I love my community and I see it being hollowed out by outside interests and dark money. The people who move here to escape liberal states are helping create the mirror image of what they fear.
Idaho is a small state. It is relatively inexpensive to manipulate our elections and our policies. Since 2015, the Idaho Freedom Foundation has been successfully training the legislature to be loyal to the Freedom Index over the people in their districts. The result is a hollowing out of rural communities, in particular. Laws supported by the machine - remove local decision-making, push higher costs onto local communities, and preference outside interests.
My community is amazing. Idaho's tradition of pulling together neighbor to neighbor is being damaged. I want to reverse the trajectory. My background in helping organizations understand the system effects of decisions has prepared me to work in the legislature. I have experience working with people entrenched in belief systems that do not serve the desired outcomes. It's overwhelming and I don't know how much difference I can make, but I do need to try. Three loyalists made it through the closed republican primary through lots of outside money and strategy. We lost two really good conservative legislators. The same money and powers that made that happen are working to dupe the many new people moving into our communities. It's a big uphill climb
Clear unnecessary obstacles so local business can succeed Ensure our grandchildren can afford to live and work here - Right now only 15% of the people who work here can afford to live here. I'd like to encourage local land trusts and tax policies that encourage people to sell to people who will live and work here. - we have a huge retired population and many are being priced out by rising property values and associated taxes. Cash rich outsiders are driving prices up and turning properties into vacation rentals. Fixing the Homeowners exemption is one easy improvement.
Stabilize essential rural healthcare services - One of the counties in my district just announced a levy that will cost $58 per $100K value on each home. The state reduced reimbursement rates by 4% which was the straw that broke the local hospital. The average Idahoan got $127 back. Now they will pay more than that to just keep their hospital open. Is that the tradeoff they wanted? - Recruit and retain qualified healthcare providers - The legislature passed a law several years ago that cost every Idaho adult 17 cents/year and paid back student loans for nurses who served in rural communities. It was effective, but the freedom index rated the bill a high negative, which caused legislators to vote against it. Killing that program. Spend 17cents to keep nurses in rural Idaho, the machine doesn't like it.
Maintain our roads before neglect makes repairs more expensive Fix bottlenecks that waste time, threaten safety, and hurt local business The series of tax cuts that have been implemented over the past 8 years have returned very little to the average Idahoan, but have resulted in budget cuts for roads ($275M this year, $1.3B road projects moved into unfunded status). We live on an international corridor that shuts down on a regular basis due to wrecks. The legislature has never had the political will to implement longterm improvements. Now even painting the lanes is questionable. Our sewer systems are aging. our bridges need repair. One of the indicators of a community being hollowed out is diminished transportation ease to the outside economy. We need to fix this. And it is a popular issue.
Prevent public lands from being sold off Protect public access with responsible use and stewardship One of the agenda items of the machine and my opponent in particular is to take back federal lands into state hands. The state has a track record of then selling them off, because the maintenance costs are not sustainable. Right now, every American pays to maintain those lands. A little state like Idaho can't do it. The people who live here want to be able to enjoy those lands. We also use timber sales to support schools, though very little of that money actually comes back to our communities. We need to have responsible multiuse of the lands for recreation, hunting, fishing, timber industry.
Fund public schools to meet constitutional requirements Partner with homeschool families for sports, arts, and advanced classes Support career tech and workforce readiness Idaho spends $1300 less per student than we spent 20 years ago. We are last in the nation. We run local levies to pay for bus drivers and operational costs. We lose teachers to Washington because the pay is so bad. One of the platform planks of the republican party (written by the Idaho Freedom Foundation) is to stop funding any post secondary education including career tech. We have a lot of home schoolers (perhaps as high as 39%) Public schools can be a unifier for our rural communities for sports, community meetings, etc. We need to find ways to keep our schools high quality, stable, and serving everyone.
Make sure state tax reductions don't just push the cost to locals Keep taxes understandable and tied to the services they support The slate of candidates that made it through the closed primary have pledged loyalty to an agenda that values and measures only reduction in taxes. It does not measure who gets those cuts. These cuts benefit the wealthiest and harm working Idahoans. I want to make sure that our taxes are fair and transparent and work for us.
Have questions or suggestions? I would love to hear from you!
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