To the editor:
Last week, our state representative for District 154, Lisa Durnell, made a post on her Facebook page regarding her decision to decline an invitation from the Howell County News for a session with her primary opponent, Travis Smith. In her post, one of her reasons for declining the invitation was that Travis Smith and Amanda Mendez of the Howell County News “shared” an intern.
That intern is my daughter. She just completed her freshman year at the University of Missouri in its journalism program. She was looking for summer work to fund her studies and approached the Howell County News. Concurrently, she sent her resume to Tanya Miller at the Mountain View Chamber of Commerce to investigate internship possibilities in Mountain View. Miller was extremely helpful and sent my daughter’s resume to all the chamber members in case there was an organization in need. Smith responded.
Both internship possibilities were part time. My daughter got both job interviews from different inquiries. There was no coordination between Mendez and Smith to “share” an intern. My daughter notified them both of the other opportunity in an effort to avoid conflict of interest. Mendez told my daughter that she would not be able to report on any election stories to avoid any conflict. The level of professionalism that I saw was exemplary.
One of the issues that I see for Howell County is the ability to find opportunities for our younger population and retain them in our area. Miller saw that opportunity, which is why she sent out my daughter’s resume. Mendez and Smith saw an opportunity for both themselves and my daughter. I thank them for that. We should all be looking for opportunities to build the community.
My daughter is a voting member of District 154 and is represented by Durnell. Unfortunately in this instance, Durnell misrepresented her. Durnell should be taking every opportunity to put herself in front of people, not blaming a young intern for her refusal to make herself available to the people she represents. If Durnell is a member of the Mountain View Chamber of Commerce, she also would have received my daughter’s resume and had the opportunity to bring in some talent to her campaign.
We deserve better.
Martine Long
Mountain View
