September 15, 2011 08:00 PM UTC

Breaking: Bob Fifer Fixes Elderly Woman's Cell Phone

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• by: Colorado Pols

We’ve received a lot of press releases here at Jeffco Pols over the years. There have been good ones and bad ones, but there’s one we received a few weeks ago from Bob Fifer, a candidate for Arvada’s At-Large Council Seat, that just needs to be published somewhere.

From the Bob Fifer campaign:

ARVADA, Colo. (Aug. 31, 2011) – Bob Fifer, a candidate for the Arvada City Council, has already knocked on 1,000 doors this campaign season, talking to voters about ways he can most help them when he is elected to office Nov. 1.

On the way to those 1,000 doors in various districts of Arvada, he has walked nearly 64 miles and taken an estimated 152,000 steps – with a goal of reaching 2,000 doors over the next eight weeks. He has listened to long lists of the things residents like best about Arvada – and some of the issues they hope he can help solve.

One elderly woman even asked him to help fix her cell phone.

“It was over 100 degrees that day, and after she invited me in for water, I ended up staying almost an hour,” he said. “While I was talking to her, her cell phone rang; and it was so loud, it startled me. She laughed and said she had been trying to fix the volume for months.”

The cell phone was a relic by today’s standards, and Fifer had to invest considerable time to figure out the settings. [Pols Emphasis] He works for CenturyLink, but he is on the network side, not involved in mobile hardware. Before long, he was back on the trail, listening to concerns on topics ranging from road conditions to golf course maintenance. He estimates about 60-70 percent of residents have been available to listen to his description of all the ways he loves Arvada and plans to make it even better.

And he has the volume turned up on his own mobile device, in case anybody has additional questions — including the elderly resident with the antiquated flip-phone.

“I told her to call me if she has any more trouble,” he said.

Did you get that?! Bob Fifer, a candidate for Arvada City Council, took the time out of his busy day to turn the volume down on a voter’s cell phone. Going far above and beyond the call of duty, Fifer even “invested considerable time to figure out the settings.” Wow. That’s the kind of dedication and responsiveness that Arvada needs on City Council. In our opinion, Fifer just drastically solidified his standing as the frontrunner.

Seriously, though, press releases like these demonstrate just how little news or buzz there is surrounding Jeffco’s municipal elections this cycle. We find it really comical. Picture some maverick reporter in a dimly-lit, smoke-filled room slaving over how best to transform this press release into a well-written piece of hard hitting journalism.

Still, with credit to Fifer’s press guy Steve Caulk, this release not-so-subtly tells us about the candidate, his career, and his door-knocking progress without coming off as too prosaic. It’s novel to the point of absurdity, but it’s readable. Sort of.

We almost feel bad for Caulk: the former two-decade Rocky sports reporter-cum-editor has to be more than a little bored in applying his not inconsiderable talent to a City Council race. We just hope that Caulk stays on if Fifer wins. Can you imagine the newsletters?