Candidates Seek Area’s ‘Fair Share’ State Senate Candidates In District 1 Claim Southern Idaho Gets Too Much

For too long, southern Idaho legislators have thumbed their noses at problems in the less populated Panhandle.

Candidates for the District 1 state Senate seat say it’s time that stopped and North Idaho gets its fair share of tax dollars for education and roads.

“We always send more money to Boise than we get back. It’s time to rework these funding formulas and make it more equitable for North Idaho taxpayers,” said Republican candidate Shawn Keough.

“We deserve our fair share and need an aggressive representative who can put those issues on the table.”

In next week’s primary, Keough faces former Bonner County commissioner Gene Brown.

On the Democratic ticket, incumbent Tim Tucker, with 14 years in the Legislature, will battle Sandpoint resident Ed Worzala.

The candidates say the imaginary line that divides north and south leaves Panhandle residents outgunned by bigger city lawmakers.

“It’s time to get something done for North Idaho and I’m kind of a bulldog,” said Brown. “I will pound on them every day about how bad the roads are up here until we get some money funneled to the problems.”

Brown’s gruff, outspoken style made him one of Bonner County’s most controversial commissioners. Voters ousted him after one term.

Brown and Keough emphasized the need for property tax relief. Bonner County has the fifth highest property value assessments in the state, yet ranks 101 out of 112 school districts in funding per student.

“If we rework the education funding formula to be more equitable, it will take some of the burden off our property owners, and return more money to the county,” said Keough.

The same holds true for the sales tax distribution formula, Brown said.

“The bottom line is we need to get our taxes back up here to pay for education and roads and keep from taxing our seniors out of their homes,” he said.

Brown and Keough focused most of their attacks on Tucker. After four years in the senate, they said the Porthill farmer has been ineffective and will be even less help in a Republican dominated Legislature.

“With an “R” behind my name that at least gets me in the same room with the power players,” Keough said.

Naturally, Tucker disagrees. Partisan politics does not play a role in the issues facing North Idaho, he said.

“It does mean anything I try to do is much harder to accomplish because they don’t want a Democrat to succeed, but look at my record,” Tucker said.

“I’m a centrist candidate who is not on the lunatic fringe of either side.”

Like Brown and Keough, Tucker says he is a champion of the timber industry, calling it the backbone of the First District.

“We have a tremendous resource base up here and I want to protect those jobs,” Tucker said.

“But that doesn’t mean we can go out and cut down all the trees.”

Of the four candidates, Worzala has the most radical agenda. He wants to do away with judges and have lawyers take turns sitting behind the bench. He likens it to jury duty.

“It would take care of a lot of incompetency going on and save the state in wages and pensions we now pay judges,” Worzala said.

He also favors a vocational work program for prisoners, so jails can produce a product, sell it for a profit and pay for prison expenses.

Along the same line, he wants vocational programs available to high school students.

“For those that don’t want to go to college they will be ready to enter the work force when they graduate,” he said.

Tucker agrees. The time has come, he said, for a statewide school-to-work or apprenticeship program for high school students.

“We are falling on our faces in the vocational education field,” Tucker said.

“We want our kids to compete in a global economy but we don’t prepare them to do that.”

He said passage of the state’s new education funding formula benefits only southern Idaho. “It should be listed as one of the 10 worst crimes of this century,” Tucker said.

, DataTimes