A member of the band Portugal. The Man recalls a flap with then-Mayor Palin that took place 10 years ago...Apparently, the City of Wasilla did not agree with us. Bummer. Sarah Palin, the mayor of our small town, informed us that a skate park simply would not fit in the budget.
Oddly enough, a few years later, we heard rumors of a multimillion-dollar hockey rink that was going to fit in the budget. Now, I don't have anything against hockey, I played my whole life, but there were already several places to play hockey in Wasilla. Of course, us dumb kids wouldn't take "no" for an answer. A few of my friends and our parents attended city hall meetings every week. Eventually, our persistence paid off.
Mayor Palin made what could be considered a "safe bet" when she suggested that if we could raise half the money, the city would match it and we would start construction. We were very happy and very determined.
The "Wasilla Skate Park Committee" went to work immediately. Over the next few months, we held bake sales, car washes, raffles and six or seven benefit concerts. We convinced local businesses to donate goods, services or labor to help support us. We even put up one of those giant, lame thermometers in city hall and colored in every $5,000 we made. And, incredibly enough, we raised roughly $42,000. Not too bad for some punk kids in a small town in Alaska.
I really don't think that Palin thought we could do it. She was certainly surprised when we filled in the red ball at the top of that stupid thermometer. And boy, did she have a surprise for us.
After all of our hard work, she informed us that the project was going to have to be delayed ... indefinitely.http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1597276/20081016/story.jhtml
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