Monday, September 17, 2012

Mayor as bait for tourists



Fifteen years ago citizens of a small Alaska town Talkeetna decided not to vote for any candidate to mayor. Instead of that they began to canvass for candidate named Stubbs. The plan worked: Stubbs took a majority of votes and won. He achieved success because of his great popularity. There were not blackmails, slanders and briberies. And at that political race he had an irrefutable advantage which the others didn’t have. He was a cat!

Stubbs achieved a political breakthrough in a very young age. Soon after the Nargleys, shop owners, found him and the other kittens in a box left at the door. Since then Stubbs became an unchallenged head of the town, he has been holding a post during last 15 years. Every day he makes the round of Talkeetna and visits local businessmen. Often sleeps at the restaurant tables and drinks… so, only water. According to citizens, Stubbs has never had conflicts with mongrels and other animals. Besides that, this mayor is famous by his devotion to the town: in 2002 he was the last who left the pizzeria which was in fire. Popularity of Stubbs grows every day and there is no word about a loss of confidence.
“He doesn’t raise taxes and we haven’t sales tax. He doesn’t middle in our business and he’s very honest” the local sellers say.


Talkeetna is situated in Matanuska-Susitna Borough and had 876 people in 2010. And so the mayor’s post is only nominal in this town. In spite of the absence of duties Stubbs benefitted to Talkeetna. 30–40 people visit him at the Nargley’s shop every day. Tourists stay here for some time on the road to Mount McKinley. Besides, Stubbs receives letters and postcards from everywhere, he has a lot of friends on Facebook. http://www.facebook.com/mayorstubbs

But such a popularity adversely affected mayor’s character. Now he has a bad habit: he drinks water only from wine glass and only with a cat mint.


by Valentin Ivanov

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