|
|
|
|||||
|
Education What are your highest priorities with respect to education? What do you think the legislature can and should do to advance these priorities? How does Virginia improve School Readiness for children? What about improving graduation rates, technical proficiency, continuing education, higher education, etc? What is your position on the effectiveness of the state SOLs? Grants are available for schools(education). Would you look into grants before raising taxes? If a child lives in poverty and that is all he/she knows, how can he/she come to school ready to learn? What are your thoughts or views on home schooling/unschooling? How would you serve this population (home schoolers) What sort of resources would you make available to homeschoolers? Do you believe that Virginia needs adult education programs to educate parents to help teach their own children? What is your position on safer sex education in the schools? (moving beyond abstinence only education) Would you push for a genuine educational program in Virginia jails - training that would make released prisoners employable? Environmental If elected, what would you do to protect Virginia's natural resources, specifically our forests, open space and estuaries. What will you do to retain clean air and unpolluted rivers in Virginia? Will you introduce and/or support legislation to make the spreading of sewage sludge a local option? 10 states have "bottle bills". Why doesn't Virginia? What is your position on the deregulation of electric utilities in VA? Can anything be done to stop it? Do any of the candidates have a vision for enabling the watersheds of the 25th district to become the first in the state to be monitored under a SWMA (surface water management act)? Do you think that it makes economic and environmental sense for Virginia to be a major exporter of electricity? How much latitude should utilities be given in siting power plants and transmission lines? What is the candidates strategy for defining and maintaining a minimum instream flow for the Rivanna River? Transportation, land use and growth How do we protect our natural resources and rural heritage while allowing for economic growth? Do localities need more tools from the State to help them to shape the type of growth that they want? What methods of raising funds and allocating them to transportation, particularly transit and rail, will you promote for the State as a whole and for our local area? Do you believe that localities should be allowed to enact "smart growth" initiatives? Do you think these initiatives, such as the one enacted in Loudon County, are an effective way to preserve the balance between urban and rural areas? Should localities be given more discretion to reprogram road building funds into alternative transportation projects? If elected, would you work to compel VDOT to give cities and counties the maximum amount of discretion to reprogram funds permitted under federal law? Would you support car-free pedestrian development? Population growth is inevitable some say. Others argue that even "smart growth" is an oxymoron and communities - just like our globe - must aim for a stationary population. Where do you stand on this issue? How do the candidates view dedicated funding for land conservation at the state level? Economic development Our tech economy has gone the way of the national tech economy, and hundreds
of skilled workers are now without suitable employment. What, if anything,
would you do for these individuals & businesses? Fighting poverty Welfare reform is up for reauthorization in 2002. What do you think needs to happen to help more people out of poverty? Virginia's welfare reform initiative has succeeded in moving families off the welfare rolls, but has not generally succeeded in moving families out of poverty. What would you do, as State Senator, to address the problem of poverty in our communities? Welfare reform has cut the rolls in half but has not helped move people out of poverty. What would you do to help move people out of poverty? Welfare to work has been focussed on getting people off the welfare roles, not into living wage jobs. How will you encourage a living wage for low-income individuals in Virginia? Welfare reform has moved a lot of families off the welfare rolls but few families out of poverty. How would you address the problem of poverty in our communities? What will you do for the working poor of Virginia? How will you improve the lives of the many citizens living in poverty? You talk about hope and opportunity!! Does that include low income families who have been (?) a lot of things because of where they live and who they are? We need more help with poor housing. What help is there for people who are at the mercy of bank-substitutes like money-changing services and loan sharks who charge usurious interest rates? Don't banks have any civic responsibilities? An important issue that is going to come up in the next year or two is revisiting welfare reform. How will "welfare to work" plans work when there is no work? How are the candidates thinking about this -- it will be an extremely tough issue with a republican-dominated legislature. Also, along these lines, unemployment compensation. Unless things have changed from 10 years ago when I was briefly on unemployment, not only is unemployment not enough to live on, but it disincentives work--any money a person makes is deducted from her unemployment check. There is therefore no incentive to do any part time work or temp work to supplement the below-subsistence amount of unemployment. As more and more people are laid off, this is going to be an area with a very large level of impact on Virginians. Living Wage Do you support a state policy that provides a living wage (minimum 8.00/hr and health care insurance for full time employees) for all Virginia employees? Would you support a living wage movement at the state and federal level? How do you feel about the right of municipalities to adopt policies such as Cville's on contractors' living wage? What is your position on local living wage ordinances? How do you plan to enforce the living wage in this community? Budget reform Both Mark Warner and Tim Kaine spoke during their campaigns on the need for tax restructuring. Once you've cleaned up the budget mess that the Republicans have left you, how do you think this should best be accomplished? Are there changes that you would make to how the State and localities raise revenue to pay for essential services? The budget impasse and the revenue shortfall has all but cut State employee salaries for this fiscal year. If elected, would you look at State workers salaries as an issue? Would you also take into consideration the short fall state workers are facing w/cost of