The candidates for the Indiana House of Representatives District 58 seat have a few things in common.
Both Republican incumbent Michelle Davis and Democrat challenger Sandy James are Whiteland residents who are passionate about education. They’re both mothers of two and work in public education.
However, they differ greatly on education policy and other issues facing the state.
Davis, 55, is the Adult Education Director for Central Nine Career Center and has spent her first two terms in the Statehouse helping shape legislation on the House education committee, of which she is vice-chair. She’s also made it a habit of meeting with constituents to hear their views on issues being discussed at the Statehouse. Some examples include a recent meeting with school leaders on disciplinary issues and truancy, as well as a previous series of town halls on illegal immigration.
She’s seeking another term to continue this work for another four years.
“I’ve been listening and learning quite a bit and continue to do some good work at the Statehouse. I feel like my work there is not quite done yet,” Davis said.
James, 61, has published multiple books and is currently teaching college-level Advanced Psychology at Greenwood Community High School. If elected, she would aim to focus on education issues using her 30 years of experience in the classroom. She traces problems facing public schools today back to two issues: that policy largely hasn’t been shaped by educators and that laws enacted by the Republican supermajority have redistributed funding to private schools.
“I see what the effects of some of those laws are, and right now, I don’t like a lot of them. So as a result, I decided that perhaps I needed to run and hopefully have some influence on future educational decisions,” James said.
James said she is also running to be an advocate for LGBTQ+ youth in the Statehouse. She has seen the “bad effect” House Enrolled Act 1608, a 2023 law authored by Davis, has had on students and staff. She says this bill, among other things, requires teachers to get permission to call a student a different name or use different pronouns. To make sure they’re in compliance, teachers have to confirm any deviation, even something as simple as a student named Sandra asking to be called Sandy, she said.
The following are their responses to questions the Daily Journal developed based on issues likely to be brought up in the Statehouse and issues that voters are talking about. Their responses were edited for length, grammar and clarity.
Next year is a budget year, what do you think should be prioritized?
Davis: It’s definitely going to be a challenging budget year. Of course, our property taxes are important, and making sure that we are handling the budget wisely, because we need to ensure that we can fund certain things that we need to fund, but yet be mindful of how we set the budget. So, we need to ensure that we continue to fund our schools, our parks, our public safety, police and fire … It’s important to remember that this is hard-working Hoosiers’ money that they go to work every day for, and we need to be mindful of how we are spending it.
James: We need to look at infrastructure. We have so many problems with crumbling roads, crumbling sidewalks, crumbling bridges. Again, I think the Republican supermajority has not focused on rebuilding things the way they should. I think we need to focus very heavily on education, teacher salaries. I think Indiana, if I read it correctly, is No. 42 out of 50 in the state for lowest teacher salaries. I personally know some young teachers who were starting their careers that left for other careers because they simply could not afford to raise a family and what teachers make so education needs to be a priority.
Do you think Hoosiers need property tax relief? If so, could it be achieved without impacting local governments and schools?
Davis: That’s the million dollar question at this point. I don’t have an exact answer for that. I think if someone did that would be awesome. … It’s the local governments that get much of the property tax income and we do need to make sure we can safely and wisely continue to fund our public safety, our schools, our parks, our infrastructure. Yet, people need to be able [to afford] to live their day-to-day lives. We, as a government, need to be mindful and responsible that we can’t tax people out of their property. I have met with some property owners and with some farmers here in Johnson County and they are concerned with property taxes as well. … This budget year, is going to be key and instrumental in how our state moves forward. And I think a lot of that will depend on the winner in November of the governor’s race as well.
