March 28, 2008

"We have teacher compensation that hasn't quite yet hit the mark, that I think we can do a lot on over the next couple of years." -Governor Huntsman

DAN BAMMES, KUER:

Governor Huntsman, thanks for joining us today. Senator John McCain was in town, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, and you joined him for a fund raiser and a brief media appearance. And it raises the question in the minds of a lot of Utah voters, as you run for re election, whether a vote cast for John McCain could potentially be a vote cast for somebody else to fill out your second term. How do you see that issue?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: I think a vote for John McCain is a vote for John McCain, and to suggest that I might not be around is to suggest that John McCain might win the election, which, I think for a lot of people, is good news, but I'm running for re-election, I've made that abundantly clear, I stated it a couple of times yesterday, and it's beyond my ability to express what an honor it has been to serve as, for the first term, and I'm a term limits person, I've said from the very beginning that I hope to win a second term, and if so, that'll be it.

And we've got a lot to do, we have a health system reform task force that is being kicked off, we have a new economic ten point plan that we're going to be generating during the summer. We have teacher compensation that hasn't quite yet hit the mark, that I think we can do a lot on over the next couple of years. And that's what's on my mind. Not presidential visits.

LISA RILEY ROCHE, DESERET MORNING NEWS: But are you committed to serving out a second term if you're re-elected governor?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: I am, indeed.

LISA RILEY ROCHE, DESERET MORNING NEWS: So even if McCain comes calling, as the new president, you won't be going to Washington in the second term?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: Well, I'm not going to talk to hypotheticals. It's my every intention to run, to be re elected, and to serve out four terms. Four years, I'm sorry. Two terms. I want to get that right.

JEFF ROBINSON, KCPW: Governor, during the economic summit last week, you delivered a pretty rosy picture of the economy. Do you think that that is still accurate, given in the past two months we've still seen a decline in job growth?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: We're seeing a diminution in our economic performance, there's no doubt about that. Now, the headlines in one of our daily state wide papers was from sizzle to fizzle, which I thought was totally inaccurate. You know, it suggests that we, while leading the nation in job growth, having one of the lowest unemployment numbers, third or fourth in the nation, we're holding steady, we're showing resilience and strength during a period of difficulty. I thought it was a totally inaccurate description of where we are as a state. And that leads to people thinking that you're moving in a negative direction, which has a psychological impact on "the economy."

People don't get out and participate as much, they don't spend as much. They think in bleaker terms. The nation is experiencing some really tough times. There is no question about that. We as a state are inexorably tied to the trends of the nation and the trends of the world. That's just how we're situated today as an economy. And we've been cruising along at about 30,000 feet, and we've hit some wind shears. And those wind shears have taken us down. And we're going to continue to hit some wind shears, and I suspect our job growth number, which is a fairly important measure of one's productivity as an economy, will always be in the positive territory. We might slip down to 1, maybe 1 and a half percent down from a high of 4 percent, while the rest of the nation, while probably 45 of the 50 states are going to be in negative territory. So the fact that we will remain in positive territory in job growth in terms of compensation and what the jobs we're bringing into the state are paying our citizens, which increasingly is higher, which is a very good thing; the fact that we'll probably not get beyond three and a half percent on unemployment, maybe 4 percent, when the nation will be maybe at 5 or 5 and a half percent, I think, show goes the underlying strength of our economy.

That's not to say we're going to be perfect. We're experiencing some tough times, and our job, during this period, will be to continue to keep our foot on the gas pedal, to promote our state, to develop the economy, to try to recruit companies to come in, as we had Disney announcing 500 jobs just a week or so ago, and many others just weeks before that, and we'll continue to encourage our entrepreneurs to do what they do well, and to do it within our state. And I think we're going to do just fine longer term.

RICHARD PIATT KSL-TV: Governor, even though the economy overall is doing well, a lot of times things come up that are unexpected. Hundreds of Questar Gas customers have received bills due to a billing error that are in the hundreds of dollars range, sometimes more. And the company has said, well, we'll work out a payment plan but you still have to owe it. They've taken a hard line on that, apparently, and the customers think that the mistake shouldn't be theirs to shoulder. What is your view on the way that is being handled, and whether the division, or office of consumer services should step in and mitigate it somehow?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: Well, I think all of the relevant bodies are participating, and will participate in sorting this one out. And it does need to be sorted out. You've got 500 families, you know, 1,000 to 1200 on average, probably a $600,000 bill in total that goes back, not just a few weeks or months, but probably four years, from what I gather. And we'll see where the Public Service Commission and others decide to take this, and you know, and consumer services. You know, they're going to have the deliberations, they're going to do the due diligence, and all of that's very, very important. I think erring on the side of the consumer is probably an important thing in a case like this. But we'll let them render whatever judgment, after they collect the information and hear from the aggrieved parties, and put all the facts together.

