BENTONVILLE -- Arkansas Republicans shouldn't lecture the federal government on getting spending under control, then take billions of federal taxpayer dollars of new health spending, House candidate Grant Hodges of Rogers said at a candidate forum Thursday.
That consistency on principle can cause severe hardship for uninsured Arkansans, replied Republican primary opponent Damon Wallace of Bentonville.
"Someone who gets sick and finds out he needs an operation could leave the hospital with $50,000 or $60,000 in medical bills," Wallace said. "You can still buy a house in parts of Arkansas for that. And they won't get a 30-year mortgage to pay that bill off, either."
Wallace said his support for the so-called "private option" state health plan, passed in the last regular session of the Legislature, was still undetermined. The program is still too new to assess its effectiveness. Lawmakers should make that assessment before making a final decision, he said.
Hodges and Wallace face each other in the District 96 race for the state House of Representatives. Incumbent Rep. Duncan Baird, R-Lowell, is ineligible to run because of the state constitutional limit on legislative terms. The candidate made their remarks at a forum hosted by the Republican Women of Bentonville. District 94 candidates Marge Wolf and Rebecca Petty, both of Rogers, also attended the forum at the Bentonville Public Library.
Wolf reminded the audience of her years of experience in as a Rogers City Council member, a Benton County Quorum Court member, a manager of the Benton Northwest Arkansas Food Bank and an active participant in local Republican organizations. Although she "has been and will be a Republican all my life," she told the partisan group she would work "across the aisle" with other interests and would make decisions as legislator she believed were best for the state as a whole.
Wolf also declared a steady commitment to open government and open public records. She reminded the audience of her and the City Council's refusal to comply with a federal magistrate's order to hold a conference in the settlement of a lawsuit, which would have put the council in the position of holding a secret meeting that would have been a violation of the state's open meeting law.
In addition, Rogers city attorney Ben Lipscomb argued in the case constitutional separation of powers provisions forbade one branch of the government, the judiciary, from ordering another branch, the legislative, to dictate the particulars of a meeting.
Petty kept her remarks brief, saying the night of the forum was also the birthday of her daughter, a murder victim. She said she would work to keep families in the district safe.
NW News on 04/11/2014