Deb Chubb–Candidate for Indiana State Senator, District 4

Members of the Indivisible NWI Steering Committee had the pleasure of interviewing Debb Chubb. Below read some highlights as you consider your choices for the primary on May 3.

Learn more about Deb Chubb at her website, https://debforindiana.com/

Most pressings issues facing Indiana

  • Maternal mortality; women and children’s health
    • Indiana’s own study released significant findings and recommendations that legislators ignored.
      • Findings included that 80% of deaths related to pregnancy are preventable.
      • Last session passed legislation that could extend medicaid coverage postpartum—but more must be done to address other issues related to maternal mortality, domestic violence and workplace violence.
      • 30% of counties offer no prenatal care so pregnant woman have to drive distances to receive it and if they can’t do that, they get no care.
      • Lack of affordable and high quality child care contributes to stress and poor health in women.
        • Making child care affordable was another recommendation from Indiana’s study about maternal mortality.
        • It is supported by the Indiana Chamber of Commerce and by Farm Bureau who is particularly concerned about child care deserts in rural areas.
        • A great deal of research supports the economic benefits overall of affordable and high quality childcare and of early childhood education. It serves the whole community.
        • Deb has extensive experience about how good child care works.
          • It needs to be well licensed and regulated.
            • The state could put dollars into building the infrastructure.
            • High quality child care needs a well trained staff.
            • It needs a good outdoor and indoor spaces.
            • It needs an excellent curriculum.
            • Pre-K should be rolled into K-12 system. That would provide all day child care. Teachers would be paid a good wage on par with K-12 teachers.
            • Child care for 0-3 years is expensive.
            • Home child care is less expensive than center based.
            • The state could provide the infrastructure needed for that setting also—training, spaces, etc.
      • Safety in the workplace needs to be addressed. Pregnant women need provisions to allow accommodations.
  • Gun violence
    • Ghost guns need to be regulated.
    • Domestic violence statutes need to be fixed. Red Flag law is useless. When guns are taken away from someone, they can easily get more guns.
    • 70% of domestic violent deaths are by guns.
    • We have to fix the gun show loophole.

Working across the aisle

  • Republicans have worked to create chaos, division and polarization because they make money off of that, especially with the education and gun laws they proposed this session.
  • We have to call out republicans for the lies they tell to pretend to be a basis for these laws. We need to call republicans out and right away. Call out the lies and do it loudly.
  • We have to build coalitions with rational republicans. Deb has the skill and experience with that. It often comes down to the language you use. Have a conversation. The best way to influence republicans is to turn it into an economic discussion—anything can be turned into an economic issue. Frame bills in ways that will appeal to republicans.
  • Legislators have to stay on top of legislation—even when harmful bills seem dead. That is what happened with the permit less carry bill that was inserted into another bill at the last minute. Republicans succeeded in passing that bill in part because democrats were not being ready for what republicans did.
  • Examples of ways to work with republicans with careful framing include legalizing marijuana, especially for medical uses, and environmental issues. Some republicans were supportive of climate change action and wetlands protections, water quality and safe drinking water. It’s important to communicate how wetlands protect water quality.

Education

Deb is a staunch supporter of public schools. Diverting funds from public to charter and private schools starves public schools. Public schools face yearly budget cuts.

  • Funding for private, charter and public schools is all about money from special interests for republicans. Standards are not equal for public schools, charter and private. Charter schools don’t have to accept any child they don’t want to—those with special needs—those who have exhibited behavior problems, etc.
  • Private and charter don’t have to provide the social services public schools do.
  • There is no longer a separation of church and state. Legislators say the money goes to the parents, not the school but that is not true. The money goes to the school.
  • Funding for private schooling is no longer only for low income families; parents with an income of up to $150,000 can now get that funding.

Ways to support teachers

  • Support teacher unions. Teacher unions have been attacked more than any other union. They have a limited ability to negotiate about issues that affect quality. We need to empower teachers unions again.
  • We need to find ways to incentivize teachers. There are 900 vacancies now. The solution this past session was allowing schools to hire less qualified teachers.
  • Talk about teachers again needs to be put into economic terms. Good quality teachers helps develop the skilled workforce Indiana lacks.

Cutting business and corporation taxes

  • Indiana has the 6th lowest corporate tax rate, but companies are not locating here. Indiana is 10 years behind in technical skill needed to accommodate manufacturing. Cutting corporate taxes is a myopic view. Trickle-down is a well-documented failure. Republicans cut business taxes for their own profit because of their ties to special interests.
  • Even Eli Lily, the longtime Indiana company, built a manufacturing plant in North Carolina because it has a skilled workforce. Intel is putting its chip making plant in Ohio. Poor education is dooming our economy.

Crime

Gun safety is the biggest thing. Indiana has too many guns.

Reproductive rights

Beyond child care, reproductive rights is the biggest impediment to women’s financial security. Women can’t control their own reproduction but are then vilified when they have kids and need financial assistance.

Environmental issues

  • Coal ash lagoons are right next to Lake Michigan. Coal ash contains metals that are very dangerous to humans. They seep into the ground to affect ground water and they leach into the lake. The state needs to support Nipsco’s cleanup efforts. Just Transition Indiana is promoting clean closure. Clean closure would benefit our economy and help Nipsco to transition to other work creating jobs and making the environment safer.
  • Environmental problems impact marginalized communities. The state should allow communities to have local over-site in the form of community councils.
  • There needs to be air and water monitoring and strict notification requirements when there is a problem.
  • Indiana needs to restore wetland protections.
  • We need to support college kids working on environmental issues.
  • Work with republicans on mitigation, like reducing CO2 emissions. Work with them on adaptation because climate changes are so evident.

Evictions

  • Indianapolis established a tenant bill of rights but the legislature overrode it.
  • The real issue is rentals. The federal government had a rental assistance fund during COVID but little of it was used.
    • Landlords are a powerful lobby group.
    • There should be a strict safety code. Everybody else has to follow code and so should landlords.

Voting rights

  • Polling places should be open for 12 hours.
  • Eliminate voter registration deadlines. Have same day registration.
  • Have a Voting Center system. Voters can vote at any site. Porter County has this system and has 44 sites.
  • Less than 500,00 qualified people are not registered to vote. The biggest issue is getting out the vote.