Shameful: U.S. Rep. Tom Marino stands up and locks out his constituents

To the Editor:
On March 13, about a dozen constituents of U.S. Rep. Tom Marino’s (R-Lycoming) visited his Hamlin office at 2:30 p.m. to encourage the congressman to support calls for an special prosecutor to investigate the Trump administration’s ties to Russia. The staff expected our visit at this time. We found the office locked with a sign saying staff would return at 4 p.m. Several constituents left and returned at 4:15 to find the sign removed and the office closed for the day.
Regular business hours at all the congressman’s district offices are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. For months, constituents around the district have been asking Rep. Marino’s schedulers and senior staff to put town hall meetings on his calendar, which they have refused to do. The highest-paid staffer in Hamlin makes $90,000 per year, and yet constituents can’t depend on him or other staffers to even show up to his job to hear constituents’ concerns.
One constituent who was locked out that day, a senior citizen and cancer survivor, wondered aloud if Rep. Marino had read a letter he had hand-delivered to the staff on health care from several weeks earlier. I said I didn’t know. None of us do, because no one from Rep. Marino’s office, including him, ever answers our questions directly. That is shameful, disrespectful, and unacceptable — and where the deeply personal and emotional impacts of healthcare are concerned, it’s also cruel. I don’t expect an apology from Rep. Marino and his staff, but all of his constituents deserve one.
Anne Stopper
South Abington Township