James: The thing about saying that you want to see property taxes drop, it’s popular because everybody’s going, ‘Oh yes, that means I pay less property taxes.’ I would like to see our property taxes done in a different way. Yes, we need property taxes. We need it for schools. We need that income for infrastructure. We put too much of a burden on the middle class for those types of property taxes. There should be more emphasis on businesses paying their fair share. … I would like to see some relief for seniors. They are on a very fixed income, and as property taxes go up, they have to give up other important things. … We need some sort of reform [in general]. It’s just a matter of finding the right way without all the income that has come from property taxes just disappearing. So, to say you want to reform is great, but you need to have some really good ideas on what to do when that income is gone. … I would like to see something that is more equitable across the income [brackets] — you know, people paying their fair share. So if that requires some sort of income tax change, or a luxury tax on larger items, those would be things I might look for.
A recent study says Indiana needs $1 billion to fund needed improvements to local roads and bridges. What could the legislature do to raise this money?
Davis: We are the Crossroads of America, so we need to make sure that our infrastructure is strong. That’ll be huge discussion as we move forward in this budget year. I think that the user pay is kind of what we’ve always been on here in Indiana, but we need to ensure that locals can get their fair share of the funding. That’s something that I think we do with our Community Crossings matching grant.
James: I think we need to look at the tax system the way it is right now and maybe do some shuffling of what we do with tax money. I think a lot of stuff maybe goes the wrong directions. I know Indiana is sitting on a surplus, and some of that surplus has come from neglecting things like infrastructure. So we — with it being a budget year — need to do a really good assessment: Where’s the money going? Where is it coming from? Do we need more, or do we just need to redirect it?
Do you think the legislature is on the right track with recent education legislation?
Davis: I do think we’ve been on the right track. We’ve put some good legislation out there with the Science of Reading to help with our literacy and our reading in the lower elementary grades. … We’re beginning to see some better IREAD scores coming through, which is a great thing. I liked our bill not allowing cell phones in the school, in the classrooms while education is going on. I’ve heard I’ve had a couple of meetings with Clark-Pleasant and Greenwood school corporations, and we were discussing the cell phone bill and they have seen positive outcomes from that. … We have some work to do still on truancy and attendance issues. We did pass legislation last year, but I think it needs some work. And we’re going to work on that here, in the Summer Study [committee]. … I have met a couple of times with the NAACP and some other education groups about truancy and attendance issues, so I’m digging into those. … Our schools should and can teach the basics, of course. I am a true advocate for the parental rights piece of that, where parents should be involved in the education of their kids. I do like the voucher system that we have out there, and as continuing to grow that so more students have choices. I’m all about choices. I think competition is good, so I’ll continue to support those efforts as well.
James: The new diploma requirements were, in my opinion, ridiculous. It hurt Hoosier students. I’m very glad that they listened to the outcry from parents and teachers and did make some adjustments to that. My question is, why change what we have with the honors diploma and Core 40 that actually works very well. I don’t see any reason we needed to lower requirements. It seems to me that when you lower requirements, you’re turning out less able students when we need to be turning out more able students. … Vouchers in Indiana, to me, are abused. That is public money being paid to public schools. When we started out, I believe Gov. [Mitch] Daniels said it was going to be very seldom used. I saw an article in the Indianapolis Star that said that it’s just exploded since pandemic, and that money is often going to parochial schools or expensive private schools. What should be the ability of a family to choose which school their children go to has become a safety net for wealthy people to have some of the tuition for their private schools taken care of. I don’t think that’s right. The idea of a voucher is great. It’s great to say a child has a choice in a school, but that voucher, to me, should be used for a public school. If you are unhappy at some place like Clark-Pleasant, send your kid to Greenwood. If you’re unhappy at Edinburgh, send your kid to Center Grove. There should be choices like that between public schools.
Hoosiers’ hospital bills are among the highest in the U.S. Do you think the legislature should act to help curb costs for Hoosiers?
Davis: I talked to Johnson Memorial Health and [President and CEO] Dr. [David] Dunkle about this a few times. I like said on education, I think competition is good for everyone. The hospital billing, yes, it’s outrageous. But don’t know how much you want government in some of this stuff, sometimes it’s a fine line that we’ll walk. But I do think transparency is important as well. Johnson Memorial Health here in Johnson County is our largest employer in the county. They do great. So, I will be supportive of Dr. Dunkle and what he’s doing there but I do think hospital pricing needs to be looked at.
