The Daily Cardinal: At the Economic Summit Oct. 14 to 16 there was a proposal that offered to cut $500 million from the UW System. We are wondering if a proposal like that was given to you, would you support that kind of cut or any kind of cut?
Jim Young: I guess I don't look at any cuts. I would like to reshuffle some money around. I don't think we need to have all the capital improvements for new stadiums and sporting facilities. I think the arts and letters and sciences need to have some equitable distribution of funds.
DC: How about financial aid increases in conjunction with tuition raises; how do you feel about that?
JY: Definitely, I would like to see more. Not only low interest loans, but grants to go along with that. Any time tuition goes up there should be the ability for people to keep pace with affordable financing.
DC: There's been a lot of talk about stopping the brain drain, of having graduates stay in the state, and at the same time we have really low minority retention. Do you see that both problems go hand-in-hand, and what would you do about that?
JY: I think there have to be two ends to deal with this brain drain and also minority retention. [For] the minority retention I would say we have to allow more people into the schools in the first place. Give more people a chance. I know a lot of the time I was doing my student teaching in high school, some kids were having a hard time in high school, but later on they flourished. I would like to see a 2.0 grade point average being accessible to any of the UW schools.
DC: Do think that could lower the caliber of applicants?
JY: ... If we have the so-called \lower caliber,"" to me that just means more people are going to have a chance at post-secondary education, because not everybody does well in high school or learns at the same pace. I would like to see the UW is becoming a place where people have a chance to thrive and express themselves and learn.
DC: How important do think it is that we keep those graduates in the state afterwards?
JY: Well, I don't buy into the brain drain so much from a perspective of that's a huge deal, other than we need to address the overall wages in the state. So there would be a couple of things I would do to address the brain drain. I would make offers to students who graduate in the UW System and anyone who has UW or Wisconsin college degrees to stay in the state for five years after graduation. They could qualify for an even lower interest loan or in some cases depending upon finances ... the ability to take those loans and turn them into grants. The other thing would be is that I would like to restructure our tax system for business to say if you pay either a living wage as your lowest wage and it includes health care, or a family supporting wage, which is $16.60 an hour with health care, then you would qualify for a tiered tax structure. ... And so I would like to give business some incentives to address brain drain by offering higher-paying jobs and getting the average wage up.
DC: What do you think is wrong with the K-12 education system in this state right now and what would you like to do about that?
JY: We don't address the needs of all the learners. We're gearing more towards the corporate model of the high stakes testing, the advancement tied to just one multiple choice test. So I think that limits teachers' ability to teach students how to think critically for themselves and make their own decisions. So I'd like to see the focus of education return back to the students' needs and dreams and in doing that we need to have not only alternative school settings ... for public education, but also look at alternative models of teaching in all existing classrooms. ... I think we need to find ways to help students succeed and feel good about their high school and grade school experience.
DC: What do you want to do about the budget deficit?
I think that we need to cut a couple 100 million dollars out of the corrections budget; the war on drugs is a failure. So I think to start addressing that we need to get nonviolent criminals out of jail. I think marijuana should be made legal and taxed along the same lines of alcohol and cigarettes. ... So anyways the Department of Administration, that needs to be cut down by another couple of $100 million and the Department of transportation ... needs to be cut by a few $100 million. ... The political appointees by the governor should be minimized to the different departments and that'll save several million dollars. So we're talking about somewhere around $500 to 700 million in cuts for those three main components and the political appointees. And I've been talking quite a bit about making sure business and high-income individuals pay their fair share of the tax burden. Right now they've been reduced to less than what low income people are paying as far as the proportion ... And to solve the current crisis anything that is made up right now, we could increase the sales tax by up to a percentage point. And if you increase it by a percentage point we're talking about over a billion dollars in new revenue. So we would be able to cut it back according to what we need.
DC: What are the challenges of being a third party candidate in this race?
JY: Well, there are many. Some of the frustration level is one thing you have to deal with because much of the media hasn't focused on issue. And as people find out about the issues I'm talking about there's more acceptance of my campaign. And when they just make it a horse race and talk about my chances, instead of talking about my positions, it's pretty difficult for people to know what their choices will be at the ballot box.
DC: What are three policy initiatives you would like to focus on?
JY: First of all I'd like to bring Native American nations into the decision making process of what's happening with development issues and resource management issues. I'd like to reintroduce the hemp industry, for a couple of different reasons, primarily to help our agricultural sector re-establish some economic viability. ... Something I'd like to start right away is to open up the process of our budgeting and legislature ... so that we have public input in the decisions that are made and so that we don't do public work behind closed doors.
