The Informed Voter Coalition is made up of these nonprofit organizations: Be Civil, Be Heard ; Drury University’s L.E. Meador Center for Politics & Citizenship; Junior League of Springfield; KSMU Ozarks Public Radio; Leadership Springfield; League of Women Voters of Southwest Missouri; Missouri State University’s Office of Public Affairs; NAACP Springfield; Rosie; Show Me Christian County; Springfield Business Journal; Springfield-Greene County Library District; and the Springfield News-Leader.
You can hear the interviews recorded at KSMU by clicking on the "listen" button above or watch videos of the interviews recorded by Nathan Papes and Greta Cross of the Springfield News-Leader.
Candidates were interviewed individually and asked the same questions. They had one minute to introduce themselves and two minutes to respond to each question. Questions were submitted by Informed Voter Coalition partner organizations and were not provided to the candidates in advance. The order of the candidate interviews was determined by a random drawing.
Missouri House District 136
My name is Taylor Daughtery, and I am representing the Drury University L.E. Meador Center for Politics and Citizenship. Today we are interviewing candidates for the Missouri House of Representatives race District 136. They are Jim Robinette and Stephanie Hein.
Stephanie Hein
Our first candidate is Stephanie Hein. Thank you very much for joining us. Let's begin by having you introduce yourself and tell us why you decided to run for this office.
"Thank you. So, as you said, my name is Stephanie Hein. I have been representing House District 136 for the past two years. Prior to joining the state legislature, I was a faculty member and administrator at Missouri State University, and that's where I spent the bulk of my career. Prior to that, I was in the hospitality industry. So I've been able to work with diverse groups of people backgrounds, have diverse conversations, and I think that's served me well both as — for the campaign and in the state legislature, because you do have different personalities all, all around. I decided to run for office because I wanted to help my community, and that was it. I felt like I had a good skill set that I could contribute to, not only our city, but our state, and that's why I ran in 2022 and continue to, you know, seek the seat again in 2024."
Amendment 3 will appear on the November ballot. If passed, it will amend the Missouri Constitution to provide the right for reproductive freedom. Do you support this amendment? Why or why not?
"Yeah, I support Amendment 3 because I think it it takes the politics out of very personal, private decisions that should be made between the patient and their health care provider. If they're a person of faith, then their religious leader as well. I don't think that politicians are qualified to make those decisions for patients. Those are very private, personal decisions that need to be kept between the individuals making those decisions. I do think, you know, we'll see it impact the race a little bit. But what I'm hearing is people may not agree with the idea of abortion, but they understand that having government involved in those decisions takes away freedom. And it's a choice of freedom for not only women, but families and how they choose to proceed with growing their family. And I also have two daughters of childbearing age. If something were to happen to them, then I would want that doctor to make the decisions that would save their lives, not have to worry about for a moment if they would get sued, or if they would have a politician in their, in the room with them making those decisions. So it is personal for me as well. My girls are getting to that childbearing age. They want to have kids, and I want them to have kids. I want to have grandchildren, but I want them to be as safe as possible and be taken care of when tough decisions have to happen."
In Missouri, citizens can bring forward important issues through the initiative petition process. What is your view on Missouri's initiative petition process and recently proposed changes?
"Yeah, I believe citizens need and deserve the right to have their voice heard through the initiative petition process. I know there were changes to or proposed changes to try to weigh some of the vote. I am against that, and I fought against that in in the House and will continue to fight against it moving forward. The reality is our government is not functioning like it should, and it's taking the citizens to come in and say, 'hey, this is what we want to see in our community.' I mean, think about all the things that we have moved forward or the citizens have moved forward through that process. We have expanded Medicaid. We have Amendment 3 on the ballot, which is to restore reproductive rights. We're looking at expanding our minimum wage. These are some good things that have happened. If you are a union supporter, they fought back right to work all through the initiative petition process. It is the fundamental piece peace that our citizens have to retain control and have a say in how government should function, how they want it to function, and and stripping people of those rights I, I just can't get behind."
Climate change is a scientific reality. Missouri's erratic weather regularly impacts farmers. What, if anything, do you believe legislators should do to support this issue? And what, if anything, do you intend to do to address this problem?