RICHARD PIATT KSL-TV: Eventually, I know the utilities, and a lot of people view Questar as a monopoly, resist any kind of additional regulation. Would you be open to possible regulation, if it calls for it, on Questar in particular?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: I don't know that this is a question of regulation. I think this is more of a question of bookkeeping. And you know, the billing practices. And you know, to say who was the vice president responsible for this part of the operation, and why weren't the bills sent out in a timely and accurate fashion? Every business goes through this same kind of thing. And what you do is you look to the responsible party within the organization and say, why wasn't it done right? Somebody's responsible, there's a responsible party somewhere within the organization, and they probably have some explaining to do.

TOM JORDAN, METRO NEWS: Governor, a couple of days ago you were at the presentation of the Utah Foundation on the top ten concerns of voters, and the top concern, as it turns out, is energy prices. This is a tricky one, when you are at the state level, trying to figure out how you deal with something like that. How do you approach something like that?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: Yeah, well, energy, when you talk about energy, I think energy writ large, I think there is a part that is gas, I think there's a part that is maybe renewable options going forward, how are we going to power a rapidly growing population base, and an economy, not just here, but throughout the entire west? And it's therefore not surprising that you have people who feel strongly about energy, because energy impacts every facet of our life. It impacts everything from what we pay at the gas pump to the quality of the air that we breathe.

And we are going through, in this country, an energy revolution. And I suspect that most people are on to that fact. The fact that we're looking more at renewable types of energy. You're looking at photoful take opportunities in southern Utah, taking advantage of solar. We're now looking at a renewable portfolio initiative that our state has embarked upon.

We never would have had this conversation a few short years ago. We're looking at, we're looking at energy efficiency as it relates to buildings, a state fleet, cars, including my own, which I've already converted to CNG. So when people saying, "What are you paying?" I say, "Well, I'm paying about 70 cents a gallon." You know, which takes a lot of people by surprise. And that's, you know, what you get if you want to go through the steps to convert to CNG. So there's a lot going on out there, and there will continue to be a great deal about energy as an issue area. And my only hope is that the citizens continue to speak out about this very important issue area, because that's going to keep the policy makers focused on taking us toward a cleaner, greener, more efficient future. Because as we get greener as an economy, we get smarter, and I think we get more competitive. And I think we get more innovative. And I suspect that when we look back a generation or two from now we'll see this revolution that we're just trying to make sense out of today as being a very important part of our overall economic competitiveness. It's going to leave us better able to compete, and cleaner, and more efficient as a country.

RICHARD PIATT KSL-TV: Governor, it's relatively quiet, there's not really that much going on so I'd like to take this opportunity to be have you talk- -

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: - -Says who?- -

RICHARD PIATT KSL-TV: - -about something a little bit heavier, perhaps. This health system reform issue that you are championing seems like a huge issue to tackle. I don't think a lot of people, including myself, quite honestly, fully get where it's going or- - Can you tell us at least where it is, where you think it's going, and how it may help people in a real, tangible way, some day?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: Thanks, Rich, I'm glad you asked it. It is a complex and multi facetted and very difficult undertaking, and that's why not many people have done much about it at the state level. Our task force will be launched in about a month, and it will be chaired by members of the legislature. I'm giving you a little bit of the process, now. And we, through our Go ED office, our office of economic development, will be more or less a secretariat that will keep the issues before this task force, and keep everybody, I hope, on task.

Now, what we want to add to that task force are the voices of the community, the people who also feel strongly about health care and health system reform, generally speaking. So that by the end of this journey, let's say we start a month from now and we end in November, these are going to be extremely important months of drilling down on the most salient issues impacting costs, insurance, transparency, and individual responsibility.

RICH PIATT, KSL-TV: Eventually are you looking at something like the state of Massachusetts has, or are you looking at other states as a potential model for what we would see?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: Everything is being looked at. Yeah, I don't think you can look at a solitary model today, because there isn't a perfect model that exists today. Massachusetts you can find has its own flaws, and there isn't really anyone else out there that's kind of as advanced as we are.

And you can talk to the people who are expert in this particular field, they will tell you that our state is pretty much at the cutting edge in terms of what we have done. Some have said, "You're not doing enough," and others have said, you know, "Given the lay of the land and how difficult a lift this is, you're out there, and you're really kind of plowing some new territory."

So what you're going to find as the task force is launched over the next month, is you're going to see different working groups that run everything from individual responsibility, i.e., you know, what about a mandate? What does that actually mean if we were to have something that was part of getting this done ultimately? Is it necessary? Is it not necessary? Can we get there via market forces alone? I don't know. But we're going to get to the bottom of that one.

