In our final Just Business before Election Day, we continue our Elections 2012 Candidate Q&A series with responses from U.S. Representative, 3rd Congressional District candidates Jon Haugen & Jaime Herrera Beutler; State Representative Pos. 2 candidates Jim Gizzi & Paul Harris; and State Senator candidates Don Benton & Tim Probst.
Congressional race
Q: What are specific examples in which you were able to garner bipartisan support for a policy issue important to small business?
Haugen: I bring a completely different perspective as a 24-year military member rather than the incumbent, a professional politician. We were not Republicans or Democrats in the military, but Americans. I can work with anyone to solve our problems. I am a non-partisan problem solver.
Herrera Beutler: With more than one in ten moms and dads in Clark County out of work, economic growth and job creation must remain our focus. In the U.S., small businesses create seven out of ten new jobs, so providing an atmosphere where they can succeed is crucial.
Earlier this year, I introduced the Small Business Opportunities Act with my Democrat colleague from Oregon, Kurt Schrader. This bill would strengthen opportunities for small business contractors (there are more than 900 eligible businesses in Southwest Washington alone) to compete for federal contracts. This important reform passed the U.S. House of Representatives with strong bipartisan support. Additionally, my forest roads bill helped protect small family forestry businesses and manufacturing operations when the president signed a one-year version into law. As a member of the U.S. House Small Business Committee, I will maintain a steadfast commitment to empowering small businesses and helping our economy recover.
State Representative race
Q: Many state agencies (id, DOE among others) have been criticized the last few years for the addition of new rules and regulations which are costing business and preventing growth in productivity and additional jobs. What will you do to curb this practice and bring oversight to these agencies?
Gizzi: There are several instances of State agencies overstepping common sense bounds in ways that are preventing growth. DOE and the BOE are at the top of the list.
Our economy is dependent – more now than ever – on a highly educated, trained workforce. It is necessary for our workers to compete with those from other countries now, as opposed to other states. Trends in manufacturing and services are such that graduating students, and our economy, benefit from workforce training and career pathways that allow for technical career development such as that provided by our skills centers.
The Washington State Board of Education ruled (without going through the legislature) that the graduation requirements for high school seniors needed to change to accommodate an academic track. Unfortunately, this ruling makes it such that students attending a skills center now are unable to meet those requirements and therefore cannot graduate on time in many instances. We should be encouraging attendance at our skills centers, not discouraging it.
I would ensure that “rulings” such and this, and the DOE ruling on storm water, would be required to go through the legislature, as well as business and community groups, prior to acceptance and implementation. Too often these rulings could benefit from discussion and involvement of our community. We simply need to ensure their participation.
Harris: I would like to see more oversight of these state agencies. We must keep in check these state agencies that have rule-making authority without legislative oversight. One agency to use as an example would be DOE, as storm water rules in Washington state are the most stringent in all of the United States.
State Senator race
Q: Balancing the state budget is a function of revenues and expenses. What are three specific proposals you’ll bring to the next session to balance the budget?
Benton: Across the board, reduce burdensome regulations including stormwater rules, Dept. of Revenue rules and freeze all unfunded mandates on all local governments. Require all permits to be issued within 90 days. Delay impact fee payments by developers until the property is sold. This will get the economy moving again and get revenue coming again. Eliminate duplicative offices; consolidate the administration of our university systems in to one system. Privatize highway rest stops and lease them out for a profit. Most importantly, we must fund education first so that your kids’ education won’t be held hostage, forcing citizens to agree to more taxes. There is not a revenue problem in Olympia. There has been a long standing spending problem.
Association of Washington Business and the National Federation of Independent Business and many, many other small business organizations have endorsed my reelection because their membership feels that my voting record has been significantly better for the business community than Representative Probst’s record of voting with the unions 100 percent of the time.
Probst: Cutting upper and middle management administrative positions and salaries in state government, moving money out of administration and into the classroom in the education system, and passing a No Budget No Pay act, requiring that if legislators can’t pass a balanced budget on time, they shouldn’t get paid.
Your readers might be interested in knowing that I also put my money where my mouth is. I refused to accept my own pay during this year’s special session, when the legislature failed to finish its work on time.
The spring 2012 special session was a month of gridlock, costing the taxpayers over $10,000 a day, resulting in a budget that spent $327 million more, and still contained an accounting gimmick. Legislators should not be rewarded for that; they should have their pay docked instead. I refused my own pay because we should have finished our work on time.
