CASPER — On a recent weekday, Casper’s Ross Schriftman spent time at the Wyoming Legislature’s joint Management and Audit committee hearing testifying twice on different issues.
As the sun set, he was in his usual audience seat for the start of the Casper City Council.
The semiretired insurance advisor, five-time candidate for political office, and Wyoming transplant from Pennsylvania is driven to be active with government, sharing his insights on a variety of topics and interests that keep him literally and figuratively running through life.
“This morning, I sent a follow-up email to the committee that met yesterday, the Management and Audit Committee,” he said. “Some of the discussions yesterday led me to look at some things this morning.”
Most communities across Wyoming have a Ross Schriftman, that person who shows up to every meeting and has something to say about just about everything.
Some may say he’s annoying, others may wonder why he keeps stepping up to the podium.
Still others may call him an community activist, which is just fine with him.
Schriftman is a frequent participant in public comment periods at Casper City Council, the Natrona County School District No. 1 Board of Education, and other governmental events.
He admits he stayed seated at his most recent Casper City Council meeting. Seeing him in the audience isn’t surprising to those on the council, but that he doesn’t have something to say certainly was, he said.
“They were surprised I didn’t get up and say anything,” he said. “Nobody did.”
At 73, Schriftman is secretary for the Casper Windy City Striders running club, president of the Natrona County Chapter of Right to Life, secretary at Temple Beth-El synagogue in Casper, and a longtime marathoner who tries to get his miles in weekly to stay in shape.
Schriftman continues to work part-time with Medicare insurance clients on the East Coast and in Florida remote from Casper.
He also is shopping a movie script he wrote and recently finished a short movie with Casper locals that he wrote based on a dream he had last Thanksgiving. He hopes to get it edited and produced locally by Christmas.
Book And Movie
In 2011, Schriftman published a book about caring for his mother as she went through Alzheimer’s and turned it into a movie script, and then a movie he produced.
His 30-minute “My Million Dollar Mom” short film released in 2018 won an Award of Excellence Special Mention in the Best Shorts Competition from the 2021 Tampa Bay Underground Film Festival.
The longtime Democrat now identifies as a Republican. He looks back to his mom, Shirley, as the person most responsible for his lifelong activism and political interests.
“My mom was always interested in politics, she worked for the State Department during World War II,” he said. “She was a Spanish translator … working under Nelson Rockefeller in the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs.”
At 8 years old, Schriftman recalls being inspired by the candidacy of John F. Kennedy.
By 13, he started getting involved in political campaigns.
At a recent Natrona County Board of Education meeting, he told school board members about how as a teen he wore his Hubert Humphrey button in school without consequence from the administration or bullying from other students.
In 1972, he completed two years at Montgomery County Community College and was a delegate candidate for Hubert Humphrey for the National Democratic Convention.
At 19, he lost the race, but at the end of the summer quit his short-order cook job to travel with his mom to Miami to be at the convention.
When they arrived, Humphrey pulled out of the presidential race due to a dispute. Still, the pair were given floor passes.
“So, my mom and I were on the floor of the convention in Florida,” he said.
In 1974 after graduating from American University in Washington, D.C., with a political science degree and experience being an intern for Humphrey, he became a candidate for the Pennsylvania state house.
He received 46% of the vote in a district that had 28% Democratic registration.
Candidate Schriftman
Schriftman ran for the state House again in 1974 and was asked to run for Montgomery County controller in 1979. He lost both times.
In 2004, he intended to run for Congress, but his mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and he needed to stay close to home. He ran for state house again and lost.
There were years of activism without running for office, but in Casper in 2024 he put his hat in the ring for a city council seat in Ward II. Though not elected, the race was satisfying.
“I wasn’t expecting to be running for any office in Wyoming,” he said. “My plan was kind of retirement.”
In his bid for the seat, he knocked on nearly every door in the ward.
He said a lot of politicians don’t like to do that, but he learned over the years that it is essential to learning what people are thinking.
“You know, a lot of council people go to these leadership training things,” he said. “You really want to learn leadership, go knock on doors, find out what your neighbors want. I really enjoyed doing that.”
His willingness to do that and outgoing nature come from his mom, Schriftman believes.
Schriftman said when his mom was older, he took her down to Atlantic City, New Jersey, where his brother kept a boat.
“I took her down for the weekend one time, and she’s walking around the boardwalk,” he said. “At one point, my brother turns to me and says, ‘There’s only seven people left in Atlantic City that mom hasn’t talked to.'”
Schriftman said his parents divorced in the 1973, but his mom stayed active in community causes and the Jewish synagogue.
When she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, he cared for her and also hired a full-time companion to help, which allowed him to continue working.
His book “Million Dollar Mom” flowed from a memoir he wrote.
After the book was published, he thought about the possibility of a writing a movie script, found some screenwriting software, and hired a writing coach to help.
He started going to film festivals like Sundance in Utah, where he met the right people and decided to do a short film.
“We had a great crew and great actors,” he said. “Since then, we have shown the film to about 50 different community groups.”
Schriftman’s mother died in 2009.
‘Relaxing Retirement’
Over the years, Schriftman said he became involved in Right to Life in Pennsylvania as he researched abortion. Once in Wyoming, he had not intended to get involved.
“But God has other plans that you don’t know about. This is supposed to be a relaxing retirement,” he said.
In addition to being president of the local Right to Life Chapter, Schriftman is also a coordinator for 40 days for life vigils and a trained sidewalk advocate as well as a member of the Jewish pro-life foundation.
His migration from a Democrat to Republican started with disagreements about Hillary Clinton’s policies and then Barak Obama.
He said the IRS effort to go after conservative groups during the Obama presidency and Obama blaming it on IRS employees in Cincinnati when it was directed out of his office “was the last straw for me.”
He went from the being the Democratic committee man in his Philadelphia suburb to the Republican one.
“People who supported me before were very upset with me,” he said. “They’re still, friends. I still stay in touch with a lot of those people.”
Coming to Casper was not his retirement plan, but the pandemic helped bring it about, he said.
People in Philadelphia became isolated and scared and he determined to go someplace else to live out his life.
He wanted a low-tax environment. His research showed him Wyoming had no income tax and was a conservative state with open spaces.
“I looked at Casper, and I said, ‘Huh, maybe in the middle of Wyoming,'” he said. “And the voter registration is like 80% Republican. I figured I don’t have to be involved in politics, but God has other plans.”
Schriftman said he typically looks at the agenda of meetings he attends and if he sees an issue that he feels is important, and he can contribute, he will do some research and often prepares something to say during public comments.
“It’s the civic duty of everybody to do, and not everybody can get up and speak,” he said. “Sometimes, I don’t really want to get up and speak because there is controversy, but that’s politics.”
Engaging Citizen
Interim Casper City Manager Zulima Lopez said she is “thrilled” with people like Schriftman who pay attention to what is happening in city government, ask “thoughtful questions” and engage with the government.
She said the city council wants citizens to be informed and the information they share to be factual.
“When citizens are engaging in that way, that is a wonderful thing for our community,” she said. Zulima said he appreciates Schriftman in all the interactions she’s had with him.
“He’s very respectful and cordial to me and I appreciate that, even when he doesn’t agree with the way we operate or questions the things we do, he is very kind and thoughtful in his questioning,” she said.
Schriftman said he feels “blessed” and “joyful” about where his life has brought him.
“There’s stress in everybody’s life. When you think there’s a problem, it’s actually a challenge,” he said. “The Chinese have a saying that a problem on the flip side of the coin is an opportunity. So that’s the way I look at life.”
Dale Killingbeck can be reached at dale@cowboystatedaily.com.
