Candidate for Iowa State Senate - District 27 in 2022 Iowa General Election.
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Get StartedWhen Sam temporarily shut down her businesses during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, she still had to provide for her family. So, she took a job as a custodian in the Grinnell Community School District. She saw firsthand the very best of humanity: our educators. She saw them at school at six in the morning and then again at six at night, working relentlessly to provide our kids with the best education. But she also saw how undervalued and underfunded Iowa's public education system is. Too many rural school buildings are in disrepair, with deteriorating infrastructure. Too many educators and school staff are overworked and underpaid. Too many career politicians in Des Moines have villainized and politicized our teachers. Consequently, we are seeing many teachers who feel burned out and unappreciated leave the classroom. As your senator, Sam will work tirelessly to increase funding for public schools, increase starting pay and retirement benefits for teachers, and provide more supplies and resources for the good of all our children. Education at its best is a partnership that includes parents, educators, and the school district. Sam is committed to listening and working with anyone to restore Iowa's reputation as a beacon and model for what education should look like in America. Learn more
Sam supports bringing down the cost of healthcare for all Iowans. That means expanding Medicare and Medicaid to cover all Iowans. Being in a rural area should never be a barrier to access to healthcare. In the Senate, Sam will fight to keep our rural hospitals and nursing homes open, expand clinics and community health centers in rural areas, incentivize highly-skilled doctors and nurses to live and work in rural communities, and implement a patient-centered-payment system. She is also keenly aware of the challenges Iowa has regarding mental health. We need to attract more practitioners to the state and expand mental health care availability and affordability. We need to provide sufficient funding for community mental health centers and funding for more emergency committal beds. We must lower the cost of prescription drugs - allow Medicare to negotiate for lower prices, support measures to increase price transparency for all drugs and medications, and regulate cost-sharing and deductibles. Learn more
Agriculture The cornerstone of Iowa's economy is our thriving agricultural system. Sam may not be a farmer, but she is committed to listening and learning about agriculture and the policies that affect farmers. Sam supports local ownership of farms. When you have colossal factory farms with control over every component of production, rural family farmers are at a considerable disadvantage. We need to stop rural agricultural monopolies from suppressing wages and taking rural agricultural revenues from our local communities. We should make it easier to start and run a family farm and use tax dollars for rural development over corporate handouts. Unregulated CAFOs or Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations have resulted in thousands of cows, hogs, and chickens housed in small areas. These industrial farms poison our waterways, pollute the air and threaten small farmers. In the Senate, she will advocate for a movement from an agricultural system dominated by unregulated CAFOs to one that emphasizes local food production. Learn more
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