Burnt Orange Report

40/40: An Interview with Kathy Rider

By Phillip Martin

Ed. note -- As part of the 40/40 project, we're trying to interview every candidate we feature. Below is the interview with Kathy Rider. For the link to my interview with Donna Howard, click here.

What made you decide to run for office?

I think that District 48 deserves an effective legislator - someone who is going to represent their views, and certainly the last two sessions we have not had somebody there that represents our views. District 48 has people who are very strong public school advocates, anti-voucher, pro-choice, and who feel very strongly about health issues. I think school finance needs to be addressed, and I'm the candidate that has the experience and the working knowledge of dealing with school finance.

What kind of experience would you bring to the table?

I was on the AISD Board for ten years, served eight as President, and while I was there we went through about three different versions of school finance. I truly don't believe anyone in the legislature ever anticipated that a district like Austin - that has 58% free and reduced lunch eligible kids - would have been considered property wealthy, or that a district such as Eanes would be sending 59% of their budget back to the state. We need a State Representative that can understand what's been going on in our public schools and will look at a way to meet the constitutional mandate we have before us.

I saw somewhere about a 65% cap on recapture that you were proposing. Can you tell me a little more about that?

I think that - as everyone knows - things always get kind of massaged when you go down to the Legislature and talk about legislation. 65% is probably a pipe dream, and I think you can probably look at somewhere between 45% and 65% that is more realistic. I really don't believe a district should send back a majority of their funds. Part of the issue about equity is - for example, Eanes sends their money to seven different school districts, and only one of them is at the $1.50 cap right now. The others are all below the cap, and one is even at $1.23, which means many in the Eanes ISD aren't so much helping education as they are subsidizing property owners so they don't have to pay as much in property taxes as people in Eanes and Austin and Leander and Lago Vista. I think that's something important that we have to look at when we restructure our school finance plan.

Ben Bentzin has come out as a staunch supporter of vouchers. Would you consider vouchers at any level, even as a focused pilot program? What are your views?

Vouchers are a subsidy to those people who have already given up on public schools. We have pilot programs. Austin ISD has over 80,000 kids. You can go to any school in this district if you just ask, as long as it's not already overcrowded. As far as throughout the rest of the state, there are already provisions so that if a school is on the low-performing list two of three years, then any student in that school may transfer to another school within that district. Very few students and parents ever take advantage of that choice, so I don't see why we should support vouchers for private schools. We simply cannot, as a state, continue to have the fifth best business climate if we don't have a good workforce, and you can't have a good workforce without educating our children.

When you say the fifth best business climate - what is that based on?

It comes from the Chamber, looking at what businesses considerable favorable in terms of resources, tax abatements, and incentives that businesses are given to make their home base here in Texas.

For the rest of the interview, including what Kathy Rider thinks about property tax relief, her idea for a 1% business activity tax, her views on health care issues, and her favorite place type of food, click on the jump below.

How do you think we can create a tax structure that is fair to all businesses?

You're never going to find that magic formula that pleases everyone, but we should try and do what we can, especially because we're talking about our public schools. We should possibly look at a business activity tax of no more than 1% of net profits. I'm sure many might be opposed to that, but the reality is that - when I served on the school board - we'd have meetings with businesses considering moving to the Austin area. The first question out of their mouth every time was, "how are your public schools." Businesses are not going to come to Texas unless we have good schools. I would, however, exclude the health care industry from that business activity tax, not just because I'm a health care provider, but because I understand the industry.

Well, I'd imagine folks who work in the insurance industry would say they should be excluded because they understand the industry. Why should the health care industry be excluded from the tax?

When I bill insurance companies for the services I provide, or when a physician or an emergency room or hospital bills an insurance company for the services they provide, it doesn't matter what you put on that bill. The insurance companies already have a set rate for what they will pay -- whether you're talking about outpatient mental health, or a c-section, or whatever. They've already set their rates and -- no matter how much the service actually costs -- they're only going to repay me a certain amount, and patients will only pay co-pays. Health care providers can't pass on the cost to their consumers, so a business activity tax would only further hurt the health care industry's ability to provide their services and keep their doors open.

