Carolyn McElfatrick has announced her candidacy for the Minnesota House of Representatives, District 3B, and is seeking Republican endorsement. She will campaign against Loren Solberg, the DFL incumbent. District 3B includes a portion of Itasca County encompassing Grand Rapids and all of Aitkin County.

McElfatrick, a Minnesota native, was raised in Austin. She has been married to Robert for 42 years and they have two grown children. The daughter of a southern Minnesota farmer, McElfatrick is a graduate of Methodist-Kahler School of Nursing in Rochester, doing her graduate work in nurse anesthesia at the Mayo Clinic. She later worked as a coordinator in clinical drug trials, most recently on breast and prostate cancer prevention as sponsored by the National Cancer Institute and National Institutes of Health.

McElfatrick is a fiscal conservative who supports strong private sector business and smaller government. One of her first priorities in St. Paul will be reduction of the business tax burden, particularly on small business. Small businesses provide 70 percent of all jobs. Minnesota is losing viable companies to neighboring states that have a more welcoming tax structure. According to McElfatrick, "You can't simultaneously talk about growing the economy and punish success by piling on more taxes. The two are incompatible. We need to get back in the game. By encouraging new industry, our district could minimize the extremes in employment trends that exist in our district. We have a lot to offer a young workforce: outstanding year-round recreation, beautiful schools and community facilities.

"Minnesota is facing a $1 billion deficit this year. It is important to bring spending in line with revenues. Available money needs to be spent wisely. I think it's wrong to ask Minnesotans to pay long term interest on expenditures like renovating the Minneapolis Sculpture Park ($8.5 million) or building an Asian-Pacific Cultural Center in St. Paul ($9.5 million). But that's exactly what the DFL is asking,” declares McElfatrick.

On education, McElfatrick says students in Greater Minnesota are being short-changed. "While our districts struggle with budgets, Metro students receive higher per-pupil funding," McElfatrick says. "Every child is valuable and deserves a fair chance."

McElfatrick, a determined supporter of the Second Amendment, says gun ownership is the right of the American individual. She is a member of the NRA and would oppose efforts to abridge that right.

She is pro-life and believes life is precious at every stage and in every condition. "Families with disabled children and senior citizens feel particularly threatened by changes they're seeing in health care. They fear eventual rationing would limit their access and discriminate against them.

McElfatrick looks forward to providing more responsive representation in St. Paul. She says that after years of marriage and raising a family she knows you can only go so long before you must clean your house. She adds that cleaning our Minnesota House is long overdue.

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