Recent editorials published in Indiana newspapers
The (Munster) Times. April 26, 2017
Legislature delivers key wins for state, NWI
It's a profound example of the success our Region and its leaders can enjoy when Northwest Indiana combines visionary policies with a unified voice in Indianapolis.
The Indiana General Assembly's 2017 legislative session abounded with more laws and policies benefiting both our state and Region than other sessions in recent memory.
Following the recent adjournment of the Indiana House and Senate, Northwest Indiana has many wins to celebrate, all thanks to strong leadership, vision and effectiveness in communicating state and Region concerns to the rest of Indiana's lawmakers.
Long-term road funding
One of the best examples of Region sensibility pushing the state's needle was a long awaited, sustainable plan for maintaining and building our state's road infrastructure.
For generations, our leaders patched the literal and figurative potholes of our most important infrastructure with quick fixes and half measures fueled by reactionary policy.
In 2017, Indiana House Rep. Ed Soliday, R-Valparaiso, succeeded where so many others have failed by shepherding compromise on a long-term road funding plan.
Yes, Hoosiers will pay more in gas taxes. So will other motorists who use and impact our roadways.
Our state could no longer afford to play kick the can with the condition of highways and byways so vital to our Region, state and national economy in the Hoosier crossroads of America.
Frankly, the can was becoming perpetually lodged in cracks and crevices of a Hoosier highway system that had become the brunt of deteriorating road jokes throughout the Midwest.
Soliday and other legislators deserve credit for daring to stand up for the politically unpopular but utterly realistic need to identify long-term funding sources for our roads.
We look forward to seeing the benefits.
Pre-K expansion
The Indiana General Assembly, guided in part by the strong vision of freshman Gov. Eric Holcomb, showed another important unified front in its willingness to expand investment in our youth.
House Enrolled Act 1004 passed the Legislature, meaning an expansion of the state-funded pre-kindergarten pilot program operating in Lake and four other counties to 20 counties total and doubling funding to $22 million a year.
The program provides preschool funding to families of 4-year-olds that otherwise wouldn't be able to afford crucial early learning instruction.
Study after study shows us the long-term education benefits of quality pre-K instruction for our children's educational futures.
We implore the Legislature and governor not to stop with the recent expansion.
State-funded preschool eventually should be expanded to all children. If we're not investing in the future of our state's greatest assets, none of the other investments matter.
Commuter rail investment
Indiana House Rep. Hal Slager, R-Schererville, continued laying tracks for Northwest Indiana's respectability in Indianapolis by serving as chief engineer for an important bill related to proposed commuter rail expansion.
Slager's plan to create special development districts along South Shore Line commuter rail expansion is set to become law.
The districts will allow communities in Lake, Porter, LaPorte and St. Joseph counties to establish these districts, which will capture tax revenues within defined areas along the commuter rail line to finance development debt.
It's the sort of self-sustaining financial innovation that should have many development experts taking note. Slager's plan is a fantastic complement to another move by the General Assembly to help fund double-tracking of the South Shore commuter rail line.
Following the 2017 legislative session, the state's budget now includes $6 million a year for the next 30 years to add capacity and speed travel on the commuter rail line that connects the Region with Chicago.
Having state financial support on board for this major economic development project is key to leveraging federal dollars for the proposal.
Our Region has earned strong advocates for commuter rail expansion in both the Legislature and Holcomb. We must not squander those partnerships by failing to unify behind the economic promise of expanding a service connecting Hoosiers with Chicago jobs and attracting young professionals who prefer public transportation.
Purdue Northwest building
House Enrolled Act 1001 also allocates $35.1 million to construct the Bioscience Innovation Building at Purdue University Northwest in Hammond.
The facility has been a top priority of Lake County lawmakers for nearly a decade to continue transforming this important Region campus of higher learning.
The university reported the new building "will provide state-of-the-art instructional and research facilities to further nursing, biological sciences and STEM education."
"We are greatly appreciative of the support provided by legislators across Northwest Indiana and beyond, and especially that of Rep. Hal Slager, who tirelessly championed our building," PNW Chancellor Thomas L. Keon said. "Every step of the way, he forged forward making his legislative colleagues aware of what this facility means to Northwest Indiana, both educationally and for economic growth and sustainability."
It's yet another feather in the cap of Slager and our entire Region.
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The (Fort Wayne) Journal Gazette. April 26, 2017
Holcomb wise to veto curtailing of public access
Gov. Eric Holcomb has used his first veto to make a ringing commitment to the public's right to know.
The legislature sent Holcomb a bill allowing government officials to charge citizens as much as $20 an hour for public-record searches.
Holcomb explained his veto in a letter to the Indiana House, where the measure was introduced.
"Providing access to public records is a key part of the work public servants perform and is important from a government transparency standpoint," he wrote. "I do not support policies that create burdensome obstacles to the public gaining access to public documents."
