Springfield native announces gubernatorial bid

Keith Stern, a Springfield native who owns Stern’s Quality Produce in White River Junction, announced his plans to run for governor on July 2 in a post to the Vermont Republican Party Facebook page.


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2017-07-07 / Front Page Springfield native announces gubernatorial bid By KELSEY CHRISTENSEN kchristensen@eagletimes.com Keith Stern, a lifelong Springfield resident, announced his candidacy for governor in the Republican party on Sunday. — KELSEY CHRISTENSEN Keith Stern, a lifelong Springfield resident, announced his candidacy for governor in the Republican party on Sunday. — KELSEY CHRISTENSEN SPRINGFIELD, Vt. — Keith Stern, a Springfield native who owns Stern’s Quality Produce in White River Junction, announced his plans to run for governor on July 2 in a post to the Vermont Republican Party Facebook page. Stern is no stranger to bids for public office. The candidate has thrice run for U.S. Congress, but Stern wants people to know that this bid is full-throttle. “I ran for congress just to get my ideas out,” Stern said. In those days, Stern says, he was still working anywhere from 40 to 60 hours at the produce stand. “This time it’s 100 percent,” he said. One of Stern’s biggest priorities is lowering the cost of health care, which he says he can accomplish by doing away with the health care exchange. Under Stern’s health care plan, a single nonprofit company would act as the billing and collecting agent for all healthcare providers, obviating the for-profit insurance industry. Stern says the model would work as follows: a healthcare provider would perform a service and send the list of services to a company that would in turn either create a bill that would then go to the insurance company, government agency, or patient and then send a payment electronically to the healthcare provider, limiting delays in payment to health care providers and encouraging competition that will drive prices down. Services will be paid through an account into which all Vermonters are paying at an income-adjusted rate. A business owner himself, Stern also wants to see Vermont become friendlier to businesses. Stern thinks that tort reform, which would protect businesses from frivolous lawsuits and the high cost of liability insurance, would reduce the risk of entering into a business. “My plan for tort reform is a simplified system that’s easier than the jury system,” Stern said. “We can coax businesses with higher risk and liability issues.” Stern thinks pharmaceutical companies, for example, would be interested in moving to Vermont if they were better protected from liabilities, which, in turn, could help his initiatives to reduce health care costs. But, Stern is also interested in protecting smaller businesses as well. He says he’s had friends who wanted to start businesses but were priced out by the high cost of liability insurance. “I know the struggles businesses go through, with government and trying to make a living,” he said. His tort and business friendly initiatives would help to encourage job growth in the state, he says. Stern also wants to get tough on drugs, and on what he describes as “giving back.” Stern says he believes in the government helping people in need. He describes himself as closer to a Democrat in the mold of John F. Kennedy or Harry Truman than a Republican, but he doesn’t believe in handouts. He would like to see a system implemented in which government assistance is repaid through community service hours and projects like helping out at a daycare for lower income people or adult day-care, as an aide in schools, helping with after school and weekend programs, helping a disabled or elderly person in home, or other important jobs. Stern has similar ideas in the drug enforcement sector. While he wants to see stricter penalties for dealers, he also thinks that folks who have eschewed jail time and treated their addiction through rehabilitation programs should give back to those same programs, by helping out in a counseling capacity. Stern is also concerned about education in the state, and wants to look at innovative ideas to fix the problem. He said he thinks there’s too much government control over school, and would like to see control shift back to the local governments. That’s one of the reasons Stern is looking to unseat a governor in his own party: Gov. Phil Scott’s health care plan put the negotiation of health-care contracts into state hands. “School districts that want to pay more should pay more,” Stern said. “There’s not a one-size-fits-all-solution for school districts or communities.” Stern is also interested in increasing state rental stock by making it easier for landlords to cull destructive tenants from their properties, eliminating waste in government and reducing childcare costs for low-income families. “If people want less expensive healthcare, a better education system, lower taxes, a better business climate and higher paying jobs, those are some pretty good reasons to vote for me,” Stern said.