Archive for Friday, October 22, 2004

Mailing questions

October 22, 2004

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To the editor:

Early in August this year I, like 166,705 other voters in Lawrence and the rest of the 2nd Congressional District, received one of two mass mailings sent out by Congressman (Jim) Ryun's office under his franking privilege. The franking privilege is supposed to allow congressmen to communicate with their constituents but is not supposed to be used to campaign for re-election. It would be an unfair use of taxpayers' dollars for a partisan political purpose.

For that reason, congressmen are not supposed to send out such mass mailings within 90 days of a primary or general election. However, due to the timing of those events in Kansas this year, a mass mailing made on Aug. 4 would be in technical compliance with that requirement if it was not campaign-related.

After receiving one of these mass mailings, I contacted Mr. Ryun's office and requested information on his use of the franking privilege. It took two months to get the small amount of information involved. What it shows is that Mr. Ryun seems to feel a compelling need to communicate with his constituents in this manner only during election years but not otherwise. The nature of the material sent out is debatable.

Gil Zemansky,

Lawrence

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