Exclusive coverage of Q&A with GOP gubernatorial candidates

By Joel Paris

In an effort to increase public awareness of issues important to the county and the state, the News-Aegis is providing a transcript of last Tuesday’s GOP gubernatorial forum.

The forum was the first of its kind in the state. It was sponsored by the St. Clair Republican Party and was moderated by State Representative Dr. Jim McClendon.

What follows is a transcript of various questions asked to the candidates. Because audience applause drowned out recording equipment at certain points, some answers have been abridged.

What do you propose to reduce the prevalence of meth abuse and ease the burden on local law enforcement?

Kay Ivey – The meth problem is deep and deadly serious. It is a threat to every one of us. It has got to stop—whatever it takes—whatever law enforcement says they need, we have to find a way to get it to them and the court system has got to be more effective. When they arrest those folks, by George, keep them in jail; none of this going in there and getting out real quick. There’s got to be some answers for that. We’ve got to all say we’re going to get rid of this because it will kill our society, kill our economy and worst of all kill our young people. It has to be addressed in law enforcement and the court systems and as governor I will make it a high priority.

Do you believe the legislature and hence the taxpayers, should fund PACT (Prepaid Affordable College Tuition) contracts that have the word “guarantee” in it? What about the other contract holders?

Roy Moore – The word guarantee has kind of been taken out of the contract after the money [for the program] started disappearing. It shows the problem of the government taking over private business. It should not happen and it happened when they went in to do this. But do I believe that the taxpayers and the people who had faith in that program should be reimbursed? I do, because I think it’s dependant on the state and I think we have to honor our commitments but I don’t think you can renege and I think it shouldn’t be managed by people in the government that have no more business managing it than anybody else.

Do you support removing the sales tax on groceries and if so, how would you compensate for the deficit?

Tim James – I was against the public position. That was nothing but a backhanded attempt to raise taxes on the working men and women of Alabama. What they were trying to do was the ole bait and switch. They said they were going to remove the tax on groceries but they were also going to remove the public deduction on your taxes and it’s a net increase in taxes. It should have been killed and it never should have come out of the blocks. We don’t need more taxes in Alabama. Let me give you a quick statistic to think about. A decade ago, 1998 my dad ran for [office in] Montgomery, there were about 740,000 children enrolled in education K-12 across the state of Alabama. Today, there’s [still] about 740,000 children enrolled in education across the state of Alabama except we have twice the money. So we’re trying to educate the same number of children with twice the money and we still have teachers that have to go to Wal-Mart and buy supplies and toilet paper. It is not a money issue it is a management issue.

How do you feel about any new taxes, whether on the citizens, corporate, or otherwise?

Bill Johnson – I’ll answer that question by sharing a little of my history. Unfortunately in my early days I had an ugly encounter with the IRS that took me a decade to get sorted out. I’ll tell you what, that left [me with] a taste and a commitment on my part as caregiver of this state. Some of you all will remember when I served on Birmingham City Council. You may not remember that when I was on the city council there I voted against every single tax, every single time any tax came up. A million dollars over the four years I was there. I am a low tax, no tax, conservative, small government person. At the same time, what I want to see is getting into a type of government, having much smaller government, so we have to answer the fact that we’ve got people hurting out there. I want to partner with faith and community based organizations to help those who are in need. I believe that’s the way we used to help people: [Through] our neighbors, our churches and our community.

State employees have a guaranteed retirement income. If their investments do not generate the promised amount, the legislature and the taxpayer must make up the difference. The taxpayers in effect subsidize their retirement income. Do you think this is a good plan? Would you change it in any way?

