BOR Interview with State Senator Leticia Van de Putte

by: Phillip Martin, Progress Texas

Tue Mar 03, 2009 at 06:00 AM CST

Ed. Note: The first half of the interview is policy-based, because I think you can learn more about an elected official from how they approach policy than anything else. However, I also know what most readers want. To read the political side of the interview -- and her answers to the 2010 statewide questions -- go to the second half of the interview immediately by clicking here.

UPDATE: Follow Senator Van de Putte on twitter: http://twitter.com/leticiavdp

Texas State Senator Leticia Van de Putte made a big splash a couple weeks ago with an incredible profile in the San Antonio Current, and a subsequent post here on BOR by regular reader and Bastrop precinct chair Robert Ryland making the case for why Leticia Van de Putte she should be Governor generated dozens of comments from the community. As of this posting, a Facebook group that wants to draft Senator Van de Putte for Governor had over 530 members.

Senator Van de Putte's record on progressive issues lends credence to the attention she has received. A former President of the National Conference of State Legislators, Senator Van de Putte received her most recent bit of national attention as Co-Chair of the Democratic National Committee Convention in Colorado last summer. A little over a year ago, she gave the Spanish State of the Union response. She is the current and long-standing leader of the Texas Senate Democratic Caucus, a group that was thrust into the national spotlight in 2003 when she helped lead her colleagues to New Mexico for a month to help fight Tom Delay's unconstitutional mid-decade redistricting map.

Needless to say, Senator Leticia Van de Putte has been a hot topic among Texas Democrats over the past few weeks. I had a chance to interview Senator Van de Putte last Friday about the current legislative session, as well as what the political future may hold for her and the Democratic Party. Read the full transcript below.

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Phillip Martin: It seems you've been quite busy lately. How has the last week been in the spotlight?

Senator Van de Putte: We had an incredible week in the State Senate. Things seem to be moving at a very quick pace, particularly at this time in the Legislature. Right now we want to make sure that all of the stimulus funding that is coming to our state and that will flow through the state budget gets utilized for its purposes. We're particularly pleased that we've been able to raise the importance of the unemployment insurance issue, so we can make sure that $540 million goes to workers that are already affected by the downturn of the economy.

I've read that Governor Perry changed the rules surrounding the unemployment fund, right?

Governor Perry got convinced by some of his business supporters that they needed to give relief to businesses, so they turned back the rate by which businesses pay into the unemployment fund. At the time, the unemployment insurance fund looked pretty solid. It was the wrong move, because as the downturn occurred nationally, Texas wasn't immune. Now, we find ourselves hundreds of millions of dollars short because Governor Perry, basically, decided to give it back.

However, the stimulus money that has been passed by the current administration would allow for us to draw down to the state an additional $540 million for workers who have lost their jobs. We had been hearing this rhetoric from Tom Pauken -- the former Chair of the Republican Party of Texas who is now Chair of the Texas Workforce Commission -- that he and Governor Perry didn't want to accept this money. They were saying that there were strings attached and this was not something we needed to burden Texas employers with.

Nothing could be further from the truth. What about the people who have already lost their jobs? We are very happy that on record this week Senator Kirk Watson -- who sits on the Senate Nominations Committee -- got Tom Pauken to publicly recognize the fact that, yes, we absolutely need these dollars and we need to change the law in the state of Texas to be able to get those stimulus dollars to the state of Texas.

With the change in law, you're referring -- I'd presume -- to the legislation you've filed?

Yes. And what's interesting is that Senator Lucio and I have been filing these bills year after year, because the policies are inherently unfair to workers. There's a trio of bills that we're looking at, and we've asked Governor Perry to put them on the special call for the Session. As soon as we pass these bills, we're eligible for the stimulus money.

There are a lot of folks that will lose their jobs this summer, unfortunately, and on into the fall. We haven't gotten to the worst of this economy. But we know there is money to start doing something now, and that's what the legislation is trying to do.

I know that we've seen some figures about full-time workers that have lost their jobs, but one of the growing stories across the country is the large number of part-time workers that are losing their jobs. Can you give me a sense of how many part-time workers have lost their jobs, or if there has been a growing rate in the number of reduced hours worked here in Texas by part-time, or even full-time, workers?

Well, Texas is one of the few states that does not allow part-time workers to collect unemployment insurance, so we don't have solid data on that. The bill I have filed would allow part-time workers to file unemployment insurance claims and, if they qualify, draw down some of those funds. While we don't know the statistics, though, we do know that in the down turned economy, the first to be told that they don't need to come to work the next day are part-time workers.

