FAIRBANKS — One of the most influential people in Tammie Wilson’s life was her grandmother, Willia Ebbler, a self-taught businesswoman and the backbone of her family’s appliance store in Illinois.

“When she arrived, she commanded a room,” Wilson said.

After Wilson turned 13, her grandmother began teaching her the principles of business, starting with how to balance the store’s books.

“Everything had to total up, and if it didn’t, you had to figure out why,” Wilson said. “She taught me about having integrity and honesty, and the customer is always first. It was always about the people.”

After Wilson graduated from Illinois State University, she helped with other family businesses and raised four children, home-schooling them. She dove into volunteer work when her family settled in Alaska in 2003, and last year she was elected to the Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly.

On Nov. 3, the voters will decide whether to make her the borough mayor.

The 48-year-old registered Republican bills herself as a conservative interested in keeping government small, efficient and responsive to the people.

Wilson is a regular on local conservative talk radio. She leads the children’s worship at Bethel Church on Farmers Loop and is a former Girl Scout.

She skips lunch, talks about prayer, keeps her daily schedule in her head and promises to do her homework and get back to you if she can’t answer a question.

She is an expert at chit-chat and enjoys wisecracking.

“I was at a gun show last weekend,” Wilson said. “It was awesome. It was definitely my world.”

Her campaign is run out of her home off Badger Road and her green sedan. The Interior Alaska Conservative Coalition in the Northgate Square has opened its doors to Wilson, who keeps signs and pamphlets in the office and meets volunteers there.

Her campaign catchphrase is “the mayor for all of us.”

On a recent Wednesday, Wilson volunteered answering phones at KUAC during pledge week. The radio station broadcasts assembly meetings.

She appeared on “Problem Corner,” a show broadcast on KFAR-AM 660. Host Steve Floyd threw her softball questions and callers wished her well.

She attended the weekly roundtable discussion of the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Association, a group dedicated to keeping public trails open to multiple uses.

If elected, Wilson said, she plans to seek the group’s advice on trails issues. Members include businessman Craig Compeau and former state legislator Hugh Fate.

At the conservative coalition offices, a poster board near the front entrance tracked the number of doors — 750 — knocked on behalf of Wilson. The goal was 5,000.

Handyman Todd Larkin soon arrived.

In 2002, Larkin helped Sarah Palin during her unsuccessful bid for lieutenant governor. He was one of the people who went to Palin’s house in Wasilla and encouraged her to run for governor in 2006, he said. They parted ways following a dispute about her choice of campaign managers, he said. Three years ago, Larkin ran for borough mayor, losing to incumbent Jim Whitaker.

Larkin said he needed a break from politics but decided to help Wilson.

“She’s worked so hard that I feel like I have to reward effort,” said Larkin, who sees similarities between Wilson and Palin.

Wilson sat in a conference room at the conservative coalition and put rubber bands on pamphlets so they could be hung on doorknobs.

She explained her approach to running a municipality with more than 400 employees and a budget of more than of $100 million.

First, Wilson said, the borough budget is too high. On “The Michael Dukes Show” on KFAR 660 AM, she said she would seek efficiencies by eliminating part-time positions and pooling secretaries.

“I can’t know everything and I’m not going to pretend to,” she said.

Wilson spent a few years as a public schoolteacher before starting her family. She also has managed rental properties in Alaska and Illinois. The number of properties has varied. Currently, the assemblywoman and her husband, a journeyman millwright, own two rentals in Illinois and one in Alaska.

If elected, Wilson plans to seek input from experts and the public when making decisions, she said.

She thinks more problems should be solved at the neighborhood level without government interference.

“The government never does anything more efficiently than the people can do,” Wilson said. “I’ve learned more volunteering than any professional work I’ve had.”

Wilson, Larkin and coalition executive director Maria Rensel met at a church and began going door-to-door on Riverview Drive and nearby streets.

At one door, a shirtless man stepped outside to chat with the candidate about school district funding and the borough’s vehicle inspection and maintenance program, which is set to end on Dec. 31.

Wilson, unfazed by the shirtlessness, agreed with the man when he said any surplus money in the school district’s budget should go toward paying off bonds.

Later, Larkin brought up the outgoing mayor’s comment that Wilson’s opponent has a superior intellect. Wilson said the lame duck mayor’s opinion is unimportant to her.

“I’m thrilled he backed Luke,” she said. “I’ve heard what people think of him.”

A few people at their doors confessed they had supported Garry Hutchison, an accountant and former assemblyman who failed to gain enough votes to make it to the runoff. They said they now plan to vote for Wilson.

One woman hugged Wilson, kissed her cheek and thanked her for running for office.

“I think that we’ve been able to bring out that extra passion in people,” Wilson said.

Contact staff writer Amanda Bohman at 459-7544.