Ed Redd—My positions on:

Limited but Effective Government. I support limited but effective government that is capable of preserving the rights of all citizens to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. Taxes are paid by citizens and are necessary to fund appropriate services, but government must live within its taxpayer-funded means.

Public Education. The opportunity for all children to be educated, regardless of their social or economic backgrounds or disabilities, or their parents' ability or lack of ability to teach them, is one of the pillars maintaining our freedoms in this country.  Education in Utah is funded by collection of income taxes and property taxes.  These taxes are paid by everyone directly or indirectly.  Everyone benefits directly or indirectly from the output of an effective public education system in that children in our communities who otherwise may not have had educational opportunities, will be more likely to lead productive, creative lives and sustain themselves as adults.

I support locally-elected School Boards in their responsibilities to oversee and manage local education issues.  I will continue to try and defer local educational issues to local school boards and administrators and avoid the tendency of legislators to micromanage local school districts.

Parents must always have the freedom to choose how and where their children are educated. Charter schools are public education options funded by tax payers for parents who feel the needs of their child are not being met in traditional public schools.   Private schools and home-schooling are educational options that do not utilize tax payer funding.  They provide important options for parents who are not inclined to have their child participate directly in publicly-funded education.  The right of parents to choose private or home schooling options for their children needs to be preserved and supported by limiting excessive government intrusion and regulation.   However, I do not generally support so-called "vouchers" for parents who choose private schools for their child because I took an oath to uphold and sustain the US Constitution and the Utah Constitution. To me, vouchers divert taxpayer resources designated specifically by the Utah Constitution for public education without any accountability to the tax payers as to how the money will be used.  There is no publicly-elected school board to oversee how these monies are spent.  

Private Enterprise, Business, and Economic Growth. Government is not the source of prosperity in our country and generally is incapable of directly improving the economy or creating self-sustaining jobs. Government’s role in improving the economy should be limited to fostering an environment where private enterprise and businesses are capable of competing, growing, and delivering better products and services. I will continue to carefully consider the potential negative impacts of regulation, taxation, and legislation on private business and enterprise.

Laws and Regulations. Laws and regulations are created to prevent individuals and organizations from infringing on the rights of others. Laws should be evaluated based on their effectiveness and relative costs/risks/benefits to individuals and the community as a whole and should either be enforced or removed from the books.

Social Services. I currently serve on the Social Services Appropriations Subcommittee.  Social services are important in preventing poor health outcomes, hunger, malnutrition, homelessness and general human suffering in people who may be disadvantaged due to numerous different problems. Whenever possible, people receiving social services should be educated concerning the source of their benefits and have incentives and opportunities to be educated and work. It has been my experience that some form of adaptive and productive employment is often therapeutic for people who struggle with disabilities

Health care.  Health care has an inherent value; it is not free. Whenever possible, patients need to have a personal financial stake in the cost of their health care and be encouraged with appropriate incentives to make healthy changes in their lifestyles. One of the biggest challenges facing Utah is the Affordable Healthcare Act (ACA or Obamacare) and addressing the health care needs of adults without children who make less than 100% of the federal poverty level (FPL) and are not Medicaid-eligible.  

This complicated group of people do not qualify for disability and currently do not make enough money to purchase health insurance on their own.  Unlike people who make 100-400% of FPL, this group of people are not eligible for any federal insurance subsidies. They are in the "health care donut hole."  Some of them are relatively healthy and could be taken care of with no insurance in an low-cost, sliding scale, self-pay, primary care setting such as the Cache Valley Community Health Center in Logan.   Others in this group have chronic medical and/or mental illnesses that if not managed appropriately, will eventually result in a disabled state.  These "medically frail" individuals are currently not disabled and with appropriate levels of care, can become or remain employed and be part of their own solution.  However, if left without needed appropriate care, these individuals often times end up unemployed because of complications of their medical condition or mental illness.  They may eventually end up qualifying for long-term disability and Medicaid costing the tax payer more money than would have been spent to appropriately manage their condition, not to mention general societal costs of homelessness, unemployment, criminal behavior, court system costs and their lower quality of life due to lack of appropriate health care.  

Examples of conditions that are not well-managed in emergency room settings, and when left un-managed end up resulting in long-term disability include (but are not limited to) diabetes, kidney disease, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, Crohn''s disease, ulcerative colitis, multiple sclerosis, cancer, various forms of mental illness, and substance abuse.  Cost-benefit analysis should be a significant factor in determining how taxpayer dollars are spent to fund the health care of these individuals and whenever possible they should be encouraged to improve their employment status and income so they can "climb out of the donut hole" and become more self-sufficient.

Medicaid recipients, especially those with chronic illnesses and disabilities, need to have options of being gainfully employed and not completely losing health care benefits. Prevention of illness through public health efforts, prenatal care, preventive dental care, disease screenings, education, and healthy personal life-style choices is oftentimes the cheapest and most effective health care of all.