Democratic gubernatorial candidates Mike Ross and Bill Halter on Wednesday clashed over Halter’s new Arkansas Promise plan, the state lottery that Halter championed and Ross’ support for anti-abortion legislation in Congress.
The Arkansas Promise is Halter’s proposal to build on the state’s Academic Challenge Scholarship Program, which the lottery largely finances. Originally, it offered recipients a maximum of $20,000, spread over four years, but the scholarships had to be trimmed because the program had more recipients than projected and it wasn’t generating enough money. Beginning this fall, new lottery scholarship recipients will qualify for no more than $14,000 spread out over a four-year period.
But while lawmakers have scaled back the scholarships, Halter says it’s time to expand them. His Arkansas Promise plan would pay up to the tuition level at the state’s highest-cost four-year public university in Arkansas for students qualifying for the Academic Challenge Scholarship, maintaining a 2.5 grade-point average andattending college in Arkansas.
It would be paid for without raising taxes by combining the Academic Challenge Scholarship, federal grant aid, additional private scholarships and charitable support, Halter said. It would cost the state $50 million to $75 million per year when fully implemented and could be phased in over a five-year period, he added
Ross of Prescott, a former congressman and state senator, said he wants to ensure that each student who wants to go to college can find a way to attend, but “we are going to do it in a way that is fiscally responsible and in a way that actually can be accomplished.
“I am planning on winning this race, so I am not going to be making promises that I can’t keep,” he told reporters during a stop in North Little Rock, one of about two dozen towns he has campaigned in over the past nine days.
“If you talk to the experts, they will tell you [Halter’s plan] is going to cost an additional $100 million,” Ross said. “[Halter] says he is not going to raise taxes, so my question is is he going to cut health-care services for ourseniors, our children or is he cutting teacher pay? How is he going to pay for it?”
But Halter of North Little Rock, a former lieutenant governor, countered that Ross is “wrong on his math” and “absolutely wrong on his contention.”
Halter said he has been clear about how he would get the $50 million to $75 million for the Arkansas Promise program. He’s likened his proposal to Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe’s campaign proposal to reduce the state’s grocery tax, which has been cut from 6 percent to 1.5 percent since 2007 and financed through cuts in the growth of state tax revenue.
Ross “needs to be explicit about his calculations,” Halter said.
Ross spokesman Brad Howard said the estimate that Halter’s proposal will cost about $100 million more “is based on multiple private conversations with a number of experts in the area of higher education.” He declined to name them.
Shane Broadway, interim director of the state Department of Higher Education who works for term-limited Beebe, said no one has requested that the department estimate how much cost itwould cost to implement Halter’s Arkansas Promise plan.
Ross said he voted against Amendment 87 in 2008 to authorize the Legislature to create a state lottery for college scholarships because “it is a tax on the poor.
“I have cast thousands of votes as a state senator and as a congressman and I have stood before the voters for each and every one of those votes and have been overwhelmingly elected and re-elected. The only vote Bill Halter has ever cast was a vote for himself,” he said.
Halter, who was lieutenant governor from 2007-11 and narrowly lost to then-Democratic U.S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln in 2010, said, “I am not a professional politician who retired to become a lobbyist. Like 3 million other Arkansans, I am not a career politician.”
Ross, who served as a state senator from 1991-2001 and as a congressman from2001-13, was senior vice president for government affairs and public relations for Little Rock-based Southwest Power Pool from January until three weeks ago when he resigned to run for governor.
Howard said Ross has never lobbied and has never been a lobbyist of any kind at either the state or federal level.
Ross said he respects the wishes of voters who approved Amendment 87 and “and obviously [the lottery] issomething that I am supportive of us keeping to help our children to be able to afford to go to college.”
He said the lottery hasn’t raised $100 million a year for college scholarships like Halter estimated it would, and the size of the lottery-financed Academic Challenge Scholarships have been cut. The lottery has raised $94.2 million and $97.5 million for college scholarships during the past two fiscal years.
Halter said, “If [Ross] had his way, the number would be zero dollars.”
The scholarship sizes have been cut because there have been more scholarships recipients than the Legislature projected, Halter said. Lawmakers have cited lower-than-projected lottery proceeds as well as higher-than-expected numbers of scholarship recipients.
Ross said last week that he would have vetoed two measures that the Legislature enacted over Beebe’s vetoes - one bars most abortions after the 12th week of gestation if a fetal heartbeat is detected; the other prohibits most abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. That prompted Halter spokesman Bud Jackson to reply that Ross voted for a measure in Congress in 2012 that would have banned abortions in Washington, D.C., after 20 weeks of pregnancy and it was stricter thanthe bill enacted in Arkansas, denying abortions even for women who were raped or were victims of incest.
Asked why he voted for a measure in Congress more restrictive than the bill that he said he would have vetoed, Ross said, “I have cast thousands of votes as a state senator and as a U.S. congressman and I have stood before the voters for election and re-election for 22 years, and I have consistently and overwhelmingly been re-elected.
“If Bill Halter wants to talk about the past, if he wants to spend this entire campaign picking apart my votes from the past, he can do that. I am running for governor with a positive vision about the future of the state” to build on the advances in education and economic development under Beebe, Ross said. He said he personally opposes abortion and opposes federal and state-funded abortions,and he wants abortion to be safe, rare and legal.
But Halter said, “Maybe in Washington it is OK to say one thing and do another and mislead people why you are doing it. Here in Arkansas we expect consistency and standing on principles.” He added that Ross twice voted in Congress to defund Planned Parenthood, which he said would have eliminated cancer screenings and other healthcare services to women.
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 7 on 04/25/2013