There are three classes of people that are mainly part-time workers. First, our young students who are either in high school or in college, but particularly college-age students. The second are working women with young children -- young moms that will work part-time, juggling family and home. The third are our senior citizens, who may be on a fixed income but still need that extra cash coming into their monthly pockets.

When we don't offer unemployment benefits to part-time workers, the ones who are affected our students, seniors, and working moms. These are folks who lost their jobs -- through no fault of their own -- but because of the downturn of the national economy and the state economy, these groups are having to go to food banks, they're going to have to ask their sisters to pay for the utilities...They're hurting, and we can only surmise that it's because they've lost the only job they have, even if it's a part-time job.

Ed. note: There is much, much more with Senator Van de Putte below the fold -- including her response to whether or not she'd run for Governor, what kind of infrastructure needs to be in place for a Democrat to win statewide, and her reaction to last week's Perry vs. Hutchison poll numbers. Click "There's More" to continue reading...

I wanted to ask about another major bill you've filed, regarding a change to Texas' school finance system. This has been a hot issue in recent years, and one that the Legislature has typically moved very slowly on. Can you tell me about your bill, and whether or not it has any kind of support in the Legislature?

Senator Royce West and Senator Kevin Eltife -- and Senator Eltife is a Republican, you know -- the three of us have filed this legislation together. It is the type of school finance bill that has support form rural schools and those folks that represent a lot of our rural areas, as well as our inner city areas. Senator Nichols is interested and has indicated positive support. Senator Kip Averitt has indicated positive support. Senator Lucio, Senator Zaffirini, Senator Shapleigh...

What has happened is that we've done a miserable job of not letting new dollars, go into our neighborhood public schools. The bill that I have proposed adds about $2.6 billion to our public schools over the course of two years. What it does is helps those schools who have the greatest gap in funding to step it up.  We use as a benchmark the Austin ISD level, but everybody gets a little something, even our property-wealthy schools, because even they are hamstrung.

We want to achieve three things in this bill. First we want to get back to a formula funded system, which is very important for future growth. We also wanted to increase equity, and get rid of these gaps. Let's face it -- all kids have to take the same TAKS test, so it just seems ludicrous that children are still at a disadvantage if the money that is used per classroom is used differently throughout the state. They all have to take the same test -- they should all have about the same resources. Finally, we wanted to reduce recapture. That's the old Robin Hood system because, again, even our property wealthy school districts find themselves in the bind because they have reduced greatly some of the programs that they have.

We think that this is a critical issue this year. All politicians run on the campaign promise that school children are our number one priority. It's time for us to match up that rhetoric with action.

Now, does your legislation contain any provision to ensure that the federal stimulus dollars that come through existing formulas will still be accessible with the implementation of your proposed legislation?

Most of the federal dollars are going straight through the Title I schools, or the Comp Ed schools -- schools that have the most children for free and reduced lunch. That's going directly to them. The other major pot of money is for IDEA, Individuals with Disability Education Act. But we do have about $2.4 billion that's going to come to the state...we're still waiting for the guidelines on that. We know that about 80% of that has to be used for primary, secondary, and higher education, but we don't know the specifics.

And that's why it's going to be very critical to use those dollars very efficiently. Jim Dunnam's got a great committee in the House that is focused on utilizing the stimulus money. On the Senate side, Senator Royce West is really the point person with stimulus dollars on education. But this money is not to supplant anything we're doing now. We want to make sure that what we do is for one-time money, such as technology needs, where schools can buy the equipment and the software that is going to be very important to our children's education Those are the sort of things that we want to make sure get done, and we're just going to have to watch this budget process very closely.

Taking a quick detour from policy -- there was an article in the New York Times today whose headline read, "Jobless angry at possibility of no benefits." And just below the headline was a great big picture of Governor Perry. So he's certainly representing our state well for the national press...

Well, that doesn't surprise me. I don't know how he goes on with his rhetoric about, "oh, there's too many strings attached to this unemployment insurance money" when even his own Workforce Commission Chair, Tom Pauken, says we ought to take the money and we ought to change the laws to get that money.

Seems to me that even Governor Perry is out of line with his own Republicans. I don't know what world he lives in. He's not talking to Texans that have lost their jobs. Maybe he's so insulated with folks that are big campaign contributors that he doesn't really feel the pain of many families right now. I don't know.

