Many young future leaders here at Boys State sat down to listen and learn from Micah Cawley, a successful politician from Yakima. This man found his success early in his career, starting right after high school where he ran for the Yakima city council. His first success was when he was elected for city council in 2006, beating someone who was running for reelection after twenty years in office. He was faced with a big task to fight crime and gang activity in his city while trying to instill a sense of pride into the city’s neighborhoods. Recently he has been appointed by the city council to be the mayor of Yakima. On the side he is a radio DJ for a country station in Yakima, and also DJs for weddings on the weekends.

Micah Cawley inspired the future leaders of our state here at Boys State and left them with some great knowledge to drive them into their futures. He focused on the strength of finding a few core values to run with as a platform and sticking to them. Another point that was made important is to not let others put a label on you. The citizens here at Boys State then had an opportunity to ask questions of the young mayor. Some good questions were raised about the challenges that Cawley has experienced and what words of advice would he give them. He replied that it is important to just be yourself and stick to your beliefs and you will find your real friends who will help you down the road. All in all it was a great presentation from a very intelligent individual to start of these young men’s experience at Boys State.