With Sen. Amanda Hemmingsen-Jaeger’s election to the Senate, voters in South Maplewood and Woodbury will decide who fills the vacant House District 47A seat, with a DFL primary on Dec. 16 and a special election on Jan. 27. While the race now features DFL-endorsed Shelley Buck, a South Maplewood nonprofit leader, and Juli Servatius, a Woodbury community volunteer, this Q&A also includes a personal message from David Azcona, who recently withdrew from the race after seeking the DFL endorsement.
- The Minnesota House is likely to be tied 67–67 when it reconvenes in February. If you’re elected from 47A, what’s one concrete issue where you can imagine co-authoring a bill with someone from the opposite party, and why?
Buck: Since this is a bonding year, where traditionally the Legislature focuses on allocating public dollars for infrastructure, housing, and other public projects, I want to make sure that we get a bonding bill passed. It means hundreds of millions of dollars that creates jobs and benefits our communities, and it requires bipartisan support. I am looking forward to getting a bonding agreement done!
Servatius: Re: Fraud: I think Republicans will like that I’m asking Governor Walz to apologize to MN taxpayers. I’ve posted a possible apology on my website. Then I would hope reasonable Republicans would agree we need to let Gov. Walz, at whose desk the buck stopped, lead the way to reforms that ensure this will never happen again.
Re: Abortion: To paraphrase Bill Burr, “Abortion is killing a baby but we should let them do it anyway.” As a moderate-minded newcomer (interloper?) in the MN DFL, I may need to look to Republicans to join me in supporting an abortion ban at 20 weeks/5 months.
- What’s one vote you would take, or public stand you’ve already made, that best illustrates the kind of representative you’d be for South Maplewood and Woodbury?
Buck: As President of the Prairie Island Tribal Council, I helped pass and implement our zero-carbon energy strategy. Protecting our natural relatives is incredibly important to me, and I will be a champion for green spaces, clean water, and clean air.
Servatius: My professional career was in telecommunications. I worked at MCI, its predecessors and its successor. I know we can pass a law to eliminate telephone scams. I am appalled at what the FCC has let caller ID become. Americans have a right to know who is calling them. Profitability for scammers must take a back seat to the safety of all our citizens. All five, six, 10 and toll-free databases should be nimbly updated to ensure no text or call is sent out without an accurate caller ID message. We should be well beyond the inadequate “scam likely” and “report junk” messages we get from the carriers.
- How do you personally stay in touch with residents of District 47A?
Buck: I’m involved in several groups; I just resigned as a DFL CD4 state director, I attend Coffee & Conversation meetings, I attend DFL SD47 meetings, I also volunteer at Woodbury Days. I also follow Woodbury News Net and a couple of community pages on social media. As a campaign, we are working on doing outreach to a wide variety of people from all backgrounds. As a legislator, I want to make myself available for town halls and office hours, as well as being available when I am physically at the House to listen to people and their issues.
Servatius: I’m starting listening sessions now, before the primary. The schedule is listed on my Facebook page: Juli Servatius for MN House. I will work hard to make sure I host weekly town halls in our district during the legislative session. It’s the least I can do to thank the voters who took a chance on me.
- What is one experience from your life (outside of politics) that most shaped how you approach leadership?
Buck: When I was finishing my bachelor’s degree I had an accounting internship at a small manufacturing company. The owner of the company was not a nice person to most of the staff, especially the manufacturing staff. I would always go out into the warehouse to see how the staff were doing. I built a relationship with everyone at the company. The team knew they could come to me and that I would help, or at the very least, listen. Sometimes that’s all they wanted. I earned their respect and was a champion for them when it came to the owner. I was able to be that bridge that was needed. That experience showed me what a little kindness and being humble could do. Anything I needed, the team was there to help me and vice versa.
Servatius: I’m running for office to effect change in both MN laws and MN culture that will uplift all disenfranchised Minnesotans. My whole adult life I’ve been friends with marginalized people. That’s a big boast, I know, but my friends will corroborate it. I’m a flaming born-again evangelical Christian. A Jesus freak! My 50 year motivation for helping the poor has been to please my Savior. In October, I decided to try to help the disenfranchised by becoming a Democratic state legislator.
- What’s something about this district that outsiders don’t notice, but you think defines us?
Buck: Something I think that is special in this district is our love of the outdoors and all the green spaces there are. We are so close to the cities yet there are so many animals all over! When I moved here, I didn’t think I would be seeing many animals and I’m happy I was wrong. I also like how diverse the district is. We celebrate the different cultures that live in the district, which I find refreshing. Not to say that there isn’t room to improve, but I don’t think some people know how many diverse backgrounds we have in the district. There also seems to be a lot of pride in living here from the people I’ve met over the last few years. It feels like a small community without actually being a small community.
Servatius: House district 47A is South Maplewood, where our family lived for 10 years, and Woodbury, where we live now and have lived for 15 years. We brought all our babies home during our years in South Maplewood. It’s a well-kept hilly bedroom community with lovely parks, a ski jump and close-knit neighborhoods. South Maplewood is the “handle of the mallet” in the city of Maplewood. Woodbury is the “Edina” of the East Metro but with a groundedness provided by our east side roots and our vibrant immigrant community. I support the new Gold line and hope more people in Woodbury will use it and say nice things about it. We’re the medical epicenter of the east metro. We have good shopping and our restaurant landscape is not too shabby. We have an active Woodbury Neighbors Facebook group of which I’m a part of and busy Buy Nothing Woodbury Facebook pages (east and west). We’re good people!
Recent college graduate, David Azcona, withdrew his bid to be the DFL representative in the seat formally held by now state Sen. Amanda Hemmingsen-Jaeger.
Azcona was one of three candidates but failed to receive the highest votes. Shelly Buck won with 20 votes; David three; and Juli one.
“I decided to withdraw because the winner will have much more money [to spend on their campaign] and have many more volunteers,” Azcona said. He added that running without an endorsement would be futile.
One of Azcona’s main platform points was to push for healthcare reform. At the state level, he had hoped to push for a single payer plan that would cover everyone.
Moving forward, Azcona is hoping to explore opportunities at the state capitol or local county level in the near future.