living increases? Do you support a comprehensive overhaul of Virginia's system of taxation, and if so how would you make it more progressive and better able to meet local government's needs? The whole CAR TAX debacle was really an unfocussed and irrational debate about a very important issue, namely the regressive nature of Virginia's local taxation. Do you have any proposals to make local taxation more progressive, for example through a statewide highly progressive local income tax? The economy is slowing, revenues are down. The previous administration has left the budget in the famous mess. What programs would you scale back, or which taxes would you raise or reinstate to make the budget balance? Creative thinking Would each candidate give an example of how, in the last 5 years, they have thought "outside the box"? Creigh Deeds took a very courageous stance in his vote against the confederate license plate. Creigh, what was your basis for the vote? For each of the candidates, what is the most courageous vote or act which you have taken? Health care How do we improve enrollment in the family access to medical insurance program, across the State? What is your position on single payer health care (as in Canada)? Do you support a state policy that provides for health insurance for all Virginians? Building the Democratic party How do you plan to win as a Democrat in a GOP area? How do you get taxpayers, especially Republican, George Allen type tax payers to understand how important it is to fund education and teachers instead of paying for prisons and prison guards? Given the disastrous loss in the local House of Delegates race on Tuesday, what can be done to assure a victory for a Democrat in the Senate race next month? The Democratic base is aging. Why and how will you attract young voters? Republicans have a very nasty habit of stereotyping us as "irresponsible, naïve and immoral". What will you do to counter-act the inevitable nasty campaigning and get a message that appeals to the people usually sucked in by Republican rhetoric? Why are you a Democrat? Increasing Diversity No child in any school district should suffer harassment or discrimination or be deprived education because they are gay or lesbian. If you agree, how would you ensure this is uniformly in all schools, rural and urban, affluent and poor in the district? What plans to you have to remedy racial divisions in the state, including a city like Charlottesville that continues to falsely promote itself as a "world class city" even though the gap between the "haves" and "have nots" continues to widen? What is your position on equal rights for gays and lesbians? Can each candidate explain why their respective name recognition did not draw more African Americans here tonight? Legislative priorities / State law reform What is the first piece of legislation you would introduce as a State senator? How do stand on the repeal of Dillon Rule? What is your position on public financing of elections? Which candidates will pledge to overturn the Dillon rule? Are you familiar with the legislative priorities of Charlottesville and the counties and towns of the 25th district? How would you work for these issues in the Senate? Choice Would you vote for a law that would ban partial birth abortion? Free Speech In Virginia, there was a recent case involving someone burning a cross on their own property. Do you believe this was a matter of intimidation or free speech? Where does the line run for you between intimidation and free speech? Gun Laws Will you stand up to the NRA and support reasonable measures like gun licensing and registration? Please comment on current gun laws. Would you advocate any changes? Is there compromise possible that could defuse this issue? How do we reduce gun violence? Death Penalty What will you do to end the death penalty in Virginia? Do you support a moratorium on the death penalty? Would you support a moratorium on, or abolition of, the death penalty? Would you support a moratorium on the death penalty? (2 questions with same wording) How do you feel about a moratorium to the death penalty? What is your position on the death penalty (2 questions with same wording)? Housing Currently there are over 570 local families on the waiting list for Section 8 rental vouchers, other families are being turned away from the Salvation Army homeless shelter for lack of space, and many low-income residents are seeing their rents go through the roof while their wages remain stagnant. What would you do, as State Senator, to address the severe shortage of affordable housing in our community and across Virginia? How do you plan to deal with unaffordable housing in this community? What are you going to do about the severe shortage of affordable housing in our community and across Virginia? Some cities prefer to build homeless shelters, rather than affordable housing. How will you address homelessness and a lack of affordable housing in Virginia? Affordable housing is a growing problem in Charlottesville and throughout the state. What can be done about that? How will you use your position as our Senator to encourage the University of Virginia to build more onground housing for their students? Misc Since the events of September11th, the nature of life in America has changed. How do you feel this would affect your role as State Senator? What do you think Virginia owes the people who come here from Mexico to work? How do you live and apply what you offer as a candidate to replace Ms. Couric? Strategically, does it make sense to have Creigh Deeds run for this office, when we need all the Democrats we can get in the house right now? Does it not make more sense to make room for a new Dem in the GA? These candidates (Creigh Deeds and Al Weed at least) appear to have quite similar views on most issues important to democrats. I suppose electibility is an important issue. This is probably somewhat of an unknown given the redrawing of this district, and of course, Deeds is more well known in the western part and across the state due to his presence in the GA, and Weed more well known here in the Alb/Char. area, in which a large number of the voters of this district are located. What are Dem strategists thinking about these issues? Questions for Individual Candidates Nancy O'Brien: Why did you retire from the Thomas Jefferson District Commission, announcing
in July you would retire in November? Why do you now want to return to work
as a State senator? Meredith Richards: In your opening remarks, you said you would act to reduce racial division and tensions. Are there any specific programs or policies you would advocate? Creigh Deeds: You said you had been effective in Richmond. Are there any acts or initiatives
which you are especially proud of?
|
