Rep. Stephanie Sharp to resign from Kansas House

[proud2BlibKansan]

TOPEKA | State Rep. Stephanie Sharp, a Lenexa Republican, announced today she will resign from the Kansas House of Representatives.

Sharp, 31, will take a job in public relations for Community America Credit Union. Sharp said serving in the Legislature didn’t leave her enough time to focus on her career and personal life.

“It’s really hard financially and career-wise to do this at my age,” Sharp said. “It’s hard to find a job that will let you up and leave for four months.”

The GOP precinct committee members of the 17th District will appoint a successor to serve until the end of Sharp’s term in January 2009. No date has been set for the meeting.

Sharp will remain in office until January. The time will allow her to help her successor adjust to the position, she said.

| David Klepper, [e-mail]

http://www.kansascity.com/news/breaking_news/story/173899.html

[SheilaT]

1. It's quite amazing how often Republicans

in the Kansas legislature resign mid-way through the term, rather than at the end. This way, the Republicans get to appoint someone, who never actually had to run for office, who then gets to run as an incumbent, as if he'd been fairly elected in the first place. The worst case that I know of is in Kansas House District 24. The Republican incumbent, Ed O'Malley, who himself was appointed to the seat when the previous Republican incumbent resigned, announced less than a month after last November's election that he was resigning to take a job in Wichita. It's something they seem to do over and over. It's a wholesale subversion of the electoral process.

[proud2BlibKansan]

2. Do we have a potential candidate in this district?

And will the repukelicans put a fundie in this seat, like they did in the 24th?

[SheilaT]

3. The man who ran against her

last year is Ed Coleman. I'm not sure he will be running again. Here's his website from the campaign: http://www.colemanforkansas.com/

Ed's a good guy. He comes to Second Saturday periodically.

When I was running I'd see Stephanie Sharp when I went to pick up my campaign literature from the company that did the printing. She worked for them part time, and I was VERY uncomfortable with that situation. I believe that none of the Democrats running in Johnson County this time around made use of them.

As for who will replace her, it's anyone's guess. A lot depends on exactly who the precinct committee chairs are in that district, but overall the conservatives have the upper hand. Because Stephanie is relatively young, I think there's a tendency to think she's not as conservative as she really is.

We did manage to triple the Democratic representation in the State House in November, and maybe we can triple it again next year.