25% of Texans are uninsured. What do you think we should do about that?

One of the things that we know is that if Texas put on the table the appropriate amount of dollars to leverage for federal dollars, we could have every single child in this state that is eligible for either Medicaid or CHIP enrolled. No questions asked. Every dollar the state spends on equates to $2.81 in federal dollars. Other states have figured this out, and we haven't yet. If we did that, and leveraged the full amount of federal dollars available to us, we could also see about taking care of our most vulnerable citizens. When a family member is critically ill, and they don't have insurance, they don't seek the preventative care they need. Instead, they end up in our emergency rooms, and overwhelm that system, preventing emergency rooms from concentrating their resources on heart attacks and car accidents and things like that.

What about the Trauma Care Fund?

Those folks haven't seen that money yet, because the Legislature has been raiding those funds in order to balance the budget. If we're going to do dedicated funds, and if we're going to say that something is valued higher and valued enough to dedicate a fund, then we need to make sure that the monies for that fund get to where they're supposed to.

During the 79’th Regular Session, there were a few budget amendment votes that would have redirected funds earmarked for the Texas Enterprise Fund to areas of health care such as CHIP or improvement of nursing home facilities. Do you think we should redirect those funds, or keep investing in the Enterprise Fund?

Well, I think you have to look at the availability of your revenue. You're going to need to generate more revenue, and I really don't believe that the sales tax will get you there. That's why you need to restructure the tax system so that we can fund all the things we've been talking about. Then we can look at the available revenues and look how we can generate more revenues to pay for the services and programs we need.

In order to help reduce people’s property taxes, Democrats have pushed a plan to increase the homestead exemption. In some cases, 144 of 150 house districts in the state would save more money on their property taxes with the Democratic plan than the Republican plan. However, due to the large amount of wealth in HD 48, your district would be one of the few that wouldn’t benefit under the Democratic plan. Would you support a homestead exemption if it did greater good for the state, or would you only vote for what helped your district?

We have to look at what increasing the homestead exemption would do for the district. I'm always going to be sensitive to what's happening in District 48, but one of the things that we also need in our legislators is statesmen. We need people that are willing to stand up and say, OK, this is good policy for the entire state, and how can we make it work for the best interest of District 48 but not at the expense of District 48, and vice-a-versa. I think the people of District 48 know that we need to do what is fair for everyone, but it may be that - because of our collective wealth - we need to pay a little more. It's something I'd certainly want to see the specific numbers for, but it's definitely worth looking at.

Do you see this as a race between yourself and Ben Bentzin, or is it more making yourself stand out among all the candidates -- Democratic and otherwise?

I see it primarily as a race against Ben Bentzin, though I don't know if anyone can win this outright, including Mr. Bentzin. I know he is dropping a tremendous amount of money into the race, but Mr. Bentzin's problem -- despite all of his money -- is that he is pro-voucher and anti-choice, and the Republicans in this district may not put a side in their yard, but they are anti-voucher and pro-choice. I know he's said he's going to be the inside voice, but I don't want to go there just to throw complaints. I'm running to set things right, and if the leadership isn't looking for solutions and a common ground, then they're not doing what's best for Texas.

I always like to wrap up with some lighter questions. What’s your favorite food?

Fried chicken and spaghetti. Not together, of course -- just separately, those are my favorite foods.

Where’s your favorite place to go in Austin?

Neighborhood parks, really, are where I love to go in Austin. I grew up in Fort Worth, and we didn't have free parks with swimming pools and playground equipment like you do, just, all over the city of Austin. I love that the Austin developers, from the beginning, set aside free places for families to attend. It just shows you how important our families and our children are to the people of this city.

What’s your favorite kind of music?

I'd say country music, more than anything else. I listen to most kinds of music, but I've always been most fond of country music.

What’s your favorite political blog?

I don't really have one. I don't read the blogs a lot, but I'm definitely going to start looking at the Burnt Orange Report more often!