TUCSON, Ariz. — With Rep. Gabrielle Giffords recuperating in a Houston hospital, not voting in Congress or making appearances, one might think that her Tucson office would be quieter these days.
However, the office has been bustling with all sorts of activity in the weeks since she was shot as staff members proudly carry out the constituent work that has been a hallmark of Giffords’ time in Congress, such as explaining Social Security benefits to senior citizens or helping out voters facing foreclosure. Her staff is also responding to the thousands of notes of condolences that have poured in from all over the country since the shooting.
Immediately after the Jan. 8 shootings, communications director C.J. Karamargin wondered whether they should open the office the next Monday. He polled the staff, and the vote was unanimous.
“We’re here to do a job,” he says. “We’re here to serve people, and no act of violence would deter us. People look at this office as not just as sort of a small little outpost of the federal government, but as an outpost of our representative form of government. ... It’s like, we have to do this.”
Despite being shot twice, Pam Simon couldn’t stay away from the office any longer. She returned to work last week to find her desk festooned with balloons and streamers. A box containing a new computer awaited her.
Then she poked her head into Gabe Zimmerman’s office. His personal belongings were gone, and other people were there, busily taking calls and making notes.
http://www.arkansas…">Shooting in Tucson
Zimmerman was one of the six who didn’t survive the shooting rampage that wounded Simon, Giffords and 11 others.
“It seems like there are vacant places in the office that all those that came back immediately have adjusted to,” the 63-year-old outreach coordinator says. “Everybody’s working very hard, but there’s a difference in the spirit. Because we’re missing people.”
Giffords’ office was already one of the busiest in the country, handling about four times the average constituent caseload of all congressional staffs, according to a survey by the House speaker’s office. A little more than a week ago, the office celebrated a milestone - its 10,000th case.
If anything, the shootings have raised the office’s profile, and it’s been busier than before the rampage.
“Their problems don’t stop,” Karamargin said. “Their concerns about border security, the economy, they haven’t suddenly ceased because of what happened on Jan. 8. So we haven’t ceased.”
On a recent day, Giffords’ staff worked to:
Prevent an 86-year-old veteran from being evicted from his nursing home.
Contact the Department of Veterans Affairs about a terminally ill vet who has been awaiting a disability rating decision since 2001.
Send tax forms to a constituent who doesn’t have Internet access.
Explain a woman’s Social Security benefits.
Stop a small business owner’s home from being foreclosed.
“People are saying, ‘I’m so sorry to bother you with this. I understand if you can’t get back to me, but here’s what’s going on,”’ said Amanda Sapir, one of five constituent service representatives in the state. “People are being so gracious. And we’re actually having to tell people, ‘It’s really OK to call us and ask for help. This is our work. We love to do it and, so, please.’”
Karamagrin said the work done informs the message Giffords takes to the Housefloor.
Sapir, whose specialties are banking and housing issues, reported to Giffords last year that a large number of foreclosures appeared to have been done without proper paperwork. Giffords called for a moratorium.
“There is a direct correlation oftentimes between the types of case work that we’re seeing and what is happening on the policy level,” says Karamargin. “The caseworkers are the front lines. They are the eyes and ears on the ground of what’s going on.”
Although the office is busier than ever, there are holes.
Just outside the reception area hangs a dry-erase board with little magnetic pegs showing who’s in an out. Beside Zimmerman’s name, a blue peg marks the “IN” column; to the right someone has written in blue marker “IN OUR HEARTS!”
Friday would have been his 31st birthday.
“The loss of Gabe Zimmerman is a heartbreak beyond words that I’m not even convinced will ever heal,” says Sapir. “He was a friend, the most phenomenal supervisor you could ask for. And a beautiful soul.”
Simon knows how lucky she is to be alive, let alone back to work.
The bullet that pierced her chest missed her vital organs and lodged in her hip. It became infected and was removed about a week later.
The other slug passed through her right forearm, missing the bones and nerves completely. She feels discomfort when she writes, so she’s typing more these days.
Simon - a longtime junior high teacher who met Giffords on a lobbying visit in 2001, when Giffords was a newly elected state representative - says she needed to return for her own peace of mind. And as one of the office “moms,” Simon says the staff needed her, if for no other reason than to keep the snack drawer stocked and the medicine chest filled.
“I think it’s a little bit like getting on the horse again,” she says. “These are my friends, as well as my colleagues.”
Front Section, Pages 4 on 02/27/2011