"Yeah, that's an interesting question because we've seen it in Missouri with increases in tornadoes, tornadic activity, increases in our temperature like we've had hot, hot summers. You know, I think there are, there is room for the state to play in these decisions, whether it be emissions type of work, whether it be funding for farmers who might need some additional assistance to transition over to different equipment or change over some of their farming methods to make it sustainable. I think we can help in in that space. I think getting our, our body to understand that this is a change and it is impacting our wellbeing and our quality of life is important. I think we can come at it from a place of how do we build sustainable housing? How do we practice sustainable practices when we're getting ready to roll out roadways across our state, which we have big investments coming across I-70 and I-44 that perhaps we have to take into account how is that impacting our environment and how can we do that work in a sustainable way? So I think there are things that we can do, tangible things that we can do just in our everyday decision making, in the processes that we have at the state, let alone when we're talking about policy as well."
Across the state, school districts serve as large employers in their communities. What steps, if any, do you think should be taken to address the teacher shortage in Missouri?
"And now you've hit close to home, because my family, we're a family of public educators, right? And I have spent a lot of time this summer visiting with principals and teachers, finding out what are the biggest challenges that they're impacting, that are impacting their teachers. And a lot of it is support and the feeling that they're respected and they're valued, they're respected and they're valued. That doesn't cost a lot of a lot of money, right? They're respected and valued in the profession. I think that's one of the places where we can start is making sure that it is seen and viewed as a profession as it is. And then we also have to make sure that they're compensated appropriately so that they want to stay in the profession. So it's a two fold type of piece. We have to bring back the culture of respect for teaching, and we also have to make sure that we're compensating our teachers, that we're fully funding our public schools so that they have the resources to stay and thrive and help our children in the classroom instead of trying to figure out how are they going to grade papers and then make it to their next job so that they can make ends meet? So I think that's where we can play a big part. As a representative, I propose several pieces that would have helped teachers increase their salary. And, you know, I hope we can do that moving forward. We saw some positive moves, but there's so much work to be done, and at the end of the day, it costs us zero to respect the profession."
What do you believe to be the most pressing issue in your district, and how do you plan to address it?
"So I am known for knocking a lot of doors, so I have about 23,000 doors that I've knocked so far. The number one issue that I hear is inflation. Inflation is eating up everyone. If it's a young family, if it's a senior citizen, everyone is being impacted by inflation. And primarily where they're seeing the pinch is at the grocery store and some of those everyday items that we have to purchase. I am hopeful at some point that we can perhaps roll back the grocery sales tax. We had some bipartisan support for that. It would help alleviate some of those strains, alleviate, you know, I proposed legislation to roll back taxes on diapers, baby formula. I mean, I think as a state, we have to decide where are we going to bring in our revenues? Do we want our revenues to be coming in from those everyday items that everyone needs, like food? Or do we look for other sources that we can provide? The other issue that I am hearing is this safe communities. And I think there are things that we can do at the state level to help with that. I mean, obviously, we want to support our police officers, but we also have to make sure that we're providing our community with the appropriate mental health support so that our officers aren't having to respond to those type of types of crises. We have to make sure that we address the drug addiction so that we can curb some of those issues so that we reduce our criminal activity. I think there are so many pieces in that puzzle that if we address some of those items, it takes care of some of the big issues impacting our city."
Jim Robinette
Our next candidate is joining me now. I'd like to introduce Jim Robinette. Thank you very much for joining us. Would you please introduce yourself and tell us why you decided to run for this position?
"Thank you. I am Jim Robinette, and I grew up here in Springfield. And in answer to your question, I didn't really decide that I was running, I was asked to run, and I saw the need for someone to run. And, anyway, I, I grew up here in Springfield. I was born at St. John's, now Mercy. I went to elementary school at both Rountree and at Field with my dad, having a couple of Army assignments in between there and then I went to Greenwood after that, and after that I was off to West Point in the Army and have had a lot of experiences, got a lot of education along the way. And frankly, I think my knowledge, skills, abilities and experiences, particularly and my law degree have well prepared me to represent the voters in the136th. Thank you."
Amendment 3 will appear on the November ballot. If passed, it will amend the Missouri Constitution to provide the right for reproductive freedom. Do you support this amendment? Why or why not?