Robert Bentley – I think it is a good plan because I think it is a guaranteed, defined contribution or defined benefit plan that we are given as part of our payment to state employees. Now, we have to realize that Dr. [David] Bronner (CEO of the Alabama Retirement Systems) has done a very good job with the retirement system. But at the present time that is part of our unfunded liabilities in this state. We have two unfunded liabilities: the retirement system and the healthcare system. Those are two unfunded liabilities that we have to report because that affects our bond revenue. At the present time we have a 77 percent amount in our retirement fund for teachers and state employees. That means if everyone retires at this time, we can pay 77 percent. Four years ago we actually had 102 percent. So, if the economy comes back it will be 100 percent funded—and that’s probably what will happen—hopefully the retirement will come back. We’ve got two types of systems. We’ve got the defined contribution plan and the defined benefit plan. The defined benefit is not taxed when you retire. The defined contribution plan is the 401-K that Dr. Bronner manages. It’s taxed like you or I [are taxed]. We’re taxed if we have a 401-K because those are defined contribution plans. I know this is complicated but let me tell you, that’s one of the things that I have fought down there [in Montgomery] is to try and get everybody’s retirement so we do not have to pay taxes on either a defined contribution plan or a defined benefit plan, nobody has to pay state income tax on their retirement.

If elected what do you propose to do about our overcrowded prison situation and where would you get funding for it?

Bradley Byrne – Let me tell you a story about a young man that I met in Mobile. His boss called me one day while I was still the chancellor of the two-year college system and he said, “I want you to come down and meet one of your graduates.” [The young man was] his best welder and he had 400 welders. I went down there and this young man came out and welcomed us at one of the big ships down there. His boss was so proud of him and said, “This young man started with me and he’s doing a really good job. He makes about $23 an hour and he’s one of our lead welders.” Two years ago he was sitting in Atmore Prison going through one of our programs that the two-year college system offers. Because he got that training, because he knew how to do something when he got out of prison, he got a job and didn’t go back. He’s now making money and paying taxes instead of being on your payroll as a taxpayer of the state of Alabama. We break the cycle of people coming back into our prison system, like up the road here in St. Clair [at the correctional facility], by making sure that when they leave they have something that they can do and get a job. What I want to do to stop our prison overpopulation problem in Alabama is make sure everyone of those prisoners before they get out can get a job. That gets them off our payroll, off the taxpayers’ backs, out of breaking the law and in society supporting themselves as you support yourselves everyday.

Although most all of us are immigrants or descended from immigrants, there has been a surge in illegal migration to this country and this state. Many legal residents and tax payers resent the loss of their jobs to illegal residents and resent being taxed to pay for health care, education and other benefits to persons not contributing to the system. How do you feel about this and do you have plans to address this growing problem?

Bradley Byrne – When I was chancellor of post-secondary education we went through every policy of the two-year college system. When we got to the admissions policy I found out to my surprised that we didn’t even ask people that go into your two-year college system, “Are you a citizen of the United States or if you are not, are you here illegally?” In the two-year college system we train people to work on airplanes and in Huntsville we train them to work on rockets and missiles. We weren’t even asking them if they were here illegally. So we changed that policy. There were a lot of people that got mad about it but you now have to prove, to get into a two-year college in Alabama, that you are a citizen of this country. We’re one of three states in this country that does that. We need to go through every program in state government and make sure that before we provide one penny of your tax dollars to people that those people have proven to us that they have documentation and are citizens of this country. If we do that across state government we will save money and at the same time assure taxpayers of this state that they are not paying for people that should not have gotten here in the first place.

A fundamental Republican platform is that less government is better and bigger government is worse. How do you plan to control the rapid escalation in governmental growth and do you think you can reduce government size and reduce the number of people on the government payroll?

Tim James – Shrinking government is a function of the payroll. It’s that simple. You’ve got to limit growth. From 1999 through about 2007, we had growth and government regulation in the state of Alabama. The legislation controlled by the Democrats kept re-budgeting every year at its highest point and it became a recurring cost of government. That’s how it got so big and how it outpaced population growth and everything else. Government should grow no faster or no bigger than the rate of inflation. Since 1998, general population has grown six percent and head count at the department of transportation has grown 35 percent. That’s an additional 1,000 people at $40,000 a pop. That’s $40-50 million in additional payroll. Let me tell you what we could do with that. You could take $40-50 million in net savings a year and float a $400-500 million dollar road bond issue and pay for it with the savings. When you come to St. Clair County [you could] put five or ten million dollars in to fix the roads. That’s how you have to think.

