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IN Gubernatorial Candidates On COVID-19, Racial Inequity And Education

(ALAN MBATHI/IPB NEWS)

The 2020 campaign for Indiana governor – like so much of people’s lives – has been overtaken by concerns about the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and nationwide protests over racial injustice and police violence. Indiana Public Broadcasting’s Brandon Smith sat down with each candidate to discuss the race's big issues.

Credit ALAN MBATHI/IPB NEWS
Gov. Eric Holcomb, (R) Indiana

Brandon Smith: I want to start with the thing that’s dominated all of our lives for the last six months, which I’m sure you can guess is COVID-19. Looking back over the last six months, then, is there any changes you would make – what would you change about the state’s response to the pandemic?

Gov. Eric Holcomb: Well, I certainly wouldn’t change how proud I am of the way that three different sectors all came together in a real quickness and focus. And that is, the nonprofit sector, the private sector and the government sectors – and I’m not just talking about the state government; I’m talking about local governments, as well. And so, we’re in a place where we can continue to manage our way through this. You know, we didn’t ever shut down completely. A lot of people say, ‘Well, you shut down.’ Well, there was a lot of business going on. And so, when you balance the lives, first and foremost, and the livelihoods, we’re proving you can go back to school. We’re proving you can go back to work.

Smith: There’s been criticism of the way you’ve spent the CARES Act money. Why are we sitting on so much of that money?

Holcomb: Well, we’re being fiscally prudent about when we actually not just, as you point out, allocate but actually spend. We’re going to spend the allocation that we’ve been given through the CARES dollars from our federal partners. We won’t leave money sitting on the table. But look, I took equal criticism for not spending down the rainy day fund and not spending down our reserves. Thank goodness that we had those reserves to be able to bridge our way to the other side. And we’re looking at where are the needs right now.

Smith: On to the other thing that’s dominated headlines the last few months, which is racial inequity and protests around police shootings of Black men and women and things like that. You announced a series of steps that you want to see the state government take. But do Hoosiers of color in particular have reason to be skeptical that things will change?

Holcomb: Well, maybe to date, but hopefully not going forward because of the actions that we’re taking and going to continue to take. After Mr. Floyd’s death, it was crystallized in my mind that we have to do something different than just have those programs out there. And if there are barriers in my house, in the Statehouse, in the state government, then we need to make sure that we’re removing those barriers and getting rid of those hurdles. And what it comes down to in my mind is empowerment. How are we going to empower people to better determine their own destinies?

Smith: I want to talk about education. Always an important issue for a gubernatorial campaign but more important, perhaps, than ever because we will no longer have an elected state superintendent. So, the first-ever appointment for a state superintendent – what are the qualifications, what are you looking for in that person?

Holcomb: They’re fluent in the area of education, from the whole complete pathway of a student’s life. So, they have that experience. Same thing I’m looking for in every agency head, quite frankly – someone who’s honest, someone who’s humble and someone who’s hungry.

Smith: Teacher pay – the vast majority of teachers in Indiana got a raise from the last state budget, we know. But it still doesn’t get us to where we’d like to be because we started from behind. You have the teacher compensation commission that was working on developing long-term solutions. Is that, sort of – the long-term solution for really paying our teachers what they deserve – kind of off the table in the short term because of the pandemic and the economic struggles that have come with it?

Holcomb: No. I want it to be higher, as you point out; I’ve been very vocal about that. That’s where this long-term, how do we sustain paying our teachers what they are worth and what we expect of them? And that’s where they’re looking at – and yes, COVID affected that but it’s not going to derail anything.

 

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Dr. Woody Myers, (D) IN Gubernatorial Candidate
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Listen to Brandon Smith's interview with Dr. Woody Myers

Brandon Smith: So, let’s talk about those issues that have dominated the headlines so much this year, the first of course being COVID-19. What would you have done differently?

Dr. Woody Myers: Oh, so much. I wouldn’t have followed Mike Pence’s lead, for one thing, or Donald Trump’s lead. Now we know that both of them have lied to the country repeatedly, there’s the tapes to prove it. I know that we should have done our testing program far earlier, far more aggressively. A number of governors were very aggressive in bringing PPE supplies together for the folks in their states and they were far more successful than we were. Now, we see that in our nursing homes for instance, the cost of a dollar’s worth of PPE six months ago is $6 to $10 now. And that has been because we did not aggregate our purchasing power, we did not have an inventory in place. That’s something I would absolutely have done. We’ve moved the stages along too quickly. In addition to that, we don’t even today have really a mask mandate in Indiana. We have a mask suggestion. And it’s just my view that what was absent from the beginning was true leadership.

Smith: So, the governor has been criticized, particularly recently, for how much money from the federal CARES Act, the COVID-19 relief dollars, are still unspent in Indiana. Is it prudent for the governor to wait on at least some of this money to see what more comes out of the federal government?