Similar to a measure Gov. Mike Pence vetoed in 2015, the bill was an attempt to deter citizens from making overly broad open-records requests that local officials say take too much time to fulfill. In his letter, Holcomb acknowledged the effort "to offset the considerable time and expense often devoted to fulfilling public record searches."
Under House Bill 1523, local and state agencies would have been required to conduct without charge records searches that take up to two hours. But the agencies would have been allowed to charge up to $20 an hour for any further time spent on a search.
Critics pointed out the bill could allow officials to discourage citizens from records requests by overestimating the time those searches might require.
Indiana's public-records law, one of the best in the nation, already contains a safeguard against mindlessly broad search requests: "A request for inspection or copying must identify with reasonable particularity the record being requested," the law says. Agencies that invoke that clause to refuse scattershot requests often receive the backing of the state public access office and the courts.
But "reasonable particularity" is vague enough to invite a variety of interpretations. Instead of attempting to override Holcomb's veto, the legislature would be wiser to further refine the wording of the present law to help citizens and officials know when a request is overly broad or unclear. Such an effort could be combined with the revival of a provision of HB 1523 that Holcomb said he would support - requiring agencies to fulfill requests electronically when possible.
Governmental transparency is essential to democracy. Holcomb's veto, and his sensible comments about it, are a heartening affirmation of that principle.
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South Bend Tribune. April 27, 2017
11th-hour legislative move neither shocking or right
It's not too difficult to grasp the rationale behind a last-minute provision inserted into Indiana's proposed budget.
The provision authorizes the state to purchase new lethal injection drugs, used in the execution of prisoners, while preserving the anonymity of the suppliers. The measure bars the release of information that could reveal the identity of a manufacturer or supplier. That prohibition also applies to attorneys seeking the information in civil and criminal trials.
The state's supply of lethal injection drugs is nearing their expiration dates. The offer of confidentiality to reluctant pharmaceutical companies and distributors is an incentive to provide the state with more drugs.
Republican leaders added the provision at the request of Gov. Eric Holcomb, according to House Speaker Brian Bosma.
Indiana Department of Correction spokesman Doug Garrison told the Indianapolis Star that many drugmakers fear being identified as the provider of an execution drug. "We want the ability to protect their identity."
In fact, about one-third of the 31 states that carry out executions have secrecy laws. Indiana went extra secret, presenting it to residents as a fait accompli. The measure slipped into the 175-page budget bill at the eleventh hour wasn't debated in committee and became public when the budget proposal was released on the Friday, the last day of the current session.
Consider that news of this particular legislative maneuver comes in the midst of the state of Arkansas' attempts to execute eight men over an 11-day period. And that states have struggled to find a replacement for thiopental sodium since production of that drug ceased in the United States.
Given the controversy and heat that surrounds the issue of capital punishment, it isn't surprising Indiana lawmakers opted to operate in such low-key fashion. But that doesn't make it right.
The decision to offer anonymity to the companies that provide lethal drugs should have been openly debated. This has nothing to do with your position on the death penalty. It's about the public's right to know what measures its legislators are considering on such a profound matter - before a vote is taken.
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Kokomo Tribune. April 26, 2017
Immunize your child
Pertussis is a communicable disease Americans just don't worry about today. Health professionals begin immunizing infants against pertussis, diphtheria and tetanus with the DTaP vaccine just two months after birth.
But pertussis, better known as whooping cough, made a comeback in October 2010. Health officials across Indiana reported infections of the disease at a 24-year high.
The rise in reported whooping cough cases might've been due in part to better diagnostic tests, health professionals said. But they also pointed to the number of children who might not have been vaccinated against the disease, as well as the number of teens who fail to get booster shots that keep their immunity from waning.
Last May, the health department of neighboring Carroll County confirmed three cases of whooping cough. The Journal & Courier of Lafayette reported two adults and a baby were diagnosed with the disease there.
It's National Infant Immunization Week. And though it has highlighted the importance of protecting children from preventable diseases such as the mumps and whooping cough for 23 years, Indiana still ranks among the bottom half of states in infant inoculations.
Howard County health officials administered 12,000 vaccinations to children the year of the whooping cough outbreak. Despite dozens of immunization clinics and warnings from school officials of possible expulsion for not providing proof of immunization, as many as 1,000 students still hadn't received inoculations before October of that year - more than two months into the fall semester.
Infant immunization remains a national concern, as well. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show more than 48,000 cases of whooping cough occurred across the U.S. in 2012, the most recent outbreak, including 18 deaths. Most of these deaths were in children younger than a year old.
It was the highest number of whooping cough cases in any one year in the U.S. since 1955.
For the health of your children and the safety of this community, immunize them before they are exposed to a potentially life-threatening disease.___