You're going to see a little group on reforming insurance, generally, which is to say, how do we get affordable and portable policies that are easily accessed by not just corporations and not just organizations, but by people.

This is where the whole revolution needs to take us. It needs to take us toward individual accessibility and affordability, and portability. You just can't have corporations dealing with health care. That's where we fail today. Because we're down to, what, 44 percent of our companies in the state are now offering health insurance. What about everybody else?

So you've got to get to the point in time where individuals are willing to take responsibility for their health care. But that presupposes a world in which you have more options available, and more affordable options, and options that can actually follow you in the work place.

What about the young, immortal population? What about the 18-35 year olds who are most difficult to insure because they think they're going to live on forever? And even if there was something that was available, it's not affordable for them.

And so you're going to see a lot of these different working groups, under the rubric of health system reform, begin to drill down, with kind of team captains, if you will. And that work will continue, week over week, through the summer and into fall, and I've said if I have to I'll call a special session to allow people to report on progress, to see if we're actually hitting the mark, and getting to where we need to be by November.

This is going to be an action oriented task force, it's not going to be just sort of an academic gab fest. It's going to be focused on really getting things done, and positioned by the end of the year for real action going into the next legislative session.

DAN BAMMES, KUER: Governor, the past efforts at examining health care issues in Utah, I'm thinking particularly of one task force, were heavily influenced by some of the corporations in the business, who had enough resources to hire a full time lobbyist for each member of the group. What steps are being taken to see that the interests that could benefit from decisions one way or another are not unduly influencing the work product of this group?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: Well, I think the fact that we have everybody at the table, and people asking how they can help, not hinder, is a very good sign that people are beginning to take this seriously. I don't see a lot of obstructionism, I don't see a lot of obfuscating on the part of big corporations. I see the main, the major players who you would typically associate with this undertaking, coming in and basically saying, "How can we help? How can we move things forward?"

All I know is that I represent, you know, 2.7 million people. I'm their lobbyist, and I will do my darnedest through this process, as I'm sure many members of the legislature will, to keep this process on task, and honest, and focused on closing the gap on those who are without insurance today. That will be what my focus is. We've gone from 309,000 now to probably 290,000 who are uninsured, instead of 12 percent it's maybe 10.8 percent of our population. That's because the good economy has sort of benefited us in that regard. But we still have just under 300,000 people who are without insurance, and that, then, puts greater pressure on the overall costs of health care.

So that's got to be where our focus is. How do we close that gap? And how do we bring those people under some sort of coverage.

ROBERT GEHRKE, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: The legislature created a similar task force last week on, to focus on the immigration bill that they passed. Now, your office doesn't have a seat at that table. Should you have been Do you want to be involved? Or how are you going to be involved in those discussions over the next year before this immigration bill takes effect in July?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: I suspect we'll be involved as the executive branch is always involved in these kinds of deliberations, whether we have a seat at the table or whether we're part of the broader discussion, part of framing the priorities that must be looked at, as part of overall immigration reform.

I think it's a good thing that the task force is going to drill down and actually look at these issues. But I think it's even more important the fact that we have a delay feature on implementation. Because, as I think you heard from Senator McCain yesterday, this, for whomever, you know, assumes the presidency, this is going to be a hugely important issue. I think this, and I think health care reform are both going to be, you know, issues that are dealt with right out of the chute.

And therefore we do have some time before implementation, make sure that whatever we're thinking about, and considering, is done in proper context with a federal fix. This is a federal issue, let us not forget that. And if we insist that we are doing it alone, then you end up with other states creating a patchwork of uncertainty for citizens, and for investors, and for people who are caught, you know, in the shadows, without proper documentation.

And that's not the way, that's not the way this debate needs to proceed. It needs to proceed in a more uniform fashion, driven by the federal government, that ultimately has jurisdiction and responsibility for the issue. The reason that we're even talking about it is because the citizenry has become so fed up, and so frustrated by lack of progress on the issue, that they are now insisting that local governments stand up and take action. Which is, in fact, what we're doing.

And I think that, in turn, is a message to federal authorities that the time has come to deal with this, as we heard Senator McCain talk about it yesterday. He addressed it in the context of our state already moving out and doing something on our own.

DAN BAMMES, KUER: If there's not sufficient progress, as this is investigated, moving up toward the next legislative session, we still have a law that's on the books, that's set to take effect July of 2009. Could we be in a position where something could take effect that is not in our interests as a state, because of a failure to study it more carefully, or a failure of the federal government to act in concert with the states? Could we wind up with a bill that does more harm than good to the state of Utah that's already on the books?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: Well, if we had such a bill, it would be a result of total failure on the part of the federal government to come to grips with this issue. We've had enough time, you know, everyone is giving a grace period to 2008, which is an election year. Everybody knows you can't get this done on the route to a presidential election.