Jobs and economic development are the lifeblood of a strong economy and a self-sufficient populous. What are your plans to strengthen Alabama’s economy and provide new jobs for Alabama’s workers?

Kay Ivey – Number one we want to provide incentives for existing businesses. Guess what? Those laws are already in the books. […] Secondly, we need a workforce training and development programs, bar none. That goes for K-12, that goes for two-year and four year [colleges] to promote workforce development because workforce development is the engine that drives the American and Alabama’s economy. After being on the ADO (Alabama Development Office) and being assistant director there, I know it very well and I know how to do this.

Also, we’re going to attract the medium sized firms to our state, not just the big firms. And we’re going to diversify. We’re going to have aerospace and biomedical and knowledge based firms, not just automotive. We don’t need all our eggs in one basket. I’ll speak to you and say [there’s a way] to grow jobs that is far better than anything that’s all about gambling. That’s not the way to get good jobs in Alabama. The way to get good jobs is to grow and get that growth to get good people to work.

The state’s education budget is currently facing proration despite vast amounts of federal stimulus spending and the governor using the emergency fund. In two years the state is likely to have neither a funded rainy day account not a federal stimulus check. How do you propose that we deal with this crisis, tax increases, budget cuts or what else? Please be specific as possible.

Roy Moore – We have over 18 percent of our state budget going to public education and each year we find out our children need reading initiatives. Something’s got to change in this state in education. We should have the top education in this state. We have some of the best teachers in the nation in education. What I propose is we turn the education to the local communities and to the parents who control the education of children. When I was chief of justice we stopped the […] funding [of a] lawsuit that was worth three billion dollars of taxes on the people of Alabama that had languished in court for 12 years. I was assigned to the case and it was stopped. That’s what I believe: you don’t need more money to be a better education system. I propose tax credits. I propose scholarship grant organizations and I propose charter schools. We need to study these things and see what works in Alabama for the education of our children, but we don’t need more money to do it.

How do you feel about gambling? Would you support a constitutional amendment making it legal? Illegal?

Bill Johnson – I would not support a constitutional amendment making it legal. I am very much opposed to gambling. I am opposed to a state lottery. I especially opposed to a state lottery because I feel like anytime the state is in a position to officially sanction gambling, it’s sending a dangerous message to our citizens that there is some other way to get ahead than working hard and saving your money. We’ve got gambling in Alabama, there’s no question about it. I do think it ought to be taxed and regulated. I’ll tell you what I think they ought to do with the money that comes from it. Just like they do with the cigarette ads that try to reduce the number of smokers, I would make anti-gambling ads and billboards. The billboard that I’ve had in my mind and I even sent this to the governor as an idea: You’ve seen those billboards that say, “I’ve won $100,000 and you can too!” You know what I would do? I would go to gambler’s anonymous and get some real people and put their stories up on the billboards [that] say, “I lost my wife and kids and you can too!” “I lost my house and you can too!” [It would show] what gambling does to families in this state.

A bill to prohibit double dipping failed to pass the legislature by a narrow margin. There are state employees serving in the legislature that can vote to fund the state agencies that employ them. How do you feel about this so-called double dipping and what changes, if any, do you think need to be made?

Tim James – The double dipping law is grossly unconstitutional. [That was] why I did not want elected officials voting on pay raises for themselves in other capacities. There have been tricks and bait and switches along the way. I know Bradley (Byrne) has done a good job in the two-year system but it’s outside the intent and it needs to stop. We just don’t need people that are elected voting to accept raises and determining how much money goes to their department.

There is a widely accepted agreement that conduct of government and elected officials leave a lot to be desired from an ethical standpoint. What do you think needs to be done to combat this pervasive issue?

