More than 100 people have come at least once. In fact, Hansen credits the forum’s instant success to the fact that when they launched it, Dexter was in the middle of an emotional discussion about whether Dexter Community Schools should annex the Whitmore Lake school district: “We started big, and we’ve stayed that way.” They now have about thirty to forty people at each meeting. Most discussion topics are local, from roads to development to schools. Everyone is welcome–from the city itself, the surrounding townships, or farther afield. And we’ve been lucky to have some highly knowledgeable people attending,” says Fink. “We can’t fix Washington, and we can’t fix Lansing. And we thought: we can do something about that in our little world. At the state and national level, we don’t talk to each other. The important part of that is that we approach solutions. “We approach solutions from different directions. I’m a Democrat, and I’m not ashamed to be a Democrat, but I don’t like the idea that if I’m a Democrat you think you know me, any more than I like the idea that you might think you know Karl just because he’s a Republican. I’m proud to say that my personal values and feelings align well with the Democratic Party. “You can run as a nonpartisan, but you can’t be elected,” he says. To run for the legislature, Hansen had to choose sides. “I like the way you said that,” says Hansen, ” ‘if you have to be labeled.'”Īs a judge, Fink ran only in nonpartisan races. John is something else,” he says, as both laugh. “If I have to be labeled,” says Fink, “I’m a Republican. “One way to let people know that it’s not going to be a partisan forum is to let people know we’re both involved. “John and I have different political viewpoints,” says Fink. John brought up the subject” of starting something similar in Dexter. It was created thirty years ago by the late Peter Fletcher, a prominent Michigan Republican and longtime local businessman.Īt the Fletcher Forum, explains Fink, “People of different political viewpoints meet every Saturday. “John and I were both aware of a similar concept in Ypsilanti, the Fletcher Forum,” says Fink. In February 2015, the two men founded what quickly became another Dexter institution: the Dexter Forum, which meets at 8:30 in the morning on the first and third Saturdays of each month at the Dexter Wellness Center on Baker Rd. They met when Hansen was principal at Dexter High School and Fink and his wife Jane’s six children were wending their way through the local schools. Both Ypsi-native Fink and Saginaw-born Hansen have been in Dexter since 1974. After he left the legislature, he continued in public service as a kind of interim everything–doing short stints as school superintendent in Willow Run, Brighton, and Adrian township manager of Scio city manager in Chelsea and Ypsilanti regional director of the March of Dimes and president of the Ann Arbor Chamber of Commerce. He has been practicing law for fifty years and still works at Ann Arbor-based Fink & Fink with various family members or, as Hansen calls it, “Fink to the fifth power.” Hansen started in the Dexter Community Schools, eventually becoming DCS supervisor and later winning election to the state house. Fink served as a judge for eighteen years and as a Webster Township trustee for a decade. First, they’ve got to greet just about everyone in the bustling room–all of whom they seem to know by name.īoth Fink and Hansen are local institutions. But it takes them a moment to get to the table. Karl Fink and John Hansen arrive right on time for a Thursday morning interview at Dexter’s Joe and Rosie coffee shop.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |