Cheryl Musgrave
District 77 vs. Gail Riecken
For nearly twenty years, Cheryl Musgrave has worked hard to improve her community, from taking part in neighborhood activism to helping Governor Mitch Daniels transform local governance in Indiana and on issues from increasing the public’s access to official records to keeping taxes low while improving government performance. Cheryl attended DePauw, where she met her husband, Bob; they were married shortly after their graduation in 1979 and moved to Washington, D.C., where Bob earned his law degree from Georgetown University and Cheryl worked in a law firm. They moved to Evansville in 1983, where they raised two children. After the birth of her youngest child, Cheryl became increasingly active in local affairs and was appointed to the Vanderburgh County Property Tax Board of Review in 1991. She challenged the secretive practices and backroom dealings of the longtime County Assessor, which were against state law, and ran against him in the 1994 general election, defeating the twenty-four year incumbent. She served as Vanderburgh County Assessor from 1995 until 2005, leading the way for the county and state in providing equitable tax assessments and providing access to public records. Bringing the assessor’s office into the twenty-first century became her signature accomplishment. Cheryl became involved in statewide efforts to streamline and reform local government during her time as county assessor. She was a member of the Board of Directors for the Indiana County Assessor Association from 1997 to 1999 and from 2001 to 2002 and also served on the Legislative Committee of the Association of Indiana Counties and was co-chairman of the County Assessor Association Legislative Committee from 2003 until 2004. In the summer of 2007, Governor Mitch Daniels, responding to widespread outrage and protests at local property tax assessment increases, appointed Cheryl as Commissioner of the state Department of Local Government Finance. As part of the Daniels administration, Cheryl brought more than a decade of experience in local government and her skills as administrator to bear on a state agency that needed a fundamental change of course. Her mandate was to review the quality of the 2007 reassessment county-by-county, bring the state’s tax assessment system into compliance with state law and the taxpaying public’s needs, including fulfilling legislative mandates and the governor’s insistence that property taxes be permanently reduced and the growth of local governments’ budgets be brought under control. Cheryl traveled thousands of miles around Indiana, holding public hearings with taxpayers and private meetings with local officials to take corrective actions and implement the reforms the state needed.Now, Cheryl is running for state representative to change the way business is done in the state, by strengthening representation at the local level, shifting the tax burden from property, and implementing reforms of local government. She will also continue her long track record of improving her community’s economic competitiveness, bringing more jobs to Indiana by increasing investment in education, infrastructure, and the amenities Indiana needs to be competitive in a global market.
Campaign Website: CherylMusgrave.com
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Support on Facebook: Cheryl's Facebook Fan Page
Twitter: @CherylMusgrave

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