I don't know, either. And I want to talk more about Governor Perry later, but before we leave policy I wanted to ask about one more question about one of the higher education bills you filed. It's called the Hazelwood Legacy Act. Can you explain what changes you are making to the original Hazelwood Act we currently have in Texas?

Hazelwood has been in Texas since after World War I. It is a higher education benefit that allows our veterans to have 150 hours of college tuition. Some of our veterans are not using their higher education benefits that they've earned, but many of them in the armed services, have asked, "If I can't take advantage of this, if I'm not going to use this, is there a way to transfer these benefits to my family?"

It's not just the one person who serves in the military; it's the entire family. When you think about it, most military children have gone to as many as nine different schools. They can't stay in one school for the full twelve years that their parents are in the armed services. The legislation would allow the service member to transfer their Hazelwood benefits to a child or to a spouse. We want to make sure that these get used, and our veterans are telling us that this is something they can do to help their families.

If we're going to honor the service of our veterans, what better way than allowing them and their families to utilize higher education benefits? Number one, it only helps the state because we know that people who go to college will earn more money, buy more products, pay more taxes...it's a huge economic windfall. And it's also a way to say, "Thank you!" to our armed service members for the sacrifice that they have made in serving our country.

These all sound like major policy proposals, and I think that's one of the reasons our readers were so responsive to the San Antonio Current piece about you a few weeks ago. One of our regular readers, a Bastrop precinct chair, wrote a 2,000 word manifesto at two in the morning making the case on why you should run for Governor. I've got to ask the question that everyone in our community and everyone on our staff wants to ask: will you please, please, please run for Governor so Democrats don't have to choose between a Bush ambassador and a cigar-chewing comedian?

(Laughing) Well...I've got to tell you. I'm very excited for our Democratic candidates and the possibilities in 2010, 2012, and beyond. When we look at where the Democrats are picking up support, it is in the suburban areas and it is in rural areas, as well as our traditional core of big metro and inner city areas. And that's because Democrats and the values and the policies that we feel strongly about are resonating with middle-class families. Those families are seeing what the failed leadership of the last eight years at the national level -- and the many years of total Republican control in Texas -- is like. Folks are coming over quick, and they are coming over because of their pocketbooks and because they know that we are right on the issues.

Given that fact, I am so honored and very excited to even be on a list...that people would think I might be able to help our ticket, and I might be able to help our state and our Democratic Party. But I'm going to concentrate the rest of the legislative session on what I need to do for the people that I represent back home in San Antonio in the 26th district, and for the people across the state.

What I think is different about this time is that I just didn't say "no" outright. I have six kids, but the youngest is now a sophomore in college, so I don't have young children at home any more. I now have the ability to possibility take on a bigger responsibility, because my first responsibility has always been to my children. I haven't ruled it out, but Democrats are going to field in every single position statewide very strong candidates.

The time when Democrats kind of just defaulted and tried to get someone just to fill-in are over. We are going to have quality candidates at the U.S. Senate level, for Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and on down the line. We know that Jim Dunnam and our House Democrats have done a fabulous job of winning State House seats to take back the House. I am so pleased and excited that Wendy Davis has joined us in the Senate. I mean -- that was a Republican Texas Senate seat, drawn by Republicans for a Republican. This is just another indication of our growing strength, and I think that a lot of things have to do with it. Certainly we're right on the issues, certainly the country and the people in Texas know that in their hearts that things have not been going the way that they should be.

I've also seen an energy with young people and the online community that can get our message out so quickly. People are using the online community to notify each other and to be very in-tuned to what is happening right now, immediately, in this state. That helps us so much in gaining strength.

I'm going to really look at it very seriously, probably as soon as we finish this legislative session. But whether it's Leticia Van de Putte or someone else, we're going to have a really strong ticket and I'm going to work night and day to elect Democrats.

I wanted to ask a follow-up to something I read in the Current piece. One of the things you discussed was that you want to feel the race is in reach. Can you speak a little bit about what needs to happen in order for the Governor's race and other statewide races to be winnable? You've spoken about the issues -- are there specific infrastructure type of things that would make a race like this a little more attractive for Democrats considering a statewide run in 2010?

I think we are growing in money and capacity at a great rate. The technology that is available should only be able to help our candidates and our basic structure. We were so lucky to have two great candidates last year come and duke it out in the Texas primary. In Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, people got engaged and they participated in numbers that we could only dream of. When a million people show up after Election Day in March because they want to participate in their precinct convention, and they stay hour after hour...that is such a beautiful part of this representative democracy.

