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Charlotte Amalie
Thursday, March 28, 2024
HomeNewsArchivesAimery Caron Wants to Be a Delegate to the Convention

Aimery Caron Wants to Be a Delegate to the Convention

May 29, 2007 – I came to St. Thomas from France with my parents in 1951 to join my grandmother, Cora PETIT, who had recently settled on St. John.
Subsequently, my parents opened a gift shop, C. & M. CARON, on Main Street, across from the Enid Baa Library, while I pursued studies in chemistry at UCLA (BS in 1955) and at the University of Southern California (MS and Ph.D. degrees in 1958 and 1962, respectively).
In 1968, after six years of research and university teaching , I returned to St. Thomas and joined the then College of the Virgin Islands where I served as Associate Professor of Chemistry, Administrative Officer, Assistant to the President, Director of Community Services Director of Continuing Education & Summer School, and Lecturer until 2002. I am now retired from UVI with the status of Professor Emeritus.
My commitment to America and the Virgin Islands started in 1956, when I became a naturalized citizen, when I renounced my French citizenship, and when I purchased two acres of land in Estate Fortuna. Later, in 1969, after joining CVI, I became a registered Virgin Islands voter and, in 1981, I married Joyce DONOVAN CARON, born on Garden Street, Charlotte Amalia. Also, I am a member of the St. Thomas Rotary Club, the St. Thomas Historical Trust, and the Caribbean Genealogy Library.
My priority goal in attempting to join the Constitutional Convention is to empower the VI voters for a greater community participation in government affairs. Specifically and as a start, I want to make it easier for the voters to initiate or reject laws, to aamend the Constitution, and to recall elected officers.
Our Virgin Islands community is small enough that qualified voters should be able to place issues on the ballot without having to collect an impossible number of signatures on a petition. If California can do it with 600 times our population, why couldn't we do it? Certainly, we are at least as mature polically!
The sooner a Constitution with real empowerment of the voters is approved, the sooner the voters will be able to amend it to restructure our government, one change or issue at a time, on an ad hoc basis, without interference from the Legislature, Congress and any future Constitutional Convention. I therefore recommend that the new Constitution draft be simple, basic, non-controversial, and status quo, so that it can be approved rapidly by a large majority of the VI voters.

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