Robert Bentley – We don’t need a lot of complicated ethics laws. What we need in this state is total openness. The foundation of a good government is trust and the way you trust us as politicians is that you believe that we’re spending your money correctly. If you know where every penny goes, [than] you’re going to believe we’re doing what’s right. We just passed a law last year that said that every agency in the state of Alabama—beginning October 1—must post online every penny that is spent. That is the first step. Let me tell you what I’m going to do. Every penny that’s spent of every elected official in this state—including legislatures—needs to be put online. If you know that someone takes me out to dinner one night, it ought to be put online the next day. If we open up government and we let everybody see where everything goes then you ought to trust us a lot more. We need in the ethics form we fill out every year, more specificity in that. If you’ve ever looked at one of those, it is so vague. You have no idea what somebody makes, [or] where it comes from. There is a companion law that ought to be passed this last year that I co-sponsored that says that if anyone works for any agency that takes state money or city or taxpayers dollars, you must put it online. So, not only does it cover government agencies, but individuals also. If we can pass that law then that would be a good law to really clean up state government.

What would you do on the state level to improve the quality of healthcare?

Kay Ivey - Number one, we individuals have got to take full responsibility for our respective health. In fact, if it means those of us who choose to be unhealthy because of our chosen lifestyle, maybe we need to have that person have to pay more for their healthcare policy because we all have responsibility to take care of ourselves and exercise. […] Number two, we have to get rid of so much bureaucracy in the medical world so that patient care is what we want and patients continue to have the choice, patients and their doctors make decisions not the companies, not the pharmaceutical folks.

The Alabama trust fund is the general fund’s largest non-tax source of revenue. It carries a [stipulation] that it continues to give income to the people. Do you support digging into the trust fund to meet budget obligations and if not, under what circumstances would you raid the trust fund?

Bill Johnson – I would not support raiding the trust fund or dipping into it at any level. I think you all have heard my position as far as small government and low taxes and even as we move forward we are going to be very short—it looks like—over the next couple years. You will have my commitment that we will make these reductions in state government by cutting state government and cutting services and not raising taxes. A lot of the problems we’re having with our economy now are because we have less money in the economy and right now raising taxes would have the exact wrong bearing effect of basically taking less money out of the economy. So obviously I’m not going to support raiding the trust fund. I do want to say that I will make a commitment that we will have a hiring freeze. So we’re [not] hiring any new [unnecessary] state employees while I’m governor. And you should know that at least a third of state employees are eligible to retire now so through natural attrition there’s going to be a lot of folks leaving the state program.

As post-secondary chancellor you were on the PACT board. Did you have any warning or knowledge of the decrease in funding to pay for the scholarship program?

Bradley Byrne – No. Thank you.

Will you bring the Ten Commandments monument to the state capitol?

Roy Moore – I’m often asked that and no; but I’ll tell you what I will do. I’ll acknowledge God and never let that right be taken, the right to observe the first amendment and the constitution of ever state and it’s a part of everything we stand for. That’s why we stand for smaller government and cutting taxes not just keeping them where they are. Government is not our God.

What is your proposal to get Alabama’s economy back on track?

Robert Bentley – Number one, we need an environment in which we can recruit industry to the state and we do that by having good workers [and] by keeping the cost of doing business low. That means keeping taxes low, and then we keep this a right-to-work state and we resist card checks.

I want to recruit major industry to this state as Governor [Bob] Riley has done. The thing that we must do is innovate the industries and businesses that are here at the present time and we do that with a low tax system. We cut taxes and we give tax abatements to companies that are already here. […] We need to give them tax breaks just like we do those companies that we recruit from out of state. If we do that we can stimulate the economy [and] we can have more people working. Those people pay state taxes, they pay income tax and they pay sales tax, both of which fund 90 percent of the education trust fund budget. It’s a circle. What we do is take state dollars and we get the businesses and tax breaks. They hire people and that makes a circle take place.



-Michael Mee contributed to this transcription

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