"As our State Senator Al Weed work for what matters to people in this newly convoluted District: sustainable development, healthy cities, rational transportation, viable agriculture, limiting sprawl and supporting rural preservation.

Al Weed brings to this contest four decades of commitment to country and to community in Central Virginia: he has led and created local organizations to celebrate local history, promote tourism and preserve rural land; he has been involved in his children's schools, in his church and in his industry's state wide organizations.

As a pioneer Virginia winegrower, Al Weed knows that a vision supported by hard work, organization, political savvy and dedication can lead to statewide success. As a long serving US Army Reserve special operations soldier he knows the value of discipline, and the rewards of service.

Al Weed believes that a State Senator is more than a representative for his District; he is a regional leader, a voice for change and someone willing to tell the hard truths. Electoral success is key to playing that role, but in itself such success is meaningless if leadership does not result.

Al Weed believes that there is a natural relationship between Virginia's cities and its rural areas. This relationship shares enough common ground that a well conceived rural-urban coalition could gain sufficient votes in the General Assembly to counter the increasing suburban domination of Virginia's future.

Virginia's cities, small rural towns and its rural counties share many concerns that politics of the last decade have trampled:

! Without truly viable public schools cities lose vital population and counties lose the ability to keep their young employed in satisfying and productive work. Al Weed would work for dramatic increases in teacher's salaries, and for state funded incentives to encourage the best and brightest to seek out the challenging school positions.

! Policies that encourage sprawl, including VDOT's over reliance on roads for virtually all of Virginia's transportation problems, hollow out our cities and consume our countryside. Local governments need the freedom to develop local tools to control growth (Weed opposes the Dillon Rule) and State economic development officials need to direct industrial and vocational incentives to our cities and rural areas where unemployment rates are high. State funds need to be provided for the purchase of development rights to protect rural lands which are the base for our agricultural economy and are significant recreational resources for city-dwellers.

! New prisons are not a healthy rural industry and should not be the only answer to crime. We need to deal with underlying causes, to include vastly greater amounts spent on drug treatment programs and efforts to keep people out of jail.

Al Weed, age 59, has been married to Emily, a retired UVA nurse, for thirty-five years. They have two grown children, Al, a UVA surgical resident, and Julie, an Albemarle County middle school science teacher. He grows wine at Mountain Cove Vineyards in Nelson County (Al Weed, electronic mail, October 28, 2001).