Senate District 20 covers 22 communities and three counties. It extends from Friendship in the east to Wiscasset in the west and all the way from Southport to Windsor. This year, the two candidates running to represent District 20 are as politically different as Monhegan Island is geographically different from Hibberts Gore. It makes for an easy decision if you are among the politically decided.  

The candidates

Democrat Chris Johnson (Somerville) currently represents Senate District 20, a seat he assumed in a special February 2012 election after David Trahan left office early. Republican Les Fossel (Alna) has represented House District 53 since 2008.

Fossel and Johnson’s personal and political differences were apparent in interviews conducted in October, while both men were in full campaign stride.

Johnson met me at Sarah’s Cafe in Wiscasset after a day of work as IT Director at DeskNet, Inc. in Portland. Johnson was dressed in an oxford shirt and gray pants. His dark blue foreign compact car was only recognizable because of its legislative license plate.

Johnson was reviewing papers when I arrived, doing his homework for an upcoming debate. We took a table in a quiet corner of the bar; he ordered hot tea and I sipped a glass of water.

Fossel, who has owned a small construction business since 1975, met me at the Wiscasset Newspaper at 8 a.m. His red Chevy S-10 displayed a Fossel campaign sign that dwarfed the truck’s bed. Dressed in a plaid shirt with turtleneck underneath, Fossel walked through the door jonesing for coffee. When he discovered there was none, he made some himself. His manner and rapid stream of conversation suggested this would not be his first cup.

Johnson, both one-on-one and in debates, is subdued and measured in his responses. He pauses to consider before he speaks and then he speaks slowly and quietly. Like Johnson, Fossel is thorough in his answers, supplying statistics, anecdotes and specific examples. But his speech is more rapid and animated than Johnson’s and he is harder to keep on topic. Subdued is not a word that one would apply to him.

Les Fossel

In conversation, Fossel often returns to the human dimension of politics. He sees his job as listener, problem-solver and consensus builder. He’s co-chair of the legislature’s Moderate Caucus, a gathering he calls one of the few opportunities for legislators to simply talk about issues. Fossel thinks finding a middle ground is essential to lasting solutions.

“You must believe in the good intentions of your opponents and not just take aim from your bunkers. We are all at fault and must take responsibility and work together,” he said.

Fossel said while campaigning he heard most concerns about the economy, jobs and healthcare and “a whole lot of distrust of government.”

On the economy, Fossel said “government can do a whole lot less than we claim.” Fossel has seen his own business drop from 12 to 2.5 employees and, as Board Treasurer, has fostered the Deck House, a residential school in Edgecomb, through tough economic times.

He said the economic recession provides an opportunity to focus on what’s important but also is a time to reduce spending. He said the recent cuts in the Department of Health and Human Services were necessary. “We took money from corrections and education and put it into DHHS and it didn’t begin to cover the shortfall,” Fossel said.

Fossel defends tax cuts for top income brackets as a way to keep high income earners in the state. He said some of the coastal population decline can be linked to unfavorable taxation. “These are people who still live here but now they have Georgia and Florida plates,” he said.

When it comes to healthcare, Fossel is armed with a trailer load of statistics. He thinks reducing healthcare costs is a high priority for economic growth.

“We don’t have a healthcare system, we have chaos. The result is costs are wildly high,” Fossel said. Fossel voted for Public Law 90, which allows insurance companies to set rates based on age and location. Some small businesses have reported large insurance rate increases, but Fossel has continued to support the bill and its intent to rationalize the insurance market.

Fossel doesn’t think a community hospital administrative district for the Boothbay peninsula has any chance of making it through the legislature and that it may not be financially feasible if it did.

“Price shifting has led to a death spiral for small hospitals. The question for Lincoln County Healthcare is can we keep Miles from the same death spiral,” Fossel said.

On education, Fossel said he is troubled by the combination of high education costs, poor student outcomes and low teacher salaries. He is in favor of reducing administration, instituting larger class sizes except for the youngest students and finding a way to make school choice more available. He suggests that any school that accepts tuition students should be willing to pay for an equal number of students to tuition to other schools.

On renewable energy, Fossel said most energy sources have their environmental downside, all are subsidized and he would be reluctant to limit Maine’s options. He said he also doesn’t advocate Maine “getting beyond science.”

“I want others to test them (new technologies). I want to be second. It’s too expensive to be first. I want the problems to be solved before we adopt,” Fossel said.

Fossel sees the job of legislator as one of defining problems closely and avoiding large, sweeping changes.

“The question is how small a change and how little can we do to solve the problems we face,” he said.

Chris Johnson

In his short stint as senator, Johnson has found working directly with constituents to solve problems more satisfying than his time in session. He cites as an example his work with local, state and federal agencies to clean up the Medomak River estuary and open clam flats to harvesting. Johnson said he is good at getting the right people together to find solutions and at asking questions that prompt an opening rather than a closing of options.

Johnson believes that the state needs to change direction. He thinks the shift in tax burden to lower wage earners and the governor’s austerity measures have further stagnated the economy. “We are effectively at zero job growth in the state,” he said, “We are not taking advantage of opportunities to improve the job market.”

Johnson agrees with Fossel that jobs, the economy and healthcare are his constituents’ greatest concerns but he disagrees on how to address these. He believes that government can stimulate the economy by investing in the state’s infrastructure. He’s frustrated by Governor LePage’s veto of research and development and construction bonds.

“Now is the time to put people to work, particularly in the construction trades, that have been hard hit,” Johnson said.

Johnson also disagrees with the governor’s stance on clean energy and the state’s renewable portfolio standard (RPS).

“The whole idea of the RPS is to say we want to create more capacity for clean power. Wind energy is obviously not cheaper than other sources. But if we are going to solve engineering problems, we need to do these experiments,” Johnson said.

Johnson said there is no silver bullet to solve the healthcare crisis but the Affordable Care Act is a “slight step in the right direction.” He has opposed Public Law 90, calling it a rate hike bill and sees a need for more government involvement in pharmaceutical drugs.

“Drug companies keep pushing prices up.We need more government sponsorship of research and more ownership.When government pays for research, it should share the profits from medical breakthroughs,” he said.

Johnson voted against this year’s budget and the cuts to MaineCare. “I don’t think 50,000 people getting their health benefits cut is going to save money,” Johnson said. Cutting healthcare benefits will translate to higher costs since people without healthcare coverage delay care and rely on emergency departments more, he said.

Johnson disagrees with Fossel on tax cuts for the highest income brackets and thinks it neither generates jobs nor revenue. “The richest one percent are paying under 10 percent of what they earn while the poorest fifth are paying 17 percent,” Johnson said. Cutting taxes lowers the state’s revenues, which leads to cutting services, like education, and shifting more burden onto communities, he said.

Johnson is passionate about education and serves on the RSU 12 school board. He thinks consolidation has worked in some places to reduce costs and to expand opportunities for teachers and students. Johnson said Somerville decided last year to send its seventh and eighth graders to Windsor school. “Now they have bigger science programs and enough students for dances and sports, and it reduced costs,” he said.

On the St. Andrews Hospital front, Johnson would like to see the community dynamic become less adversarial. “We need to talk about what else we can do. What drove Lincoln County Healthcare to this decision and can we influence it or its consequences,” he said. Johnson said he would like to help facilitate that process.

Sue Mello can be reached at 844-4629 or sumello@boothbayregister.com