KINDER TAKES SENATE BID TO THE UNIVERSITY CAMPUS

State Senate candidate Peter Kinder says representing the interests of Southeast Missouri State University would be a top priority if he is elected.

Kinder told a crowd of about 30 faculty members, staff and administrators at Southeast Friday that the job of state senator for the 27th District involves "carrying the water and doing the heavy lifting for the university in Jefferson City."

During the nearly hour-long meeting at the University Center, the Cape Girardeau Republican said he recognizes he has an uphill battle to win a Senate seat in a district that has traditionally been Democratic.

"I know what I am up against in Southeast Missouri south of the Benton hills," said Kinder, who pointed out that he has many relatives who are Democrats.

But he said he has overcome such odds before when he helped engineer the election to Congress in 1980 of Republican Bill Emerson. Emerson won re-election and has repeatedly won re-election in Southeast Missouri.

"He would not have been elected without the support of Democrats or even re-elected," said Kinder.

Betty Hearnes of Charleston, Kinder's opponent in the Nov. 3 election, spoke to a university gathering Wednesday. She has said that a Democratic lawmaker is needed to represent the 27th District because the Senate is run by the Democrats.

But Kinder said the Senate is less divided than the Missouri House along party lines. "Party politics is not as big a factor in the Senate. Of the two bodies, the Senate is dramatically less partisan than the House."

He said he is well-acquainted with many of the state's political leaders and could work well with state senators on both sides of the political aisle.

Kinder insisted he could handle the political maneuvering needed to help the university and the 27th District, and "dance along the precipice that any legislator has to do."

Referring to Hearnes' argument for electing majority party candidates, Kinder said, "Taken on their face, those remarks are an argument for never doing anything."

The 38-year-old Kinder stressed the importance of having a strong public school system, both at the elementary and secondary level and in higher education.

"I owe a lot to the public school system of Missouri and to higher education as well," he said.

Kinder vowed to work for improvements in higher education and at Southeast Missouri State. He said the university is important to the region not only in terms of education, but also in terms of economic development.

He said that both he and the Southeast Missourian newspaper, at which he is associate publisher, backed Proposition B last year, the tax-and-reform measure for education.

But voters overwhelmingly rejected it. "I think they are sending us a reform message," said Kinder.

He said voters don't want business-as-usual in the Missouri Capitol. He said they don't trust the career politicians.

Kinder said that belief is driving public support for a November ballot measure calling for term limits.

The Cape Girardeau Republican supports the measure and predicts it will pass. "I think it is a reform that is coming. I think it is going to shake things up."

Kinder said he supports President Bush's idea of experimenting with a voucher system in elementary and secondary education.

"I look with favor upon the voucher system and school choice," he said.

School choice, he said, has strong support from minorities. The reason, said Kinder, is that minorities, particularly in urban areas, feel the public education system has let them down.

"The worst public education systems are in our distressed urban cores," said Kinder.

Currently, parents have no real choice in what public school their children attend, he said. That's not the case in higher education, he maintained.

"I see our current system in higher education being a choice system," said Kinder.