The first 2023 town hall meeting of the area state legislators and their constituents took place on Saturday, February 4th. It took place at Candlelight Church in CDA. The politicos played to a packed house. Present were State Senators Doug Okuniewicz, Ben Toews, Carl Bjerke, and Phil Hart. State Representatives present were Vito Barbieri, Jordan Redman, Elaine Price, Joe Alfieri, Tony Wisniewski, and Ron Mendive. Mr. Don Bradway moderated the proceedings and read questions submitted from the audience.
Some of the hot topics on the front burner were election reform, educational savings accounts, a freedom of conscience law exempting doctors from certain medical practices contrary to their religious beliefs, a patient’s rights visitation bill, water scarcity issues, and the regulation of pornographic materials available to minors in public libraries.
At the outset, the legislators made it plain they are fighting an uphill battle in Boise. The rest of the state politicians view North Idaho as a : “Red-headed step-child”. With that said, all present emphasized headway was being made towards their pro-family, pro-life, fiscally conservative agendas. The central jewel in the crown being the Education Savings Act, which would empower parents who voluntarily opted to participate in it, to set aside non-taxpayer monies to use to send their children to the school of their choice. This is the opposite of the Idaho Launch initiative in which an unelected bureaucracy would give $8500.00 of taxpayer money to every high school graduate to pursue whatever career field they desired, with no audit.
The issue of election oversight was covered, and bills are pending to move school levy elections to the November general election with the change of: “No second bite of the apple” if the school district loses. The reform of initiatives was explained in that the initiative process must apply to all counties in Idaho and it was documented that out-of-state money floods into Idaho backing initiatives geared to changing state culture and raising taxes to fund left-wing social agendas.
As a side note, Sheriff Norris was present and revealed an agenda currently in place in the State House, whereby city police departments, which serve at the pleasure of local officials, and the Idaho State Police receive substantial funding from the state coffers. County Sheriffs, however, must rely solely on county property tax revenues to fund their departments and pay their deputies. The legislators are going to work to change that.
Since the legislature is only in session from January through March, these public servants have quite a bit on their plates. It was obvious from the positive responses of the audience their efforts are truly appreciated. There were so many questions, the moderator could not ask all of them. He promised to save them for the next Town Hall, which I am looking forward to covering.
