in size—that no one is tracking. Gabby wanted witnesses from the space program to address whether that satellite collision was a harbinger of life-threatening disasters to come. “What is needed and how do we go about getting it put in place?” she asked.
One thing I always loved about Gabby was the way she focused her attention on the biggest issues and the smaller ones with equal passion. In 2009, two British tourists were hit by a truck and killed while crossing State Highway 80 in Tombstone, the historic Western town in Gabby’s district. There had been three other fatalities there in recent years. Gabby wrote to Governor Jan Brewer asking her to act quickly to install a crosswalk and lighting. The Arizona Department of Transportation had conducted two studies at that location and determined a crosswalk was not justified.
“Tombstone, known internationally as ‘The Town Too Tough to Die,’ must not become known as a place where tourists and residents risk their lives when they cross the street,” Gabby argued. ADOT studied the issue again, but didn’t agree crosswalks were necessary.
Gabby knew she wouldn’t win every issue, but she woke up each morning ready to keep trying. She really did. Whether she was focusing on a vast stretch of outer space, her district’s 114-mile border with Mexico, or the few dozen yards from one side of a busy street to the other, my wife was relentless.
When it came to the biggest and toughest policy issues, I watched how carefully and thoughtfully Gabby made up her mind. TARP and the stimulus package were particularly difficult votes for her. In 2008, TARP—the Troubled Asset Relief Program—was designed to strengthen the financial sector by allowing the government to buy assets and equities from financial institutions. Given her concern that the government often does a poor job spending taxpayers’ money, and that the bill didn’t have sufficient accountability measures, Gabby initially voted no. The bill failed. Then the stock market plummeted and President Bush couldn’t get enough Republican support for a new version of the bill.
Gabby knew it was a politically unpopular thing to do, but given how critical that moment was, she felt the right decision was to support the president and the house leadership in both parties. She also felt the changes in the bill had made it a better piece of legislation. If the new bill had failed, our banking system and the entire economy may have failed, too.
As a fiscal conservative, Gabby wasn’t one to vote for new spending unless the situation was dire. That’s why President Obama’s economic stimulus package in 2009 was such a difficult vote for her. It gave her sleepless nights. She collected input, pro and con, from her constituents. Then, worried about a recession or even a depression, she voted for the plan.
Like all of us, she wanted to be liked, but she wasn’t afraid to be unpopular as long as she was given a chance to make her case. And she liked the challenge of changing people’s minds.
She was repeatedly invited to speak before the Tucson Chamber of Commerce, and even though the chamber always endorsed her Republican opponents, she appreciated the opportunity to be heard by these conservative business leaders.
At one speech, near the end of her first term, she began by covering all her bases: “I am honored to be here today as a third-generation Tucsonan, a product of our public schools, a former