In a recent interview, Jud Ashman looked back to his earliest days as a community activist in the city of Gaithersburg.
“A lot of people walk around, saying you can’t make a difference — why try?” he says. “In 2001 and 2002, that was not our experience with the Gaithersburg Mayor and City Council. They listened.”
A family man who owns a local small business, Ashman, 39, had never been in politics when new development threatened to overburden already bursting public schools attended by his two children. “We organized some residents and went to the Gaithersburg Mayor and Council. We went up against people (developers) with millions of dollars,” he says. “Gaithersburg’s mayor and council listened to us. We won.”
The knowledge that people can make a difference in Gaithersburg propelled him in 2005 to seek election to the Gaithersburg City Council. He lost by 44 votes.
Shaking his head, he smiles. “It was a wonderful experience.”
Wonderful?
He speaks of the endless campaign trek from stranger’s door to stranger’s door, of the things he saw and words he heard at the time — with something like reverence. Ashman saw, heard, and began making connections and building relationships.
“When they hear why you are there, they open up to you,” he says. “You learn how much they care about the community. You learn about their concerns. It’s gratifying and restorative.”
In 2007 Ashman ran again and won. He is now is in the third year of a four-year term on the City Council, a role he loves.
“I like helping people,” he says.
In a place like Gaithersburg, he says, “you can see the impact [of your work] so directly. People talk to you everywhere — on the sidewalk, in the grocery store. You are so accountable.
The most important challenge facing Gaithersburg today, Ashman says, is economic development particularly throughout the city and particularly on the east side of Olde Towne.
On Oct. 10, in the sun-drenched midst of the Oktoberfest gala in Kentlands, Ashman stood for nearly five hours in front of the Gaithersburg Book Festival tent and passed out hundreds of bookmarks announcing that May 21, 2011, is the date of the second annual event.
He came to the Book Festival tent to help and meet the first shift of volunteers at around 10:30 a.m. Shortly after, he took up his position in front of the tent.
He was still there at 1 p.m., thanking the early volunteers as they turned in their blue Book Festival shirts and the next shift came on. He was there at 2 p.m., shaking hands, talking to dozens of people as they wandered by, and at 3 p.m., chatting and giving folks the slim bookmarks.
He was still working the crowd around 4 p.m. as others — volunteers, performers, musicians, artists and vendors — began to dismantle and pack up, and the estimated 12,000 people who came to the Oktoberfest began to wend their myriad ways home.
It seems that in the interest of the Book Festival — and other items of importance to him — Jud Ashman’s shift never ends.
Ashman was the idea-guy and provided much of the leadership for the first annual Gaithersburg Book Festival in May 2010, which was a huge success. He credits volunteers with the event success — 8,000 people and 56 authors whose books included many bestsellers, as well as Pulitzer Prize winners, National Book Award winners and other literary recognition attended.
“It was the biggest literary event [of its sort] in the history of Montgomery County.”
Thanks to Ashman, many already have the date of next year’s festival marked on their calendars.
Karen O’Keefe is a member of the Gaithersburg Book Festival Committee.