(C) Pennsylvania Capital-Star
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State Rep.-elect Scott Barger wants to find common ground on public education • Pennsylvania Capital-Star [1]
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Date: 2024-12-17 11:00:00+00:00
Scott Barger describes his time spent as a vocational pastor as his dream job, but after his father died, he moved back home to Pennsylvania to help his mother in 2015.
Barger was born and raised in central Pennsylvania and upon returning to the region, he helped run the family business, which included broadcast radio. In January, he launched a primary challenge to incumbent state Rep. Jim Gregory (R-Blair) for the 80th state House District.
“Sitting around and complaining about the political climate doesn’t really change anything,” he told the Capital-Star. “And so through some not so gentle encouragement from friends and acquaintances, we decided to get involved and try to be part of finding solutions, instead of sitting on the sideline and complaining about problems.”
Barger defeated Gregory, a three term incumbent, by 8 points in the primary election, which some outlets described as an upset. Barger did not have a Democratic challenger in the general election.
His campaign website highlights his positions on a wide variety of issues including his support for a “Florida-style public measurement” to reshape public education, which some other conservative states are following suit. He also opposes the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, and wants to defund Planned Parenthood. Barger also would seek to enact “welfare to work” legislation that would require “healthy, able-bodied citizens to perform work or community service to renew benefits,” and supports state pension reform.
He enters the state House at a time when Pennsylvania will, once again, have a divided legislature. But he thinks there’s common ground around finding solutions for public education.
“One thing we have in common is that none of us think that a kid’s education should be limited by their zip code,” Barger said. “And I do think that there is a growing kind of shared… I don’t want to say frustration, but a shared concern that if we just keep doing what we’ve always done, we’re going to keep getting what we’ve always got.”
He added that he believes it’s time to look at the way the state is funding schools, and is in favor of school vouchers.
This interview was lightly edited for length and clarity.
Capital-Star: Tell me about your district, and what’s unique about the district.
Barger: So the 80th is a very rural area. It’s conservative working people. Almost the entire district is in Blair County, but there’s a little bit that’s next door in Huntington County, but a lot of agriculture, a lot of outdoor activities, mountains, beautiful pastures, trails, all of that stuff.
It’s about as American a community as you’ve ever seen. We’ve got the small town feel, baseball, apple pie, the whole thing, and it’s, I love it. I love representing this district.
Capital-Star: So what would you say is the most pressing issue facing constituents in your district?
Barger: We have a president who’s won the popular vote and the Electoral College, and the issues that carried that campaign were primarily the border and the economy.
And I think here in the state of Pennsylvania, as I was knocking doors, the issue of the economy was at the top of everyone’s mind.
My first priority is…what can we do to unleash the economy here in the Keystone State? How we should respond to this nationwide concern that our economy should be doing better.
Now more regionally, I think that there’s a lot of frustration with the way that public education has worked across the state. We have concerns in small school districts, like what are here in the 80th district, but there’s also very serious concerns from urban centers in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia that the way we have been doing public education here for so long isn’t quite checking off all of the boxes. I do think that there are solutions to be found to those challenges.
Capital-Star: What is your top legislative priority when you’re sworn in? Can you talk about some bills you plan to introduce or support?
Barger: Well, as you know, we Republicans will be in the minority in the House. And so the legislative agenda really is determined by the other side.
However, my agenda, and what I encourage my Republican colleagues to join with me in this agenda is let’s work with Democrats to come up with bills that will be solutions to some of these problems that I’ve talked about, that can actually not just get out of committee and be passed on the House floor, but it’s something that that the Senators across across the other side of the building will actually consider voting for as well.
You know, we all want sort of the same things, right in our communities. We want good schools, we want safe neighborhoods, we want opportunity for our children to prosper in life. Well, we all want that, whether we’re Republican or Democrats. So the question is, how do we get there? So my personal legislative agenda is to work with the Democrats, who it looks like will be running the House here next year and for the next two years, to find bills that actually have a chance of passing the Senate that will solve some of these problems.
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