James: That’s going to be a tricky one because we have a society — especially when we’re looking at how big the Baby Boomers are — that is aging. So, bills are getting higher and higher. My late husband fought colon cancer for two years. His bills were astronomical. Yes, we need to do something about it. And what we need to do is sit down and look at how much profit insurance companies, hospitals and pharmaceuticals are making. Because there needs to be some limit to that because they’re making it on the back of consumers. They’re making it on the back of sick people. So, I was very supportive of President Biden’s lowering the cost of insulin. We need to look at where can we do things like that for Indiana.
Do you agree with the cuts made to Indiana Medicaid causing some Hoosiers to lose coverage or pay for it for the first time? Is there a better way the Medicaid shortfall could’ve been made up?
Davis: I don’t agree with that. I also don’t know that there’s a good answer and I don’t know that we know exactly what happened with the shortfall. I’m sure there are [other] ways, and [we are] continuing to have those conversations with experts in those areas, to listen and gain insight. I’ve talked to constituents in our community who are negatively affected because of the cuts. I have empathy for them for what they’ve been going through. But I don’t know that anyone has an answer. That’s part of this whole challenging budget year that we’re going to have.
James: The fact that we had a shortage, after all of the bragging about how much surplus we had in Indiana, that bothers me. Yes, something needs to be done about it. We again, are balancing budgets on the backs of people who can’t afford medicine or can’t afford food. I don’t think those cuts should have been done. I think we should have found a better way to deal with that, instead of hurting people.
The lack of affordable housing is an issue facing Johnson County and the state. Is this something you think the legislature should address?
Davis: We need to continue to look for ways to encourage local community communities to address this as well. But it all kind of ties back to how much you want government getting involved in these things? We did have House Enrolled Act 1005 last year, which had it did something with administering some residential housing infrastructure, like assistance funds. … When you talk to groups and constituents, the cost of housing that’s out there and the lack of affordable housing that’s out there is definitely an issue and a discussion topic. I’ve been in the legislature for four years, and I feel like we’ve talked about this every year. So I don’t know that anyone has a good answer yet … but the discussion is still out there. It ties back to our budget year and our property tax solution and what that might will look like when we get through this.
James: What I see around me in Johnson County is starter homes being bought up by corporations that then turn around and rent them out at prices that are way above what the market should bear. We need to have some limits on these companies coming in and snatching up every home because, No. 1, it increases house prices. No. 2, it then forces them to increase rental prices and again, they’re making a profit off of people who can’t afford it. During the pandemic, house prices were kind of average. And then because of supply and demand, after the pandemic, when everybody started looking, prices were jumping left and right. We’re at least seeing that settle now. I still think that we’re a little overinflated, and that worries me.
THE DAVIS FILE
Name: Michelle Davis
Party: Republican
Age: 55
Residence: Whiteland
Family: Husband, James; two adult children
Occupation: Director of Adult Education, Central Nine Career Center
Education background: Franklin Community High School, 1987; Ball State University, 1992; Purdue University, 2017
Political experience: State Rep. District 58 since 2020
Memberships: Indiana Adult and Continuing Education Association, Coalition of Adult Basic Education, Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame, NRA, School Safety Specialist
THE JAMES FILE
Name: Sandy James
Party: Democrat
Age: 61
Residence: Whiteland
Family: Husband, Brian Dieckmann; two adult children
Occupation: Advanced Psychology Instructor, Greenwood Community High School
Education background: Indiana State University, bachelor’s 1983; Indiana University, master’s 1994; Postgraduate courses, University of St. Francis
Political experience: First-time candidate
Memberships: American Psychological Association, Teachers of Psychology in Secondary Schools
ABOUT THE JOB
What: Indiana House of Representatives, District 58
Term: Two years
Pay: $28,791 annually + per diem of $196 a day (2024)
Duties: Representatives draft and vote on legislation brought before the General Assembly, including the bi-annual state budget.
Area: District 58 includes all of Clark Township and most of Pleasant Township.
