Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

The candidates for the Georgia House of Representatives District 136 squared off at the LaGrange-Troup County Chamber of Commerce forum on Tuesday evening. With early voting underway and Election Day just over two weeks away, the forum offered a final chance to reach many voters.

Incumbent David Jenkins (R) took on challenger Jeff Lowe (D) in the forum organized by the Chamber of Commerce and live-streamed by The LaGrange Daily News. Videos of the forum, including other races, are available on both the Chamber and LDN Facebook pages.

Jenkins is a retired Army pilot who owns a farm outside Luthersville, Georgia. He has served the District 136 for two terms.

Lowe is a retired Baptist pastor of more than 24 years, having most recently pastored First Baptist Church in Riverdale, Georgia.

Each candidate was given 90 seconds for each question, with two minutes for an opening and closing statement. 

Some of the questions covered in Tuesday’s forum include:

MEDICARE EXPANSION

House Bill 92 proposes a limited Medicare Medicaid expansion to cover more low-income adults. This move is in line with ongoing discussions about expanding healthcare access in Georgia. What is your stance on expanding Medicaid in Georgia? How would you address the healthcare needs of the uninsured or underinsured?

“I am 100% in favor of expanding Medicaid,” Lowe said. “You don’t want to be poor in Georgia. You don’t want to be without health insurance. You know what people do who don’t have health insurance? They don’t go to the doctor. They don’t go to the extended care type facilities that I would go to because, hallelujah, I’m old enough to have Medicare. The day I got Medicare, I saved $1,000 a month in health insurance. Now, that may not make a difference to y’all, but it sure made a difference to me.”

“We have more than 450,000 people in Georgia who have no health insurance. Let’s expand Medicaid and give those folks a chance to have health insurance,” Lowe said.

“The issue with Medicaid is it’s a broken system. It’s a bureaucratic nightmare. And, it doesn’t pay the provider what the service costs,” Jenkins said.  “I know in the air ambulance business, if you get too many Medicaid patients, you can’t serve that community. Ultimately, it doesn’t pay the bill, and that becomes a problem getting people to take it.  There’s really no point in giving someone something for free that there’s nowhere to buy.”

SCHOOL VOUCHERS

The Georgia Promise scholarship account per proposal, which failed previously, could be reintroduced to provide stipends for students in underperforming schools to seek private education options. How do you view school choice initiatives like this, and do you believe they improve educational outcomes, or do they risk diverting funds from public schools?

“I believe in school choice,” Jenkins said. “My early childhood we spent it up in Atlanta, in the school that I was in was a failing school. We didn’t have a lot of money, so we broke the law and we used my grandmother’s address in Tyrone, and I got into Fayette County Schools, and I got a good education. I attribute that to making it into the Army, flight school and in and out of college. I actually failed the fifth grade when I went to Fayette County. I was so far behind in the school I was in.”

“I’ve heard the excuse that families just have to make sacrifices, they just have to pay that tuition. But for some people, it’s not a choice. So I’ll give school choice to anyone,” Jenkins said.

“I think people look at public schools as a way to indoctrinate our children. That’s not what education is about. We should leave the parents in control of their family’s beliefs. So I’ll always support school choice.”

“I support our public schools 100% because any child who comes in the door of a public school is going to be provided an education,” Lowe said. “I am a firm believer in separation of church and state. Do you know that if we take this voucher money and we allow it to be diverted to a private school, it could be diverted to any type of religious private school? It could be one that is familiar to us, perhaps with a Christian base, or it may not be.”

“I am in favor of 100% supporting and encouraging and challenging our public schools to do the very best they can with the money that they do have,” Lowe said.

PROPERTY TAXES

Many homeowners face increasing property tax bills due to their property values going up, especially those on fixed incomes. How would you address the challenges of rising homeownership costs and ensure that property taxes do not disproportionately burden seniors and low-income families?

“We in the 136th district, like a lot of Georgia, we’re dealing with rapidly rising property values. The county commissions, the school boards have some pretty strict guardrails on what they can and can’t do. Ultimately, they have to tax something for what it assesses for. These assessments are not all done at the same time,” Jenkins said. “We enacted legislation that will give homeowners relief on this. This is going to be a ballot referendum that essentially, once you buy a home, it’ll continue to be reassessed. But if it is your home and you have homestead exemption on that, then you’ll be granted, essentially, protection from that increase in value. It will be capped.

“Local governments can opt out of this, and if they actually opt into it, they’re going to have an option to add a sales tax. It’ll help them recoup some of the revenue that they may have lost,” Jenkins said.

“It’s a complicated issue,” Lowe said. “Nobody wants to pay more taxes … I was happy with my homestead exemption when I got old enough to have a discount on it. But you know what? We’ve got to do the right thing for our folks in our schools and the needs that are filled by our property taxes as well. So it’s just a tough issue.”