Although I can’t vote in the city council election (out of the city limits), what the council does certainly affects my life. And it’s in that spirit that I’m enthusiastically endorsing Melissa Youssef.
When I was a science teacher at Durango High School serving on the DHS Strategic Planning Committee, and there was a conflict with the board of education, Melissa was the only board member who reached out to me to better understand the teachers’ perspective (even though we both received rather harsh criticism for communicating “outside normal channels”).
When I was Secretary of the Board of Directors at the Powerhouse Science Center and we had a leadership crisis, leaving me as the only officer on the board, it was Melissa who stepped up to take the job of president and successfully lead us through that crisis.
When Animas High School was struggling to open the facility at Twin Buttes, it was Melissa who stepped in as board president to successfully get the funding for that opening.
Her enviable record of successful leadership in our community has come from her remarkable ability to consistently and reliably foster the communication between and among (often conflicting) participants that leads to workable solutions.
Need you ask why I think Melissa would be a superb city councilor? Doesn’t she represent exactly the kind of leadership we need?
Marc L. Masor
Durango
