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Staff reports 10/06/2008

Somerset County - Mercer and Smithfield.
Kennebec County - Belgrade, Fayette, Mount Vernon, Readfield, Rome, Vienna and Wayne.

Name: Walter Gooley
Age: 74
Political Party: Republican
Residence: Farmington
Employment: Consulting forester, runs Christmas tree business
Education: BS in forestry and entomology, University of Connecticut
Political experience: Four terms Maine House; one term Maine Senate


Name: Ann Woloson
Age: 46
Political Party: Democrat
Residence: Belgrade
Employment: Executive Director, Prescription Policy Choices
Education: BA health and family life education, University of Maine at Orono; graduate course work completed in public health policy and community health education, University of Southern Maine and University of Maine
Political experience: None

Walter Gooley:

1. What can you, as a state legislator, do to help people struggling this year with the high cost of gas and oil?

Gooley supports taking $10 million from the state’s “rainy day” fund to supplement federal energy assistance money. He also supports and participates in efforts involving community groups to identify and help those in most need of assistance.

2. How would you handle the biggest issues facing the towns in your district?

Gooley said he hates mandates from above, whether at the federal or state level. He favors a grass-roots approach to handling big issues. He said he would have taken that approach to the school consolidation initiative.

3. Do you have any plans that would result in more jobs for Maine?

Gooley said he does not have specific plans but supports an approach that combines tax breaks with working with local economic-development groups such as the Greater Franklin County Development Corp.

4. What do you think of the beverage-tax repeal on the November ballot.

“I voted against the beverage tax.”

5. Would you support legislation to change the income tax or sales tax?

Gooley is against expanding the sales tax but favors lowering the income tax from 8.5 to 6 percent. To compensate for the loss of tax revenue that would result, Gooley recommends assessing the size of state government, especially at the administrative level, to see if reductions could be made.

6. What’s the biggest social issue facing the state in the next two years?

Gooley is not against entitlement programs for low-income Mainers but said eligibility standards need to be re-evaluated. He favors, for example, a 30-day waiting period for MaineCare eligibility for newcomers to Maine who are income eligible for the program.



Ann Woloson

1. What can you, as a state legislator, do to help people struggling this year with the high cost of gas and oil?

Woloson sees a short-term and a long-term approach. The most immediate step is to take steps to make sure everybody eligible for assistance knows about the programs. The long-term step is to work with the Maine congressional delegation to ensure that such programs are funded fully by the federal government.


2. How would you handle the biggest issues facing the towns in your district?

Woloson said listening to constituents is the starting point to tackling any big issues. Once a problem is defined, she said she would first look to work with local organizations and community people to resolve the issue before turning to the legislative process.

3. Do you have any plans that would result in more jobs for Maine?

Woloson sees alternative energy and health care as two growth industries. Her plan would be to develop academic programs at the college level to produce graduates with the skills to fill positions in those professions.

4. What do you think of the beverage-tax repeal on the November ballot.

Woloson opposes repealing the beverage tax although she is critical of the process that led to the tax. She said the tax funds a worthy program in Dirigo Health.

5. Would you support legislation to change the income tax or sales tax?

Woloson would support a decrease in the income tax for middle-to-low-income Mainers.

6. What’s the biggest social issue facing the state in the next two years?

She sees the rising cost of health-care as the most critical concern. “I think the cost of health care affects everything.”

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