Two members of the Monroe County Council are competing for a seat on the board of commissioners. Democrats David Henry and Trent Deckard face off in May for the spot of outgoing commissioner Lee Jones.
WFIU/WTIU News met with each of them last month to ask questions about the election and the county’s future.
Answers have been shortened for clarity.
Why are you running for county commissioner?
Deckard: I have a collaborative leadership style. I think we need a lot more of that, both working internally in the county, working with partners like the city and the Town of Ellettsville, and I want to bring people together around some of these big issues that are just gripping our community. We have massive affordability problems that are keeping people out of housing, out of childcare, out of all sorts of options. For years, the county has kind of put our hands up or done nothing. I think that we need better answers than that.
Henry: Times are tough for a lot of people in our community, and as I've observed being a party chairman and also on county council, we have a lot of people in our community struggling to make ends meet, to get that first housing opportunity, to find a career here, instead of just lacing a few jobs together. It's time for county government to really prioritize those issues for our whole community.
What is the biggest issue in this race?
Henry: I think it's a culture change, and it's really about the future of the county. Do we have a county that continues to go along to get along, to have conversations that don't seem to result or end results, or do we turn a page on this and we set goals? Do we set standards and ask every day, what has your county government done to find housing opportunities for people, to help people get a career and stay here and become that next generation of Monroe County residents?
Deckard: I think it's the temperament for the way we move forward. We have alarming statistics hitting our county on lack of population growth. We see it in our school system. We have a change in our population significant enough that classroom sizes, school apportionment, is not what it once was. Where that gets alarming is our workforce. If folks can't move in here, and they're not growing up here, that means that when we go to attract future jobs, I can't say as an elected official, I've got a workforce for you or a house for that workforce. That is a drastic neon light. We need folks with the temperament not to clear the room, bring people to the table (business, residents, otherwise), and say, ‘How do we work through this so that we get to the other side?’
What’s the main difference between you and your opponent?
Deckard: My opponent and I serve on the council together. I've been there since 2019. There are people that probably think that that's a bit long for service, but what that service has done is given me a long time to watch our county. The county is a difficult entity the way it's shaped. It's taken me time to understand how the county functions, what we need to do, but I combine that with time in state and federal government to know how do you get things done. I worked for a member of Congress that always had to work across the aisle. I ran a bipartisan state agency where you had to literally work with the other side. I can work with anyone. My opponent has got his own attributes that he brings to this table, but on experience, were just different.
Henry: Aside from that I have a beard, I think Trent and I just have different tempos, and I don't mind being a guy in a hurry, because I'm interested in results. And I think that comes from a lifetime of government service, where you set goals and you meet them, you win contracts back when you've delivered and you've said what you're going to do. And I think it's okay to do that. I think it's okay to nudge people and coach them along to get to results.
County government has had trouble reaching agreements between councilors and commissioners and between the county and the city. How do you plan to improve collaboration in your new role?
Henry: We're all the same party, and yet we don't seem to work out loud and together on the issues that we all care about. I think that one of the solutions we need to put in play here is being more transparent and more accountable to the public, saying what we're going to do, doing what we're going to say, and working out loud more often than we do behind closed doors.
Deckard: I have a collaborative leadership style. And I know a lot of politicians say that, a lot of folks running for office say that, but that's actually my style. I don't adopt ‘my way or the highway’ approaches, because I know that they fail. I am a voice that, despite all of our past, our history, our acrimony, I believe can bring people to the table. We can put egos to the side and say, ‘All right, what are some common goals?’ And I can do that without clearing the room. I think that that is sort of a sad metric that we have. But I think that positive energy and that goal-orientated focus is desperately needed right now.
The county has been dealing with the loss of revenue from Senate Bill 1, which set caps on property tax. How are you going to stabilize finances and make sure that services are being maintained?
Deckard: Having been on county council since 2019, having gone through a pandemic, I know that when the council is engaged, the council can be extremely resourceful in figuring things out. What's more, by partnering with our department heads, they are notoriously resourceful at figuring out how to do things smarter, more efficient. And while those are cliche sayings, I've seen those in action, and our department heads are brilliant towards that. But the bottom line is we can't go back on cutting services that folks need. They need a response on what the county is doing, information, data boards, all that. I think that we've been in perilous places before. We can do this and get to the other side.
Henry: I've spent almost 20 years in federal, state and local government, administration and management. This is one of these opportunities where we need to work more collaboratively with the Town of Ellettsville, The City of Bloomington, and find all that duplicative effort and overlap. If there are opportunities for more interlocal agreements to combine departments and try to share the burdens across our county as a region, we need to start looking at that. And I think we have good partners in the city that see it that way, too.
Ellettsville and Richland Township are exploring a merger, in part to gain independence from county government. Are you pleased with the way that’s moving forward?
Henry: Anytime that citizens get to go to the ballot and vote on their future, whether they merge into a township or stay a town, I think is a good thing. The question about the merger is really another consequence of a long legacy of fighting with our neighbors instead of working together. Ellettsville apparently feels that they need to go their own way on housing options, on zoning and development. I think a new county commission with a new look might be able to work more closely with the Town of Ellettsville and say yes a little more often than no.
Deckard: Here's what I'm pleased about. The town and township are presenting a plan to the voters. The voters are getting all the information they need. When they're not getting it, they're raising their voices. The thing I want to make sure that we do, as a person now on county council, is represent all sides of that, including folks not in either jurisdiction. I want to make sure that on day one, that if that were implemented, all services currently offered either by the county or managed by the town in partnership we have all worked out so that if there is a snowstorm, there's a plow, and we know where that plow is going. In the past, the county has been heavily focused on kind of fighting it out with turf wars. I want to follow the will of the voters.
Recently drug manufacturer Novo Nordisk laid off 400 Bloomington employees. Job growth has been a concern for both the county and the city. How do you plan to encourage job growth?
Deckard: My father worked for RCA when that plant was closed, so I take this to heart. I saw what that did then, and I don't sleep well knowing the fact that we have cuts. That's why in my council service, I've been consistent supporting new jobs coming in. And I also proactively ask our folks who are in economic development, who are in real estate, what is it people tell you that they can't come here? Our airport is thriving, it's attracting a lot of attention. Our west side, the life sciences corridor, that's an economic development hub. We've got to be having elected officials that understand that and get up in the middle of the night worried about job loss, worried about people affected.
Henry: I grew up in the Rust Belt, and I know what it is to grow up in a small town where you have one or two industries, and so when we have an industry that is having fluctuations, where we have hundreds of layoffs, it should give us pause. The way to get at that is to attract a diversity of employment in our community. We haven't looked at I-69 and what it can bring us since 2012. We have no plan for how to develop light industry, green jobs, labor jobs to our community, and we need a county commissioner that is really focused on those things.
