House District 9 candidates share their views in public forum

Montana House District 9 candidates Rodrik Brosten, Democrat, and Scott Reichner, Republican, participated in a public forum with candidates from House Districts 5, 6, and 10 along with Senate District 3 candidate Bruce Tetvedt at Flathead Valley Community College on Oct. 10. Senate District 3 candidate Shannon Hanson did not attend.

About 50 people attended, several of whom had questions for the candidates. The main topics for the evening were education and how to fund it and how to improve Montana’s economy.

This is Brosten’s first run for political office. He spent two years in the U.S. Army 25th Infantry Division and graduated from Montana State University with a degree in mechanical engineering. He is currently semi-retired after working at Siemens Allis, an electrical switch company in Portland, Ore. He moved back to the valley in 2000 and has since been working in his machine shop and doing carpentry work as Brosten Manufacturing.

Reichner studied finance at Brigham Young University and moved to Bigfork in 1997 and currently owns Flathead Mortgage. He served three terms on the Bigfork School District Board of Trustees, two as chairman, and has held the District 9 seat since January 2009 where he was the chairman of the House Education Committee.

Brosten and Reichner shared different responses when asked if they believed educational funding currently has the correct balance or if there were changes they would support.

Reichner said educational funding comes primarily from property taxes and that he would like to see it shifted to the revenue received from oil, gas, and coal industries. He used Wyoming and North Dakota as examples and pointed out Montana’s schools have $3 million in deferred maintenance work that needs done.

“Those are public lands and should be spent on public education,” Reichner said. “I went around the state and a lot of our schools are in trouble. I propose using our natural resources to fix up the schools that need it so bad.”

Brosten’s focus was on local control and increasing teacher salaries. He said Montana’s teachers are some of the lowest paid in the country.

“There’s a difference between teaching someone how to think and teaching someone what to think,” Brosten said.

Education wasn’t the only topic covered during the forum, and due to time restrictions not every candidate answered each question that was asked. Right-to-work laws and the affordable health care act were also discussed.

When asked by a member of the audience what the state is doing to improve safety for workers, Reichner’s response was that the state is working on bringing accident rates down with programs such as Work Safe Montana. He said Montana’s accident rate has dropped more than any other state’s in the last eight years.

“There has to be a business side and government side and they have to work together to get the industries doing a better job,” Reichner said.

When asked about Citizen’s United, Reichner’s response was that it is a complex issue because millions of dollars are raised with unknown sources. He said it is going to take cooperative legislation to fix it.

“You can’t tell me you’re happy with all the ads Rehberg and Tester are running, it is discouraging and misinformed,” Reichner said.

Other questions were more open ended for the candidates to discuss things not typically mentioned while campaigning, such as voting with their conscience versus following the party line.

Brosten’s response was that he agreed with a previously made statement that Democrats and Republicans agree 80 percent of the time.

“Democrats aren’t always right and Republicans aren’t always wrong,” Brosten said.

Reichner’s response was that serving in the House is not a money making endeavor, he estimated he made about $8,000-9,000 over a two-year period and the reason for going was to make a difference.

When asked what their number one personal priority would be while working in Helena, Reichner said his personal priority would be for Medicaid reform.

Brosten said it is to increase the state’s minimum wage.

“If you put more money in employees pockets, they will have more to buy goods and services and businesses will have to hire more people,” Brosten said. “It would be a daunting task to be down in the legislature, but I will try to support policies where all Montana citizens will have a healthy work environment and be able to access all the education and a job that pays a living wage and equality for women.”

A third forum for county commissioner candidates will be held Oct. 23 at FVCC.