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ENDORSEMENT LETTER FROM FORMER MAYOR MAYBELLE FRASER
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Keep Our Nativity BerkleyVoteYES.com PO Box 725172 Berkley, Michigan 48072 224-0361 email: info@berkleyvoteyes.com
Dear friend and neighbor,
As a life-long resident of Berkley, I have found Berkley and the families who live here are a kind, compassionate, and close-knit community. We share many traditions.
When we recognize and celebrate the diversity of our neighbors, we do so with respect, honor, and tolerance.
That spirit of community made me proud to serve as mayor, and proud that I remain a neighbor and fellow citizen today.
It was certainly in that spirit that each and every year I served as mayor, it was a time-honored tradition of our community to respectfully display a beautiful donated Nativity scene on the City Hall lawn.
In fact, the Nativity scene has been at City Hall since some of us were children…as long as some of us have been alive. I can’t remember a Christmas when the beautiful Nativity scene wasn’t at city hall.
With respect to all our neighbors, I believe that community holiday tradition enjoyed by families in Berkley for generations should be preserved and passed on to our children and grandchildren for Christmases yet to come.
On the November 6th city election ballot, I hope you’ll join me in voting YES to keep that tradition alive. On your city absentee ballot, or at the polls on Tuesday, November 6th, please join us in voting YES to Keep Our Nativity.
With two weeks to go before the November city election, I’m also writing today to ask for your help. If you agree that Berkley should keep its long-time tradition by voting YES to Keep Our Nativity, please help us get that message out to all Berkley voters over the few weeks remaining.
You can write a personal check, a business check, or just drop a few dollars in the enclosed envelope and mail it back to us today. Please make your check out to “Berkley Citizens Vote YES.”
I hope you’ll think of it as an early Christmas present back to your community, for your own children and grandchildren and other families, even those yet to come.
There are other ways you can help too. Please fill out the Berkley Community Volunteer slip I’ve enclosed and let us know if you or your family can help us make phone calls or hand out literature explaining why we need to vote YES on November 6th to Keep Our Nativity. We even have yard signs available!
Even if you can’t afford to contribute financially, please return the Volunteer slip to us in the enclosed envelope. We’re hoping, of course, that you feel strongly enough to make a contribution and volunteer. Thanks!
Of course, it’s fair to ask…why in the world does Berkley have to go to all the trouble of having a ballot measure and running a campaign just so we can Keep Our Nativity scene at City Hall where it’s been for generations?
Especially when neighboring communities such as Birmingham, Clawson, Madison Heights, Troy, Southfield, and Warren display Nativity scenes at their city halls each Christmas as they always have. Some of these communities include religious symbols to celebrate Hanukah during this season as well.
The answer is that ACLU lawyers pressured and threatened city officials in Berkley to remove our Nativity. Why are they picking on Berkley? In Clawson, city officials told the ACLU to take a hike after the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that Clawson could keep its Nativity scene.
Putting the issue on the ballot lets the people who live here in Berkley decide - not ACLU lawyers - but rather, WE THE PEOPLE, you and I, and our families. We can make our voices heard by remembering Tuesday, November 6th -- on your absentee ballot or at the polls -- to vote YES to Keep Our Nativity.
Please urge your family, friends, and neighbors to vote YES on November 6th too. And please mail the largest contribution you can -- plus the Community Volunteer slip -- back to us in the enclosed envelope today. Thank you, and even though it’s a few months early… Merry Christmas!
Maybelle S. Fraser Former Mayor, City of Berkley 1995-1997 |
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Berkley Vote YES! |
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Paid for with regulated funds by Berkley Citizens Vote YES to Christmas Holiday Display, PO Box 725172, Berkley, MI 48072 |
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Berkley Citizens Vote Yes to Christmas Holiday Display To contact us: PO Box 725172 Berkley, MI 48072
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