Myers: And how many people will die during that wait? How many more people will get infected during that wait? The answer’s no. You use the funds that you have that you have now. And if the federal government is guilty of not providing complete and adequate instruction, you ask later for forgiveness.

Smith: I want to talk about the other issue that has dominated our conversation the last – our national conversation, our state conversation – the last several months, which is racial injustice. We’ve seen some steps that Governor Holcomb announced in recent weeks – the hiring of a cabinet officer, reviewing all the training that goes on at the police academy here in Indiana. Is it a good first step?

Myers: If that’s truly in his heart, if that’s truly what he believes, then he could’ve done it four years ago, three-and-a-half years ago, when he first took office. Or he could’ve encouraged his previous boss, Mike Pence, to do it. You know Brandon, we’ve got now 16 years, 16 years of leadership in the Statehouse by a Republican governor and here it is 60, 70 days before an election that this is now an important issue? I’m not going to need a special officer to look over the work of everybody else and then report on how everybody else is doing. I’m going to hire people from the beginning who know how important diversity is, who know how important inclusion is.

Smith: Let’s talk about education. Always an important issue, of course, in an Indiana governor’s race. It’s more than half of the state budget. But perhaps more important than it’s ever been because there is no longer an elected state superintendent of public instruction. You would be the first governor, if elected, to appoint that role. What are you looking for in that person, what kind of qualifications are you looking for?

Myers: Somebody who’s a true leader. Somebody who knows how to communicate with the public, communicate with teachers. Someone who the teachers trust. Someone who has an intimate knowledge of how school systems work today and how they can work better. But someone, also, who’s willing to question how we are doing our work today and whether or not there are better ways to do it in the future.

Smith: Indiana’s been looking at, studying teacher pay here for a few years now. We know that we are doing poorly as it relates to our neighboring states and states across the country. Because of the budget challenges that Indiana, like so many other states, will be facing for the next few years, are teachers going to have to wait a little longer for those long-term solutions?

Myers: Not from me, they’re not. We’re going to find the money to pay the teachers of the state of Indiana what they deserve. They are the future of our state. We will go through that state budget with a fine-tooth comb. We will make every change required in order to make sure that our teachers get what they deserve.

 

Credit ALAN MBATHI/IPB NEWS
Donald Rainwater, (L) IN Gubernatorial Candidate
donald_rainwater_interview.mp3
Listen to Brandon Smith's interview with Donald Rainwater

Brandon Smith: As a Libertarian, what do you see as the role of government in addressing the pandemic?

Donald Rainwater: Provide the citizens with the information necessary to decide for ourselves how best to safeguard our lives and the lives of our families. I believe that all too often, the idea that government can protect everyone is misguided.

Smith: What about Gov. Holcomb’s response hasn’t worked in your mind? The number of cases as it relates to the number of tests has come down in recent months. He touts those numbers, says it’s clear the response is working. What about it didn’t work for you?

Rainwater: Many, many, almost a million Hoosiers have had to file unemployment claims since the first week of March. We have no idea what the economic ripple impact of the executive orders will be from now over the next couple of years.

Smith: The money that’s come from the federal government, primarily by way of the CARES Act, intended for COVID relief – Indiana is still sitting on $1.3 billion of that $2.4 billion we’ve gotten.

Rainwater: And many of the folks who are still unemployed haven’t got unemployment checks because our unemployment insurance system is antiquated. We’re not helping those who were displaced economically by the governor’s unilateral executive orders.

Smith: If you’re governor of Indiana, as you see the problem of racial injustice not just in government but in society in general, what then is the role for government to help address that crisis?

Rainwater: Much of the what we’ll call racial injustice has been government overreach. Here again, whether it was to oppress someone or to attempt to make up for past bad acts, it doesn’t work. You can’t use government to fix something that really can’t be fixed.

Smith: What role do you see for police reform?

Rainwater: We need to have an honest, straightforward discussion about holding individuals accountable for individuals’ actions. And I don’t think we do that today. I think we all too often want to blame a group of people for one person’s bad actions. I’m a proponent for body cams – I think it protects both the officer and the citizen. I believe that we need to do better training.

Smith: So, education is always a big deal in an Indiana governor’s race. The governor will now appoint the state superintendent of public instruction for the first time, instead of that position being elected. If you’re hiring that state superintendent, what qualifications are you looking for?

Rainwater: Well, I’m looking for someone first of all who has not only been involved in public education but someone who also has experience and knowledge and open-mindedness toward educational choice in Indiana. I believe we unfortunately politicize education entirely too much in the state of Indiana. And we need to focus on making sure that the dollars that Hoosier taxpayers pay for education get to the kids in the classrooms.

Contact reporter Brandon at bsmith@ipbs.org or follow him on Twitter at @brandonjsmith5.

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