WJFW: Andi Rich announces campaign to challenge Mary Felzkowski for State Senate District 12
MARINETTE COUNTY, Wis. (WJFW) - Porterfield native Andi Rich announced her bid to challenge Mary Felzkowski in the race for Wisconsin’s State Senate District 12 in November. Rich has worked a career in flood management all over the country. She says she wants to focus her campaign on rural communities like the one she’s from, which means fixing everything from well water contaminated by PFAS chemicals to helping rural public schools get the funding they need.
“This is my community and that’s why I feel comfortable wanting the changes that I want,” said Rich. “I know the people here and we’re all frustrated with the same things.”
At the top of Rich’s priority list is making sure rural residents have safe water to drink. While voicing excitement for the EPA’s recent designation of PFAS chemicals as hazardous, she says it fails to serve rural citizens.
“New rules from the EPA don’t address the problems with well water,” said Rich. “I’m hoping to get a seat at the table to help put together a more comprehensive assessment and resolution for the problems that we’ve got here that will help everybody and not leave people behind just because they decide to live rural.”
Rich also says child care is a central issue, and emphasized the need for both parties to work together to make changes.
“There’s not only a lack of childcare but there’s a huge lack of affordable childcare,” said Rich. “I think we really need to work together instead of all of the finger pointing to come up with the solutions that are going to work for the different areas of the state because it’s not all going to be the same.”
Rich also highlighted her past work in Marinette County to combat affordable housing issues, which will be another big issue for her campaign.
“We’ve worked with some grant money to do a feasibility study to find locations that we could put more houses and complexes that can help with the solution,” said Rich. “And I think following that trajectory is our best option.”