Editor’s note: At the 5th District Congress Forum on Thursday, Hampden and Sidney students raised eight issues. This edition includes answers to the first three. We will continue the discussion in Friday’s paper.

Candidates for Virginia’s 5th District congressional seat outlined their agendas and goals during a public forum on Thursday, October 17. The discussion took place at Hampden-Sydney College, where students asked questions and each participant was given two or three points. minute time limit for response.

They included Republican and current state Sen. John McGuire, as well as Democrat Gloria Whitt, who serves as president of the Amherst County chapter of the NAACP. Each person was given the same eight questions to answer during Thursday’s event, speaking to a group made up of most Hampden-Sydney students. We present their answers as they were given. Today we will introduce the first three questions and then continue the discussion in the next episode.

As for who would come first, a coin toss was held at Thursday’s forum and the first question was asked of Witt. It then spun back and forth throughout the night.

Question 1: The cost of living has risen sharply over the past five years. What are your individual goals and plans for supporting legislation to provide economic relief to Virginia’s 5th District?

Gloria Witt: Inflation is real. The price of all our products and services is high. I see this as some element of corporate price gouging, so what can we do about it politically? I support policies that will lower drug costs, I support legislation that will help us with affordable housing because we know that housing is one of the lost American dreams, and I also believe that when it comes to economic growth for this area, 11,000 square miles, 24 communities, and with three major cities, most of our county is rural.

So how do we create a thriving community? In my opinion, it’s about reimagining education and creating career technical skills for the 60% of young people who leave high school without a college degree, won’t get one, and won’t join the military. So for me, it’s about expanding career technical skills that will lead to living wage jobs. This will impact the economy because current businesses tell me they can’t find a talented workforce. And if we expand our skills, they can provide a living wage and therefore create opportunities for District 5 members.

John McGuire: If the government were a business, it would go bankrupt. I have a 26 year old business. My wife and I celebrated 26 years in business by helping teams and individuals, including the Hampden-Sydney lacrosse team. Last September we celebrated 26 years of signing both sides of the payroll. Everything is more expensive. Young people tell me they have an app that they look for every morning to find out where the cheapest gas is. Four years ago they didn’t do this.

And four years ago, interest rates were around 2%. They exceeded 7%. Inflation was below 2% and reached 10%. The solution to our problem is not stronger government. The free market works, but when the government interferes with it, it doesn’t work. If you guys want to retire and most of you are young, but we have people who are not so young, there are people who are retiring because they can’t afford the fixed income that they have.

So what we need to do is achieve energy dominance. Four years ago we almost dominated the energy industry, and then we shut down ANWAR, stopped fracking, and started buying fossil fuels from countries that don’t like us. So they made money, we spent money, and it drives up inflation, reduces the value of your investments, and makes it difficult for everyday Americans to live, work, and raise their families. That’s why I will support legislation that will make us dominant in the energy industry and reduce costs.

Question 2: Many residents of the 5th District live in rural areas. What problems do you think are unique to rural areas and how do you plan to address the issues facing rural areas such as poverty and homelessness?

McGuire: As a state senator in the General Assembly, I just received the Politician of the Year award. I wish I could tell you that the idea was mine, but it’s almost always someone else’s idea. Our job is to listen to you and be your voice. We have developed a policy that designates the fourth Wednesday in April as CTE (Career and Technical Education) Signing Day. Not every child is destined to go to college, but I think that as educators, as parents, we have a responsibility to prepare young people for life.

So I would encourage and support a bill that would help training because I knock on a lot of doors in these rural areas and they tell me their child won’t come back to Farmville because they can’t find a job. And of course it is a very influential area for agriculture and forestry. Our third revenue stream in Virginia, $21 billion, is forestry, and these people tell me that diesel prices were $2 a gallon a few years ago and now they’re up to $6. And so they have a hard time paying their bills, they have a hard time paying their employees, and so we need to pass legislation that makes us dominant in the energy industry, as I said, and lowers the cost of fuel and of living. .

Witt: First, I want to go back to the first question and the idea of ​​inflation. Inflation is real and businesses are making more profits than ever before. Regarding fracking, based on news reports, our economy is in the best shape it has been in years. Highest stock market, more employed people. We’re drilling, baby, we’re drilling, and that’s why I think the idea of ​​fossil fuels driving down prices is a myth. So let’s make this clear. Economists say our economy is the best it’s ever been, and this doom and gloom is very interesting coming from the Republican Party. In terms of what am I going to do or what do I see as a problem for our community?

Mainly affordable housing, healthcare, broadband. And CTE is at the core of this. Senator McGuire mentioned that he introduced legislation to support career technical education. Yes, vocational education occurs throughout the county. The problem is that we are not producing enough skilled labor to meet the growth needed in these rural areas. We’re dealing with a 20% poverty rate in District 5 and a median income of $50,000. We must recognize that 50% of our young people graduate from high school in May and qualify for the lowest paying jobs because they do not have professional technical skills. He (McGuire) was in the legislature and they’re doing something, but it’s not enough. We need to rethink education.

Question 3: What role do you think the federal government should play in education policy? And how do you plan to support preschool and secondary education in the district?

Witt: It all starts with holistic thinking. As I have said before, we are not producing enough talent in the K-12 system. You have to pay teachers what they are worth, you have to look at the curriculum, bring in subject matter experts from the corporate sector to become teachers. This means looking for licensed people who may not have a four-year degree but have the subject matter expertise needed in high schools. It’s hard to get a corporate America worker making $80,000 to go to high school and make $40,000. So all this mismatch needs to be dealt with front and center.

So I want to use my voice, because I’ve listened, to go to Congress to get into these spaces and fight to get our tech career systems off the ground and, more importantly, create a whole new way of educating our youth. They go to school every day, and we leave so many young people behind. We are doing a disservice to our youth. Do you wonder why they lose hope and opportunity? They don’t see themselves owning a home or buying their first cars. Because everything depends on skills. We must prepare our youth. And we need to start with the schools, not diverting money to charter schools because 80% of our youth go to public schools. We need to fix this.

McGuire: Energy will solve many of these problems. Instead of spending money, we are going to earn it. We must be energetically dominant. There are 13 vessels in the Gulf of Mexico, their job is to carry out hydraulic fracturing. The Biden-Harris administration did not issue them permission at all. Let’s move on to education. Our children should be taught, as Governor Glenn Youngkin says, how to think, not what to think. These divisive ideologies coming from the federal government in our schools are wrong.

I’m a Navy SEAL, I’ve been to some very dangerous places for our country, I’m 56 years old, and I’ve seen a lot of things I don’t want to see, and when one of our delegates, Tim Anderson, read a book that was on the floor in elementary school General Assembly, I wish I hadn’t heard what he read. I believe that schools should prepare young people for life. If you graduate from a vocational school or go to college, and then after five years you cannot find a decent job, then we are letting you down. So our job is to prepare young people for life, not teach them divisive ideologies, and I would like to shift more responsibility for education to the local level to support the needs of this community.