Republicans in state House race debate

PANAMA CITY — Four candidates vying for the Florida House District 6 race echoed common conservative themes in a debate in Panama City on Monday night as they tried to convince Republican voters to cast their votes for them.

They talked of less government and regulations, lower taxes and conservative values.

The event, held at the Martin Theatre on Harrison Avenue, was hosted by the Bay County Republican Party. It featured Republicans who are vying for their party’s nomination in the race to fill the Florida House District 6 race, which is open because Jimmy Patronis can’t run again due to term limits.

The candidates included Tho Bishop, 24, who has previously served as a deputy communications director for the House Financial Services Committee in Washington, D.C.; Melissa Hagan, 45, the former chief development officer at Gulf Coast State College; Thelma Rohan, 68, a nurse who served on the Bay County School Board for eight years, and Jay Trumbull, 25, whose family runs a water distribution company.

The candidates first answered 10 questions, giving their views on topics including allowing casinos in Florida to their top initiative if elected.

All of the candidates except Bishop were opposed to allowing casino gambling to come into the state.

Bishop said casino gambling could provide jobs for local people.

“I’ve got a lot of friends I grew up with,” he said. “If they don’t work during the offseason, if they are unemployed, they’d love to take casino jobs. Now I can understand the moral concerns about gambling. I don’t think Tallahassee should be forcing gambling on Bay County. But I am fully in favor of letting the Legislature let Bay County make that decision for itself.”

They also gave their views on what their number one initiative would be as legislator.

Hagan said job growth especially in Bay County would be her priority.

“That would be my focus,” she said. “We need an educated workforce in order to attract new industry to this area, and I think education and job growth go hand in hand.

Rohan said her top goal as a legislator would be to improve education for children “to have the absolutely best education that we could possibly give them.”

“I don’t feel that when the governor allows Common Core (standards) to become part of the Florida plan that it is going to best serve our children,” she said.

Trumbull said his number one initiative is creating a “job friendly, business friendly environment for Bay County and for Florida.”

“All too often we have a lot of different areas that extorts small businesses, and one is way too much regulation,” he said. “Two, is increased taxes and fees, and three, is an increase in some frivolous lawsuits, and we have to figure out a way to make this the most business friendly place in the country. Florida is on the cusp of doing that.”

Bishop said a top priority for him would be to help people who have extensive nursing experience in the military get jobs at local hospitals without having to go through several more years of nursing training. He said he has a friend going through this.

“This is outrageous,” he said.

At the end of the question period, the candidates explained why they felt they would be the best candidate.

Hagan said she has the diplomatic skills to get things done in Tallahassee.

She said when the television commercials stop airing, “I think that’s when the real work of governance begins, and that’s when your wisdom of life experiences and that art of persuasion that you need to get things gone in Tallahassee is going to be used.”

Rohan said her life experience and experience as a School Board member is what sets her apart.

“Whether you think my age is a problem, that’s with you, that’s not with me,” she said. “I do have the energy. I have the experience. I have more experience than these three candidates all rolled into one. I’m a 50-year grassroots Republican. I’m very proud of that.”

Trumbull said he is proud to be a part of a four-generation business in Bay County.

“I’m proud of the fact that my great grandfather moved to Panama City with absolutely nothing,” he said. “He borrowed $3,000 from his uncle to open Culligan water on Harrison Avenue in 1947.”

Trumbull said he not proud of how the government treats small businesses.

“What I’m not proud of is that we have government getting in the way of people trying to carry out the same American dream that my great grandfather was able to accomplish,” he said. “As I’ve talked about tonight, that is through red tape and regulations, just redundancies and overreach, gross overreaching, regulation.”

Bishop said he wants to be a difference maker in Tallahassee.

He said he remembers how his late father inspired him, helping to build the Republican Party in the South and going behind enemy lines in Vietnam to rescue prisoners of war.

“He used to tell me that the right people with the right ideas with the right location can change the world,” Bishop said. “That’s what drives me here today, because I don’t know about you, but I’m sick and tired of the status quo. Both parties are to blame.”

He criticized the Legislature in its last session for passing the largest budget in the state’s history.

Bishop said the Legislature has been “rewarding big corporations at the expense of small businesses,” and has done nothing to stop the federal takeover of the fisheries.

“The attorney general has said that having a concealed weapon in your car justifies police searching your vehicle,” he said. “In the state of Florida, you should not be giving up your Fourth Amendment rights.”