A.G. Gancarski
“It’s my first day over here,” Rep. Corrine Brown said to our question on Saturday about the challenges of campaigning in Baker County, “but I worked with this region before.”
In 1982, elected to the state House, Brown found herself battling Gov. Bob Martinez, who wanted to close the MacClenny hospital, which dealt with psychiatric issues.
“We need additional mental health,” Brown said, “not less.”
Brown is still committed to mental health treatment, believing that Reagan-era cutbacks resulted in the kind of oversight lapses that lead to “homegrown terrorism.”
In introducing herself to a new district, some things change. Brown is fond of saying that every community has different priorities.
Yet as she introduces herself, in the autumn of her political career, to voters throughout a sprawling district where she lacks infrastructure, there is a need to make up for lost time on local issues.
Her work in the Congress gives her a leg up on some matters. such as her fight for Florida’s water resources in the Quincy area (where she will have one of three campaign offices) against the depredations of Georgia and Alabama.
And, as she reminds us, Brown helped facilitate the largest land transfer in federal history to a black land grant college: 4,000 acres to Florida A&M, from where she graduated. She also has fought in Congress to improve the funding situation for HBCUs.
Brown, though identified with the urban areas she’s represented, notes that she’s represented rural areas before, and won them over.
When first elected, she represented Palatka, which initially didn’t sit well with the local chamber of commerce.
“The Palatka Chamber said I was the representative for colored people,” Brown recounted.
But in the end, she won them over, with attention to the concerns of local stakeholders.
“That is the kind of thing that I do,” Brown said, noting her work to bring 17 more cents on the dollar back to Florida for transportation funding purposes, moving Florida’s share from 75 cents to every dollar taxed to 92 cents for every dollar taxed.
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During her remarks and after a playful conversation with Republican nominee Glo Smith, Brown reiterated these reminders of her legislative record in Baker County, delivering a modified version of her presentation style.
Before her remarks, Brown said, she “rode down the street, saw a church sign” that said “never stop doing your best even if no one gives you credit.”
Brown, playing to an entirely white crowd, didn’t use some of the pyrotechnics familiar to those who follow her in Jacksonville and Washington.
She talked of the importance of mental health, and did defend the Affordable Care Act, but with less thrust than in Jacksonville, noting that “Florida taxpayers are spending $50 million, sending money to Washington” and getting nothing in return.
Brown talked about the Sunset Limited Amtrak service from New Orleans east, touting it as a “homeland security” measure, which would allow the movement of people in a tragedy, like post-hurricane or terror incident.
After leaving, Brown was en route to a barbecue in the area. Her main campaign appearance this weekend, however, is in Jacksonville, where her headquarters will open officially Sunday afternoon.
