The Times spoke with the Republican governor in December and asked him to share his opinion on specific issues facing the state. Excerpts of that conversation follow below.
On merging local governments:
"There's hundreds of places across Indiana: some very low income, some very prosperous. They still ought to be looking at the same thing because you stretch dollars and save on overhead and serve people better." Briefs: Save on overhead, please don't use consolidation as a way to grow government.
On corruption in Northwest Indiana:
"I happen to think that things are better. There's a certain stereotype there. But it's very, very important that citizens there take a zero tolerance attitude."
On the size of state government:
"This is not some little temporary interlude and we'll be right back to the levels and size of government, scope of government that had built up before the recession hit and the bubble burst. ...You're going to see a step back." Briefs: Preach it Mitch, all too often budgets get cut only to swell exponentially the next time citizens are looking the other way.
On redistricting reform:
"Keep the politics out. All sorts of other adjustments, like minority community boundaries, ought to be in the decision process. I'm going to try to see that we don't have another situation where the parties cook it up in the back room." Briefs: Sounds like Todd Rokita's proposal, is this Mitch's way of saying he's supporting Todd? for Governor? I don't think so, I think Todd wants Senator Lugar's seat and will endorse Becky Skillman.
On canceling welfare privatization:
"What looks good on paper may not be in the messy real world. ...We'll learn from those mistakes. It's important to notice there were certain design changes that did work. Fraud, which was rampant before, appears to have been minimized. So we'll keep the parts that work well."
On national health reform:
"This is the most anti-citizen, anti-consumer, anti-taxpayer, and incidentally, anti-Indiana bill I've ever seen. ...It is a disaster as health care policy. It's going to make health care harder to get and more expensive with less choice and it's going to raise taxes...It's an embarrassment to the country that such a bill could happen, let alone in such a sleazy process."
