One-on-one with candidate for governor Bradley Byrne

By Bill Britt

The following is part one of an extended conversation with Bradley Byrne. Part two will be published in the August 13th edition. Bradley Byrne wants to be governor of Alabama and on a recent visit to the News-Aegis he shared his candid views on a number of issues that concern our county and state.

There are things you notice when you are sitting three feet from another person that are not easily captured in words, images or in sound. The little nuances of speech, the look in the eyes, those telling micro expression, that if observed closely let us know what is really on the person�s mind.

Like all candidates running for high office we ask, what does this person really think? How much of what he is saying is based on true beliefs. How much of what he is saying is calculated and tailored only to win votes?

In our conversation Mr. Byrne came across as intelligent, honest and capable.

Bradley Byrne is an Alabama native born and raised in Mobile. His family roots go back generations. Byrne, a graduate of Duke University and the University of Alabama Law School, is married with four children.

Byrne practiced law in Mobile for over 25 years before entering public service in 1994 with his election to the Alabama State Board of Education. He was re-elected to the board in 1998. In 2002, Byrne won a Republican seat in the Alabama State Senate representing District 32. He was re-elected in 2006.

Byrne became recognized statewide when Governor Bob Riley asked him to become chief executive officer of Alabama�s troubled two-year college system.

At the time, the Alabama two-year college system was rife with problems and systematic corruption stemming from years of systematized error.

By most all accounts, Byrne�s reform efforts have succeeded in returning honesty, integrity and renewed purpose to Alabama�s two-year college system. Byrne says he wants to take his hard-earned experience into the Governor�s Office.

The following is a transcript of the conversation between Republican Gubernatorial Candidate Bradley Byrne and Bill Britt, editor of the News-Aegis.





Q: The Alabama two-year college system was discovered to be riddled with corruption and patronage. What lessons from its failure and your subsequent cleanup will you bring to the governor�s office and what ethics reforms will you push to enact in the state government overall?



A: First, one of the things I learned as chancellor was it starts with the person at the top. You have to lead by example and make your words match your actions. A standard of public and personal integrity should be expected from everyone. As chancellor, I learned that you need to take action. I got in my car and drove to every campus and met with our employees and talked with them about an integrity standard.

Then, we put everyone through ethics training, every single person, including myself. We put everyone through criminal background checks�everyone. What that said is there is a standard that we are all expected to live up to and we are going to be accountable if we don�t. As a result, some people are actually being prosecuted and, let me just say, that Richard Minor [St. Clair County District Attorney] played a huge role in these cases and we are very grateful to Richard for what he has done.

Some people weren�t necessarily criminals but they just needed to go, and through various means we got them to leave. So, by our words and our actions, we instilled in that system a culture of public and personal integrity. I think the employees in the system really appreciated that because they felt they were being unfairly saddled with this reputation of being the crux of the problem when it was really only a small percentage of people who, unfortunately, were in leadership positions.

The second thing is we have got to pass laws�we need to ban double dipping throughout state government. We banned it in the two-year college system by state board policy. The Supreme Court upheld that but we need laws that make that the rule throughout state government. We know we can do it. It is not unconstitutional. It is not illegal, as they all say, because that has been tested.

The second thing we need is a law that criminalize the practice of pass-through pork. Let me tell you what that is, the legislature [inflates] your agency budget request by a certain amount of money. Then, after the session is over, they pick up the phone and call saying, �I can get you an extra half million dollars but I want you to start this new program over here and hire my good buddy or my nephew or my daughter or whomever.� Well, that is a fundamental corruption of state government. We need to pass a law that makes it a crime and put an end to it.

The third thing we need to do is ban the practice of PAC-to-PAC [Political Action Committees] transfers because that hides where the contributions come from. I have nothing against political action committees but when they essentially have one committee give to another committee, give to another committee and hide where it starts from, I have a problem with that. And we have heard a great deal about that over the years and Representative Jeff McLaughlin, from up the road here, puts it in every year then they play a little game with it. They pass it in one house and don�t pass it through the other. Well, they benefit from this little game and we need to have laws stop it.

Another thing, there is no limits on what a lobbyist can give to a legislator or a member of the executive branch. They can give me a washing machine or take me to the Bahamas. It�s crazy. And the only thing that you have to disclose is if you spend more than $250 per day. Now for $249.99 a day, you can show me a pretty good time in Alabama. We need to put some really hard limits and some really low limits [on what can be given]. I think their needs to be full disclosure of everything because this is a fundamental corruption of state government. Lobbyists can buy legislators and our ethics commission does not have the powers or the resources they need to do their jobs. They do not even have subpoena power so they cannot compel testimony. This weakens their ability to be a proactive investigative arm of state government. Essentially, the ethics commission has to wait for someone to bring a case to them. Then, they investigate as best they can. If they do make a finding they send it over to the district attorney�s office or the attorney general�s office. Some legislators laugh when they talk about this procedure.

