By Jerry La Mastra

It is with a great deal of hope for our future that I congratulate Bill Grandizio and Bob Hittinger for their win in the general election for the two seats on the board of supervisors for London Grove Township. They ran an honest and issues-based campaign and I wish them well in their new positions.

I look forward to January 2010 when these men will be able to officially start helping our township again become one where the our elected public servants work for our best interests and use common sense and principled thought to govern without the influences of the myriad of special interests and hidden and not-so-hidden agendas that do not help our taxpayers or our community.

Unfortunately we have seen, all too often, that our elected "representatives" believe that we Americans exist to fund their desires and their lifestyles. We desperately need a return to when our elected officials actually work for us and do what is right -- not what is beneficial to them or is easy or what only helps their agendas.

I also congratulate Matt Seavey for his honest and issues-based campaign and his election as a full-time district justice.

I pray that we are turning a corner in this country where our elected officials will learn to respect Americans' individual rights as delineated in the Constitution and given to us by God; Where the individual decides what is best for him and her and their family and property; Where onerous regulations and taxes no longer stifle our prosperity and our freedoms and liberties; Where the rights of the individual are not destroyed in the name of "progress" or "progressivism"; and Where business owners and local, family-owned businesses are not forced to close down because of the whims and agendas of elected officials.