Last year's primary allowed us to update voter files, to really have a reason to get to the polls, and we got luscious data from that. We have to use that data in a manner that is useful -- there has to be a baseline of support and structure. Things like the Texas Democratic Party, our online community, the Democratic Trust, Annie's List -- that's a basic underlying structure that raises our profile not just to our core activists, but now provides a level of support so that great candidates -- and we're going to have great candidates -- so that they can appeal not only to our traditional democratic base, but also to those persuadable voters that we know are coming our way.

But you think we can have an infrastructure in place in time for the 2010 elections?

We've got the basic structure in the base out there, and we're going to improve on that, so that our candidates can take their message and connect with the voters. To me, yes, it's got to be winnable, it's got to be within reach, but I think we're in a better position right now in March 2009 than we have been in a long time, and we're only going to improve as we go forward through the interim in 2009 and into 2010.

Look -- winning is great. I'm like every other candidate, and I want to win. But it can't just be about winning to win; it's got to be about the policy. We know that when you get progressive folks in policy-making decisions, that they will move the policies that will be helpful for families who work, for students, for our seniors... Winning to win is great, and you get that victory -- but it's what you do with it that matters.

I know that when we can elect strong Democrats, policies will change, and that will deliver what Texans really want: great neighborhood schools, affordable college education, an environment that will last long enough for their children and grandchildren, economic opportunities, new jobs. That's what Texans want. And we know that if we elect Democrats, we elect people who will reflect those policies.

I  wanted to follow up on the DSCC letter you sent last December. Did you ever get any response from them or anyone else in the national Democratic community about what they plan to do in the future?

Well, that letter was the result of some phone calls I'd had and some private conversations, and we were just tremendously disappointed that of all the money raised in Texas for the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee, only a few thousand dollars made it's way back. And we had a quality candidate. You need resources to get your message across to voters, and it was a little insulting that the campaign committee had at least helped our past Democratic candidates, but this time they chose to put their resources in other states.

My displeasure is that, as I told Senator Schumer and Senator Menendez in face to face conversations in December and in January, that we're going to have a vacancy in the U.S. Senate soon. Kay Bailey Hutchison is coming home, and we're going to have a strong candidate, and it behooves them to invest in the Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate. As they inch closer to this magic number of 60 in the U.S. Senate, they've got to realize that they have this false impression that Texas is a solid red state.

I told them, "No, let me tell you what's happening in my state. We're picking up in the Texas House, we're picking up in the inner cities, we're picking up in the judicial races, and we're going to have statewides. We're probably more purple than you think, we're heading towards blue, and you need to invest in us because we've always had deep money pockets for you guys."

The message has been delivered. Let's hope that they come through and support our Democratic candidates.

Do you have any reactions to the poll last week that showed Senator Hutchison twenty-plus points ahead of Governor Perry? Are these polls meaningless this far out, or is there some importance in these polls?

What a poll does is tell you what the pulse of the people is at one particular point in time. A year is a long time, and we're a year away from the primaries. We know that Governor Perry, if faced with just a Democrat last election, could have been defeated. He only got 39%. Had we not had other candidates in there, we would have had a great opportunity for Chris Bell. Having said that, let's not kid ourselves -- Kay Bailey Hutchison is their strongest standard bearer. She ranks very high on the popularity scale on the Republican side among likely voters.

But -- we know that when Democrats fight, we are pretty tough on each other. When we have an intraparty fight in primary we fight, but we fight fair. Republicans eat their own. It's going to be a bloody race. I think they're going to resort to personal attacks, because that's what they do anyway. That's their standard playbook. Whoever their candidate is, he or she is going to be weakened by that Republican process.

Having said that, I'm not surprised that Kay Bailey Hutchison, at this point in time, shows some strength over Rick Perry. I mean, let's face it -- it is Rick Perry.

And I don't suppose you've given any thoughts about how a female Democratic candidate for Governor could do better against a female Republican candidate for Governor?

Well...(laughing)...I think we've got some great candidates...

I had to try one more time, Senator.

Well...I'm excited people are talking to me. I'm going to concentrate the next couple of months on what I need to do in the legislative session. We've got some good opportunities, but let's cross that bridge in June. But whether it's me or someone else, we're going to play. We're going to play, and we're going to play hard. We're going to have strong contenders.

We're in a tough time, and we need serious people right now. Democrats have those people. It may be me, it may be someone else, but I will be working to make sure we get our candidates elected.