TheTimesTribune.com, Corbin, KY

Elections

Discussion

January 31, 2012

Three Republicans file for 4th District seat

Times-Tribune

CORBIN — By Ronnie Ellis / CNHI News Service

Three more Republicans jumped into the race to succeed retiring Republican Congressman Geoff Davis from Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District.

State Rep. Alicia Webb-Edgington, Lewis County Judge/Executive Thomas Massie and Oldham County School Board member Brian Oerther all filed papers Monday for the race, joining Boone County Judge/Executive Gary Moore who filed his papers last week.

Massie, 41, is in his first term as Lewis County judge/executive. He is an entrepreneur and graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who says he has already found over $200,000 in recurring savings during his first term as judge/executive.

He said his “private sector background as a job creator” makes him the best candidate in the race. “I know what it takes to make payroll, I know what it takes to grow a business.” He said more private sector experience is needed in congress.

He said the federal debt is a crisis and backs a plan to cut spending by 1 percent each year for six years until the budget is balanced. Massie proposes more domestic energy production and less regulation of the energy industry and wants a simpler tax code.

The tax code is “too confusing, it needs to be fairer and it needs to be flatter and we need to take out some of the loopholes that the special interests have carved in there with their political clout.”

Oerther has never held public office. He’s worked for 10 years as a middle school math teacher and lives in LaGrange and calls himself an “anti-tax activist.”

Webb-Edgington, 45, was first elected the state House in 2008 after serving as Homeland Security director during Republican Gov. Ernie Fletcher’s administration. Before that, the Edmonson County native was a Kentucky State Police trooper. She and her husband, Ted, and their teenage daughter, Jill, live in Fort Wright.

Like Massie and Moore, Webb-Edgington sees the federal debt and budget deficit as the number one problem facing the country and the top issue in the race. The debt is so large, she said, that it translates into “$45,000 of debt for every man, woman and child in the country.” She said the district’s biggest specific issues are jobs and funding for the Brent Spence Bridge that connects northern Kentucky to Cincinnati over the Ohio Rivers. She describes herself as “a fiscal and social conservative.”

“I am the only one in this race with legislative experience who has voted on the issues,” Webb-Edgington said. “I have a record and I want people to review that record.”

Moore, a native of Pendleton County, is in his fourth term as Boone County judge/executive and is married to Court of Appeals Judge Joy Moore. They have two adult children. Moore worked in the building and housing supply industry for more than three decades and says his business experience has allowed him to operate Boone County government more efficiently, something he wants to bring to Washington.

He touts his record as judge/executive, saying property taxes have fallen in Boone County even as he cut the county budget by $4 million.

RONNIE ELLIS writes for CNHI News Service and is based in Frankfort. Reach him at rellis@cnhi.com. Follow CNHI News Service stories on Twitter at www.twitter.com/cnhifrankfort.

Text Only
Elections