Private option at issue in House District 94

ROGERS — The Republican primary for state House District 94 is between Rep. Rebecca Petty, the incumbent of Rogers, and the legislator she succeeded, Debra Hobbs.

Hobbs, also of Rogers, was unable to run for re-election in 2014 because of limits on the number of terms a lawmaker could serve. Petty won the seat while Hobbs made an unsuccessful bid for lieutenant governor. The Republican primary in 2014 was Petty’s first race.

Voters in 2014 approved an increase in the number of terms allowed, making Hobbs eligible to run again for up to 10 more years in the Legislature.

The winner of the March 1 Republican primary will face Democrat Grimsley Graham in the Nov. 8 general election. Graham is another returning candidate. He unsuccessfully opposed Petty for her first term in the 2014 general election.

Hobbs said she decided to run against Petty because Petty voted to continue the state’s private-option health care program for another two years. The private option uses taxpayer money to subsidize private insurance.

Hobbs opposes the plan and voted against it when it was first approved in 2013.

Petty said she approved the state budget including the extension to give a legislative task force time to find an alternative, as Gov. Asa Hutchinson requested. Hutchinson, a Republican, met with the U.S. secretary of health and human services earlier this month to seek federal approval for changes to the plan.

“The biggest difference between us besides experience and background is our view on the private option,” Hobbs said. “I think spending $1.1 billion of taxpayers’ money for insurance for able-bodied people who can do like we do and buy insurance is a mistake. That money should go to people who need help. We will be cutting the Medicaid fund to pay for people who could take care of themselves.”

Federal health care change was forced on the state and no amount of protest will make that disappear, Petty said.

The private option was crafted by Republican lawmakers in 2013 as a response to Democratic lawmakers, she said. Democrats, including Gov. Mike Beebe, wanted to accept federal taxpayer dollars for a simple expansion of the Medicaid program to about 200,000 more people.

Instead, Arkansas lawmakers designed a plan to subsidize private insurance plans with money intended for Medicaid expansion, she said. This meant recipients had to pay at least a part of their own costs, unlike what would happen in a straight expansion of Medicaid.

In other issues, Petty noted the challenges of the fast growth in her district.

“I have to watch out for business and make sure the state keeps up a pro-growth environment by not raising taxes or adding regulations we don’t need. We don’t have as much crime as other parts of the state, but that’s an important issue to us. That’s one reason my district appreciates it when I try to be a voice for the voiceless. I speak up for crime victims, and I’m hard on crime.” Many vulnerable people, particularly the elderly, live in the district, she said.

Petty said she is particularly proud of sponsoring legislation that allows child victims of crime to take a therapy dog into the witness stand to comfort them when testifying against adults who attacked them. She also sponsored legislation that allows police faster access to tracking cellular phones in kidnapping cases.

Hobbs said she has a long history of protecting private-property rights, extending back to before her service in the Legislature to her time on the Benton County Quorum Court.

She served the district as legislator for six years, has lived there for decades and knows it well, she said.

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