So, if you do all these things you fundamentally clean up state government.

Governor Riley has proposed all these before and hasn�t been able to get them passed. What is the difference this time? I think the news stories about recent trials and ongoing trials, not just statewide, but also in Jefferson County have made people a lot more sensitive to the situation. People are paying attention. We need to make this an issue up and down the ballot next year. I am going to be doing it and everybody (governor, lieutenant governor, legislator) should take a stand on it. You watch, they will all be for it during the campaign.

But, here is the difference, if I am elected, the day after my inauguration; I will request a special session of the legislature. I am going to bring them all in and put only these bills in the call [list of topics]. I�m going to say, �Alright, we all ran on this. These are all the bills we said we are going to vote for and here they are. This is a special session just for this purpose. Before you even come into regular session you need to pass them.� The press and the public will be invited so all eyes will be on them and then say, �Do it.� I think it will pass. There may be some people squirming around while they are voting, but I think it will pass in the call.

I want to compliment Governor Riley, he has done that as well.



Q: An other question relayed the your experience leading the two-year college system. It appears to me that more emphasis has been place on workforce development lately and I think that is a positive move forward. How do you see developing the economy in Alabama in general?



A: Our greatest resource is the people of this state. We talk about how we have all of these beautiful waterways and natural resources buried in the ground, and we do. Those are major assets. And certainly building the public infrastructure, roads and bridges, and making sure we have a good business environment in terms of taxes, regulations, etc. Is certainly key. The most important thing I learned from being chancellor and being on the governor�s economic development cabinet, is that in all of these efforts we have underway in Alabama, is being able to provide or assure these businesses and industries that are coming here that we can provide them with the quality workforce that they are looking for.

The governor made a major point when he asked me to be chancellor. He said, �We are in the process of bringing dozens and dozens of new big important industries with high-paying jobs to Alabama and it is not going to work if we can�t provide them with the trained workforce. We also have to make sure that we can backfill with existing business and industry. We need workforce training at the highest possible level.� That was what sold me on doing it.

My first day as chancellor, I asked my secretary to bring into the office whomever was in charge of workforce development. There was nobody. So, we had to create the office of workforce development. We brought Dr. Matthew Hughes from the aviation college in Ozark to lead the program and act as the governor�s workforce development director as well. Governor Riley signed an executive order that created this very streamline system where local, regional workforce planning councils send to us their needs. Then we try to fulfill them. It was so successful that Dr. Hughes is now being flown all around the country training others since Alabama is now the role-model.

Whenever we bring in prospects for business and industry, we can always take our workforce effort and put it out front. We are the best in the country. The very apex of that is an agency called AIDT (Alabama Industrial Development Training) which is an agency under the two-year college system. They have been ranked year after year as the best in the country. So I think our workforce arm of the state is second to none in this country. We can always get better and be constantly improving what we are doing. Working with those local, regional workforce councils is critically important. I feel great about all this, I think that is going to help lead us out of the recession.



Q: In your recent address to the graduating class at Troy State you took a very Reaganesque tone, seeing the positive and possibilities, is this an indication of your leadership style?



A: I am a son of a World War II veteran I was raised by that generation. My mom and my dad went through the Depression as young people. They came out of that situation and Daddy was drafted before Pearl Harbor. I think about what they went through and I think about what we are going through right now. If my dad were here he would say, �Son, buck up.� We are a much better country than some people think we are. I think America is a great country. Now, we are making some dumb decisions in Washington but we are a big enough and great enough country that we will get through this.

Alabama is in a great position to take advantage. Look at the fact that your Honda plant down the road [Lincoln] is beginning to come back. The Hyundai plant in Montgomery is now back to full production. We have a 10,000 person BRAC [Base Realignment and Closure] that is coming to Huntsville. A 12,000 person BRAC that is coming to Ft. Benning, right across the river from Phoenix City. Mobile has 1,000 new jobs that they are going to train for the big shipbuilding company Austal who is contracted to the Navy. When they finish, 20% of United States Naval fleet will have been built in Mobile.

All of these things are happening around us and it is easy to get down in the bottom of a recession but this is not going to last forever. We need to ask now, how are we going to position ourselves to be at the cutting-edge of the recovery?

When I was still Chancellor and on the governor�s economic development council that is what we were doing. We have some incredible opportunities for the state of Alabama, for us to be at the very leading edge of the economic recovery. I believe we can be in a position where we can have an economy like no other in the southeast. I�m excited about the opportunities ahead. I am very upbeat despite all the negative stuff and very positive about Alabama�s future.



See part two next week.

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