Cache County Council candidate: Kathryn Beus
Q: What makes you stand out from other candidates? Why should people vote for you?
A: In my race, I actually don’t have an opponent. I had an opponent in the primary, and I won the primary. So now, I’ve advanced to the general election. And I think one of the things that helps me stand out is I have a lot of experience. I am currently in my third term as a council member on the Nibley City Council. Having had that experience, I can identify what I think the county needs. I can help lead in the county, and I can help with making some of those decisions that are going to affect the whole county, as we have a lot of growth that we’re talking about. And I’ve experienced a lot of growth in my time in Nibley City, and I’ve helped to accommodate that and plan for it, so that we’re really proactive about our growth. And also, just a lot of the issues that we have county-wide, a lot of it has to do with growth. How are we going to deal with our open space? We’ve identified that’s a value we have, and how are we going to make sure that we can have planned open space and deliver open space, so it’s not just like, “Oh man, I remember when this was open. I remember when Cache Valley had vistas that weren’t just homes.” And so, I think with growth, we’re talking about garbage removal, we’re talking about wastewater, we’re talking about how can we keep this high quality of life that we currently enjoy in Cache Valley for future generations.
Q: If you aren’t elected, how will you still be involved and still serve the community?
A: I’m currently just one year into this term, so I’ve served for nine years on the Nibley City Council. I still have three years that I could continue to serve, so if something were to happen and I don’t get elected, I would just continue serving in Nibley. I love Nibley; it’s a great community, and I have thoroughly enjoyed the time that I’ve spent serving there. And I feel like I’ve worked hard to do good work there.
Q: What do you think is the most important responsibility of this position? How will you do your best to manage that?
A: I think the one of the greatest things of local government, in particular, is doing the public business in the public eye. And I feel like we’ve always advocated for that in Nibley, and to get people out and involved. And we want to make sure that they see that we are doing things in the proper form. We notice all of our meetings, we make sure that we have public input, and we don’t do anything that’s going to go contrary to how our meetings are set up, so that we can make sure that we do things in a public way and that goes with everything that we do. I mean a big thing is our budget. That’s how we identify our priorities — by setting a budget. I want to make sure we do that in the public eye. We do that in a public way so that people can see that there’s direct accountability for where their money is going.
Q: What do you hope to change or accomplish if elected?
A: I want to increase the amount of leadership that the county currently has. I feel like we’ve been doing a lot of reactionary things lately. I want to increase our leadership. We need to be leading out in the new garbage disposal and how we’re going to do our waste disposal. We need to lead with that, we need to lead with emergency management, and we need to lead with open space initiatives. So I feel like I really just want to make sure that the county leaders are well versed, and come in with an open mind and are able to start leading on those initiatives. I feel like the county hasn’t been as proactive about it — it’s been pretty reactive on a few of those things, and so I think that’s my greatest thing. I really want to go and step up the amount of leadership that the county offers to the municipalities, and I’m in a unique position where I’m coming from, having served on a city council for such a long time. I don’t want to step on any city council’s toes because I feel like the best government is that that’s closest to the people. But I do want to be a great resource and step up what we can offer to the residents of the county.
Q: If you could only eat one food for the rest of your life, what would it be?
A: I think it would have to be ripe peaches. Ripe peaches are heavenly.
-Carter.Ottley@usu.edu
Featured photo by Heidi Bingham