08/01/2024
Good morning Ray County, I hope you are all doing well and keeping cool this week. As we get closer and closer to the Republican Primary on Tuesday, August 6, 2024 I am again asking for your consideration as Ray County Coroner. I would be honored to serve Ray County honestly and effectively and with respect and integrity.
Let's talk about respect and integrity this morning, I didn’t enter this race just to be a thorn in someone's side, I didn’t enter this race to bring any negativity to anyone, I decided to run because I think I can do better, better than what Ray County was appointed with, then ran unopposed twice in 2016 and 2020. Arent options nice? I mean Mediacom was the only option in Ray County for a long time, and they are experienced in what they do, but it doesn’t make them better. I see a lot of folks signing up with United Fiber, so remember just because something has been around for a long time and it’s “getting by” does not make it that best option. I'm not running for myself, I’m running for you. Also, I will not be intimidated by anyone, and I will continue to run my campaign the way I want. On that note, I would love to share with you what happened on July 15, 2024.
July 15, 2024
I was at work around 9:24 AM, when I got a call from current Ray County Coroner and acting Sheriff of Ray County Bart Willim. This phone call can be broken down into 3 parts, so we will start at the beginning. I was a little surprised by the call, but Bart and I are both funeral directors in Ray County and I thought he may have a question or was possibly reporting a death. Unfortunately, his call was more argumentative and abrupt, the first portion of the call was him disputing my claims that he had used his position as coroner to garner funeral business. He started by telling me that it is unethical and immoral to try and combine the two, and that he had NEVER spoken to families as a coroner about prices or accommodations he could make as a funeral director. Never once had he promoted his funeral home at a coroner call. NEVER! And “How dare I say otherwise” Then he demanded I tell him which families had come forth to express those very concerns to me. I refused, and I will not be intimidated into specifying certain families in Ray County that have gone through tragedy, then had their tragedy minimalized by elected official trying to make gains on their loss. I know who these families are and I have spoken with them. They made the conscious decision to use a different funeral home the next time around. After I explained to Bart that I would not be divulging personal information, he immediately called me a liar.
Immediately after calling me a liar, he threatened to release to the public, as he put it, “your run-in with the highway patrol”, okay, then let’s release it! I can’t remember the exact date, but I think it was February. On my way home from Liberty it was cold and dark, around 5-6 pm, on the west side of the railroad bridge west of Orrick, I passed a few cars at one time. When passing cars I was taught to get over, get by, and get back meaning, don’t mess around in the lane of oncoming traffic. So I didn’t, then closer to Orrick I passed another car. One of these cars believed I was driving aggressively, and contacted the Ray County Sheriff's office. I do not believe I was driving aggressively, and I am sorry to that individual who believed I was. I had stopped to check the mail and drop off some items at the funeral home in Richmond, and that's when I was approached by a Ray County Deputy, he was very nice and explained everything to me, and I felt upset that someone was that distraught to have called me in. In the end the deputy called the reporting party and they didn’t want to go any further with any actions, and I think that was fair. There were no tickets issued and everyone got home safely. Even if we believed different things, I was proud of our deputies for taking the time to explain everything to me, and I hope the reporting individual was also okay with the outcome. I’d say this was far from negative fodder for a campaign but, I guess Bart thought this would really hurt me. It doesn’t and the “threat” doesn’t either.
The final portion of this phone call was Bart trying to convince me that having a comprehensive price list and a packet of useful information to hand to families at the time of a coroner call would, again, be crossing a line and trying to garner business for the funeral home that I work for, merely because our prices are lower than his. I then reminded Bart, that other funeral homes would also be listed in that information, and those other funeral homes are also less expensive on some items than the funeral home I work for. That's why it is a FAIR representation of costs for the consumer. This packet will also contain useful information about the process of death certificates, waiting times, lots of other FAQ’s and will include resources like grief counseling options and contacts for state aid in certain cases. I am developing this informative packet for the consumer, so they can be well informed and make the correct decisions for themselves. Isn't that the right way?
It’s not a new thing for Bart to call and try to strong arm other funeral homes into upping their prices to match his or to be more “Competitive with his prices” and when funeral directors refuse they get called names. Because other funeral home owners actually have integrity, and actually care for the people they serve, they also refuse to be bullied.
I will not be intimidated by someone who calls me at my place of work to threaten me and then resorts to calling names like we are on an elementary school playground. The entire conversation was about 10 minutes long and my administrative assistant and another funeral director were sitting in the same office with me as this call was placed. The same administrative assistant that Bart yelled and screamed at until she was almost in tears, because he had dinner reservations and he was going to be late because our removal service was taking too long to do a removal of a coroner case…
Remember, just because the coroner job is getting done doesn’t mean it's getting done in the best way.
August 6, 2024, it’s time to choose a better way, the right way!
