2019 Governor's State of the State speeches: on Welfare & Poverty
J.B. Pritzker:
Low minimum wage is sentence to poverty
Many of you asked me why I made passing a $15 minimum wage an immediate priority. The current minimum wage is $8.25 an hour--which means even if you are working full time every week out of the year, you are making $17,000 a year.
You can't send your kids to college on $17,000 a year. You can't afford a single health emergency. You can't sustain child care. And one paycheck is often the only firewall against homelessness. The current minimum wage is a lifetime sentence to poverty.
Source: 2019 State of the State address to the Illinois legislature
Feb 20, 2019
David Ige:
Lease state land for affordable housing
We need to use public resources to break the cycle of speculation and profit-taking that has turned affordable housing into an unreachable goal for our people. We will be submitting legislation to build condominiums for sale on state lands utilizing
99-year leases. The state will retain ownership of the land under these condos and determine the terms of resale if the owners decide to sell. We will be able to keep the units affordable, plan growth, create jobs, and make the most of unused state lands
Source: 2019 State of the State address to Hawaii legislature
Jan 22, 2019
Kate Brown:
Invest $400M in affordable, accessible housing
Every Oregonian should have a warm, safe, dry place to call home. And it should be affordable and accessible. We have to act quickly to help the chronically homeless and our children and families and our veterans. My budget makes a historic
$400 million investment in housing. If you approve a $20 million bonding package early this session, we can speed up construction of 200 units of permanent housing for the chronically homeless.
Source: 2019 State of the State address to the Oregon legislature
Jan 14, 2019
Brad Little:
First-Time Home Buyer Account: tax break for young families
We must make sure state government is reducing all unnecessary barriers to prosperity. One barrier is the daunting financial reality facing first-time homebuyers, particularly young people just starting their careers and families. One specific proposal
I will champion to help more Idahoans achieve the American Dream is the First-Time Home Buyer Savings Account. This account will encourage young families to set aside part of their pre-tax income to make a down payment on their first home.
Source: 2019 State of the State address to Idaho legislature
Jan 7, 2019
Charlie Baker:
Make housing policy with transportation policy in mind
There's much to do in transportation. I want to highlight some of the recommendations of our Transportation Futures Commission. - First, continue to invest in public transportation.
- Second, we must make the investments in public infrastructure
that will enable the next generation of zero emission & autonomous vehicles to thrive here in the Commonwealth.
- Third, reduce greenhouse gas emissions within the transportation system.
- Finally, we need to more fully appreciate the relationship
between where people live and where they work and how state and local government policies affect their ability to get from one to the other. Our housing bill was a strong step in the right direction to deal with this. It respected the need for
communities to plan for themselves, but created incentives to tie development more closely to overarching strategies concerning transportation and land use generally. In the end, it failed because it was too much for some and not enough for others.
Source: 2019 Massachusetts governor inaugural (State of the State)
Jan 3, 2019
Doug Burgum:
World poverty is down; world health is up; ND will benefit
Our total population now surpasses 760,000--for the first time in state history. Many of our citizens had direct experience with our decades of rural depopulation--and claims that "things are getting worse." The facts clearly show otherwise.Extreme
global poverty has been cut in half over the last 20 years. 75% of the world now lives in middle income countries. Global life expectancy is up to 72 years. Across the globe, we've seen dramatic decreases in deaths related to disease, war and natural
disasters--and dramatic increases in access to clean water and electricity, literacy, food production, internet access and immunizations. Abundance--by nearly every measure--is on the rise.
Why does this matter to North Dakota? For two reasons. A
world with improving health and increasing incomes will consume more energy--more food--and more technology. The world will need more and more of what North Dakota has. Second, it matters in the context of the US--and North Dakota's role in the world.
Source: 2019 State of the State address to North Dakota Legislature
Jan 3, 2019
Page last updated: Apr 02, 2019