But, you know, in the quarter or two following the election, you know, if this doesn't get done, then that's exactly at the federal level then that's exactly what you're looking at. You're looking at states that will largely take this responsibility and move it forward.

DAN BAMMES, KUER: But would you take steps at that point, if nothing happens productively, to side track this bill, to lobby for its repeal, for example?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: If we are hearing nothing from the federal government, if we are hearing or seeing little in the way of progress in the first half of '09, then we probably deserve to take matters into our own hands as a state, and move forward. Because I suspect the people will not allow it to go on beyond that without action taken in some form or fashion.

LISA RILEY ROCHE, DESERET MORNING NEWS: So you're comfortable with the bill as it's written to take effect if the federal government does not act?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: Well, the bill has been watered down from where it was initially. And I think it allows us to proceed as an economy, to keep, you know, in allowing our state to function as it should as an economy. It gives us sufficient time to kind of allow the federal government to step up and do something. Suffice it to say, I think the world is going to look a lot different as it relates to immigration policy by the first or second quarter of '09, and I think this conversation we're having right now will largely be, as they say in the military, overtaken by events.

And if what we are talking about now has not been sufficiently addressed by the federal government, then I think you will see not only Utah, but a whole lot of other states that will rush headlong into doing something on their own. Which would suggest a systematic failure on the part of the federal government to address it. And I don't think we're going to get there.

RICHARD PIATT, KSL-TV: A lot of people agree, though, that the real problem with the immigration issue is that there's no real streamlined process for people to legitimately become citizens. Yet a lot of the bills that we see at the legislature are things that would restrict, you know, the ability of people who are already here to function as, you know, members of society in little ways, sometimes you know, bigger ways. But if those are the kinds of bills that we're going to be seeing in response to the lack of the federal government doing anything about it, is that constructive, or do we need to maybe think in the larger scheme of where the federal government may need to go?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: This is, without question, an imperfect process. You know, we're dealing with the symptoms of the sickness. The real heart and soul of the sickness is in Washington, and that's with a system of processing, and granting citizenship to people who are currently in line. It is a long and difficult process, and one that has been completely revamped with the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. It's taken a little bit from the State Department and a little bit from INS, and it's kind of created its own thing.

And so when you stop to ponder, you know, how long the average wait is, and getting longer, and the fact that, you know, that even in the post 9/11 world, we have failed at the federal level to fundamentally streamline and make better this whole process of citizenship. That's where it begins.

And because they are basically unable to make that function better and faster, you have a backlog, and the backlog then results in people living in the shadows, and we are then dealing with all of the issues that are created by the failure in Washington to deal effectively with a processing system of immigrants. And we're just not talking about people who are south of the border, we're talking about people from all corners of the globe who are trying to work this system. And it is fundamentally broken, and it needs to be fixed. So you know, let's be smart enough to identify where it all begins, and what needs to be fixed in order for us all to kind of play our appropriate role as states.

ROBERT GEHRKE, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: There was a meeting last night in Magna where Kennecott tried to reassure its residents near the tailings pond that they were not in any harm's way. Have you, from a state perspective, what needs to be done to help make sure that those people are safe, and make sure that the process was well, there was a full vetting process for this state regulatory side?

GOVERNOR HUNTSMAN: Yeah, I wonder what we can do about something that happened 20 years ago, where the state engineer at the time is no longer with us. Now, I've heard from our current state engineer, who's currently engaged in the process, and Kennecott, who, as you know, since that occurred 20 years ago, has been through I think two or three new owners, currently Rio Tinto out of the UK, and so the south pond that was a settling pool is no longer a pond, but basically has a lot of residual elements from that in the dirt. And that went from the early 1900's to probably the early 1990's when they shifted then to the northern pool.

So the question is what to do about, you know, the dirt and the remediation of the dirt. And from what I have heard, Kennecott embarked, you know, 20 years ago, on a 30 year program for remediation. So we're now 20 years into a 30 year program, and I think they're doing what any corporate citizen ought to be doing, which is to engage in conversation with the people potentially impacted, and dealing with it at a local level.

What we are doing, our state engineer is involved, he, of course, as with all cases, is making sure that safety is first and foremost. That's their responsibility in that office. They have an office of dam safety, and if you were to go into their office you'd find that with respect to all the dams in the state, and there are open records, you can go and you can read about any of them. And I can't speak to the transparency issues 20 years ago, but I can tell you what they're doing today.

And so as a state, you know, I think they need to ensure first and foremost the safety of that former settling pond, which is now kind of a dirt bowl. And whatever remediation is ongoing to continue to inspect it and make sure that it's in compliance with state codes.

DAN BAMMES, KUER: Governor, thank you very much for joining us today. An audio and video recordings of this are available on the web sites at UEN.org and KUED.org. Thank you again for joining us.

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