"I don't support the amendment because I think it's extreme. If you, I also think that the Supreme Court got it wrong, because there's a Missouri statute that talks about the requirements of what statutes and portions of the Missouri Constitution would be repealed for initiative petitions, and Amendment 3 did not do that in the petition. And so therefore it was sort of faulty from the get go. I think the Supreme Court frankly got that wrong. I also think that Amendment 3 is a little bit extreme in terms of removing parental consent. And also the I think the exception is not fully protective of a viable fetus."
In Missouri, citizens can bring forward important issues through the initiative petition process. What is your view on Missouri's initiative petition process and the recently proposed changes?
"Well, I would tell you that Missouri's Constitution is a mess. It doesn't look like a constitution. It looks like a statute book. So I think jurisprudentially I think that's a problem. I'm not against having initiatives, but frankly, it seems like our initiatives go to the constitution. It seems like jurisprudentially again, from a legal, philosophical perspective, the constitution ought to be something that's fairly immutable and difficult to be changed, and that's not at all what we have here in Missouri. And frankly, I would like to see the initiative petition process change to where initiative petitions become not part of the constitution, but rather equivalent to statutes."
Climate change is a scientific reality. Missouri's erratic weather regularly impacts farmers. What, if anything, do you believe legislators should do to support this issue? And what, if anything, do you intend to do to address this problem.
"I will tell you that I think climate is changing, and I think climate change is going to cause a lot of problems, and it has caused a lot of problems to date that we're already seeing. I will tell you that what Missouri can do about that is very little. What I worry about is the cost benefit analysis of any policies that are enacted to address climate change. And what I what I mean by that is that, if we make it more difficult for business to do business through, for example, carbon credits, then I think, you know, we're essentially victims of a prisoner's dilemma where Missouri may do that, but it may have a very little impact in terms of climate change, but it may have a major impact on quality of life and the economic well-being of Missourians, particularly where you look at the developing world and what they're doing or not doing about climate change. But by the same token, I think that, you know, I'm a big fan of the Japanese principle of kaizen, incremental improvement over time, and I think that we ought to be addressing that in all things environmental, to include emissions that impact climate change."
Across the state, school districts serve as large employers in their communities. What steps, if any, do you think should be taken to address the teacher shortage in Missouri?
"That's a really good question. And I think the teacher shortage — first of all, I was glad to see that the legislators improved starting pay for teachers across the state, and I hope that they're able, you know, to fully fund that. We should be able to we're in a balanced budget as we're required to constitutionally. I think that, you know, we need to incentivize teachers not only to become, or students to become teachers, but we also need to increase the quality of the teaching experience for teachers. I've talked to a lot of teachers in the almost 3,000 doors that I've knocked in the district so far. And I will tell you, a lot of them are very frustrated with interference from the administration, with discipline problems in the classroom. They feel like they're being interfered with in the teaching process by administrations and also that they're not getting help, particularly with respect to disruptive students in terms of discipline. And I think if you improve the quality of the teaching environment in the classroom, I think you will have a better incentive for teachers, because I think students are clearly hearing this out on the street, and fewer and fewer are wanting to sign up to be teachers. And I think we have to increase both the extrinsic and intrinsic rewards for teachers."
What do you believe to be the most pressing issue in your district, and how do you plan to address it?
"I think we have a huge crime problem here in Springfield. I think we've got a lot of property crime. If you look at the statistics, it's Springfield is sadly punching way above its weight in terms of both property crime and also recently gun violence, which I was really heartened to see that there's a $6,600,000 grant to study gun violence. And that's not only gun violence on others, but also to address suicide by gun. And I'm really looking forward to see what that study comes out with. I think, but in terms of crime, I think that Missouri desperately needs, and Sheriff (Jim) Arnott has also talked about this truth in sentencing, and by what — here's what I mean by that. In the federal system, there's truth in sentencing. If somebody gets a four year sentence, obviously that's a felony length of a sentence for a crime, say armed robbery, they're going to do that four years. They may get a little bit of time off, maybe 5 or 10% off for good time for good behavior. But they're not going to, you know, get out of jail having served 10, 15, 20% of their sentence. And that's exactly what we're seeing in Missouri right now. And some of those criminals who have been convicted as criminals are going back out on the streets and re-offending. And I think that needs to be addressed specifically by the legislature in the upcoming session, and I look forward to doing that."
