KaRon Cooper

SW 314
Adopt-A-Legislator

Adopt-A-Legislator

My State Representative is Vanessa Guerra for the 95th House District and my State
Senator is Ken Horn of the 32nd District. The district that State Rep. Guerra covers is the cities of
Saginaw and Zilwaukee and Bridgeport, Buena Vista, Carrollton, James, Kochville, Spaulding
and Zilwaukee townships in Saginaw County and for State Senator Horn covers Saginaw County
and other areas in Genesee County that includes Argentine Twp., Clayton Twp., Fenton Twp.,
Flushing, Flushing Twp., Gaines Twp., Linden, Montrose, and Montrose Twp.
Vanessa Guerra was born and raised in Bridgeport Township, Michigan where she have
acknowledgements her diverse community and the great work of her teachers and staff of
Bridgeport High School for helping her be successful at the college level of the University of
Michigan where she double majored in Latino Studies and Political Science. She believes that
education and the creation of living-wage jobs are critical to the future success of the 95th House
District. Her aunt, a teacher who has been forced to relocate repeatedly due to school closures
during her 18 years with the Saginaw Public School District. Ms. Guerra has seen the damaging
impact of cuts to state education funding. As the grandchild of workers who spent more than 40
years in the areas General Motors factories, she understands that manufacturing and skilled
trades are the backbone of our local economy, and that bringing such jobs back to our
community is key to its revitalization. She will work tirelessly to ensure that both our children
and their parents are provided every opportunity to not just succeed, but to thrive. She believes in
assisting our youth by improving the community as a whole in results she ran for the Bridgeport

Township Trustee in 2012. During that time, she also entered law school at the University of
Detroit Mercy, where she is focusing on public interest law. During the summer of 2013, she
served as a Prosecuting Attorneys Association of Michigan Intern in the Saginaw County
Prosecutors Office, and later served as a volunteer advocate for victims of Domestic Violence in
the Third Judicial Circuit Court in fall 2013.
State Senator District Ken Horn as lived in Saginaw County for over 30 years. He
currently lives in Frankenmuth with his wife Veronica. They have two children, Kevin and
Andrea. Kevin and his wife Ruth have one child, Liam. Ken graduated from Concordia
University with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Criminal Justice. Ken was a small business owner
for nearly 15 years, owning and operating Horns Restaurant in Frankenmuth. In addition, he has
served as a substitute teacher in Bridgeport and Frankenmuth schools. Ken was a Saginaw
County Commissioner for 14 years, representing Birch Run, Bridgeport and Frankenmuth
Townships and the city of Frankenmuth. He served as chairman of the Legislative SubCommittee and also served on Courts & Public Safety, Community Corrections Advisory Board,
County Services, Budget/Audit Appropriations, Saginaw County Airport Commission and the
Saginaw County Event Center Board. In 2006, Ken was elected to serve the 94th District in the
Michigan House of Representatives. From 2007 to 2012 he represented the cities of Birch Run,
Chesaning, Frankenmuth and St. Charles in addition to 12 townships in Saginaw County. Ken
served as chairman of the House Energy & Technology Committee. The 32nd District elected
Ken to the Michigan Senate in 2014. Ken has been appointed to chair the Senate Economic
Development and International Investment Committee and serve as vice chair of the Senate
Transportation Committee.

The legislation that my legislator introduced or cosponsored is HR 0049 of 2015 which is

a house resolution bill that Vanessa Guerra that she introduced by her on March 26th, 2016 and
was also referred to Committee of Education that same day. This bill will the resolution urge
Michigan institutions of higher learning to improve policies, training, and victims' services
regarding cases of sexual assault and stalking. Another bill she introduce with help from State
Representatives Jon Hoadley (D-Kalamazoo) a new package of bills aimed at reforming
campaign finance issues in Michigan. The six-bill package seeks to address problems ranging
from striking dark money from elections to the way fees for late campaign filings are
administered and lowering contribution limits.
For State Senator Ken Horn, he and 11 Republican lawmakers introduce a 14-bill
package that would benefit Michigan schools by eliminating unnecessary and redundant
reporting requirements and streamlining the reporting process. The Michigan school districts are
mandated to prepare and submit hundreds of reports to state and federal entities. These reports
can be time-consuming and tedious to produce and are often redundant or even archaic by the
submission date.
During the time for voting in the house, Vanessa Guerra have voted nay for every bill that
come into the house from the time she took the office to present day. In the 2014 District 95
general election, she won 76.2% of the votes of 17,371 in the primary election to run against
Norman Braddock and won 58.4% of votes of 4,085 from the voters. Her terms ends December
31st, 2016. For State Senator Ken Horn, in 2010 he ran for the District 94th general election where
he won the election with 24,362 votes.
Overall, this experience in completing this assignment has been very interesting for me
back I have learned so much about my State Representative and how she is about the youth and

the city of Saginaw. Her hard work and dedication to her district means a lot to me as a citizen of
Saginaw and I believe she will continue on doing great work and she has my vote again when
she runs for reelection.