State Representative Gail Riecken’s Statehouse eUpdate for April 15, 2013‏

INDIANAPOLIS – I get this question a lot…at Third House meetings, from people I meet on the street, from members of my own family.

“So, what are you guys doing up there in Indianapolis?”

I want to be optimistic and tell them that we are making strides on helping the middle class, improving the quality of education in our local public schools, and just making life in general better for Hoosiers.

But it gets tough after weeks like the last one.

Early last week, the Republican chairman of the House Ways & Means Committee strolled to the microphone at the end of a session day and told the members that he was not going to hear a bill that would expand affordable health care to more than 400,000 Hoosiers and provide the means to give 30,000 Hoosiers jobs.

Rather than taking advantage of the federal health care expansion – which would bring close to $10.5 billion back to our state, by the way – the governor has chosen to try to convince Washington to expand a statewide health care plan that cannot come close to providing the level of coverage that can come from the federal Affordable Care Act.

And if the federal government says no to the governor’s plan? There is no backup plan. And that is my major complaint with the process-no backup plan for the legislature to discuss!

Where does that leave Hoosiers wanting to cut medical expenses and avoid using the emergency room as their primary health care option? No one knows, which is more than just a little scary to think about.

When the House majority wasn’t turning its back on health care, it was approving a proposal that places almost complete control of our state’s largest city in the hands of its mayor. If this legislation becomes law, the mayor will be the ultimate authority over the purse strings and the policy, without any need for input from other locally-elected officials on the city-county council.

By any definition that you choose to use, this is a power grab by majority Republicans to help the Republican mayor of Indianapolis. It is a slap in the face of home rule, locally elected councils and any other standard of local representative government that comes to mind.

And while you’re thinking about that, think about how easy it would be for lawmakers to try and install a similar system – one person controlling everything – in other communities?

But if you think all the news last week was bad, I want to end on a slightly more positive note.

Over the past couple of weeks, you probably saw the news about a proposal to require that every single public and charter school have at least one armed employee roaming its halls each day.

We all want our schools to be safe, but this plan offered no explanation how we would pay for the plan, or how these people would be selected or trained.

As time went along, legislators on both sides of the aisle in the House began to consider the enormous risks involved in this plan, and it was decided to take some time and give us a chance to study the proposal in depth over the summer. If it makes sense, we can come back in 2014 and take further action. We need to think long and hard about what we are doing when it comes to improving the safety and security of our schools: Now we have the time to do exactly that.

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As always, please contact me if you have any questions, comments or concerns related to our state government. Here is how you can stay in touch: call my office toll-free at 1-800-382-9842; write to me in care of the Indiana House of Representatives, 200 W. Washington St., Indianapolis, IN 46204; or email me at h77@iga.in.gov.

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State Representative Gail Riecken
Indiana House District 77