Interview with John Potter, candidate for Missouri’s 47th House District

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

John Potter is a Republican seeking a seat representing the 47th House District, which covers western and northwestern Boone County.

The district is currently represented by Democrat Adrian Plank, who won election 2022. Potter ran unsuccessfully for Columbia Board of Education twice, standing on a conservative platform that included criticism of CPS's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and saying the district needed more transparency.

Nia Hinson: Tell me why you decided to run for District 47.

John Potter: Yeah, I decided to run to represent the people. Well, I originally got involved in politics in the educational system, being heavily involved with Columbia Public Schools, attended a lot of board meetings. And just seeing that with my experience there, that the state could do some things more to help education in general.

Hinson: I guess I should start by asking you, how has your campaign been going so far? And when you're talking with voters, what have they been telling you?

Potter: Good, good. I think we're getting the momentum we need. When I'm talking to people I mean, we are focused on independence. We're trying to talk to them to get them to show up to the polls and vote for me. And so we're hearing pretty good, haven't been getting any doors slammed in our faces or anything like that. I think it's been a pretty good campaign so far.

Hinson: You mentioned one of your heavy focuses would be on education and bettering education. What are some of the other things that your platform kind of stands for?

Potter: I have a passion in the energy industry. I think I tend to look forward in the future and see trends in our electrical grid here in Columbia I think could be improved. I think that there's some things that are happening at a city level that I think may be hampering that. And so I want to kind of bring a coalition together, people to try to get a reliable energy source in Missouri here, nuclear power being that energy source. I think it's a, it's a like kind of a meet in the middle when it comes to burning coal and having wind and solar, which I think is good. I think we need to get off of burning coal. I think we need to focus in the meantime more on natural gas, solar and wind. I think solar and wind are good, but it's just not reliable here in Mid-Missouri. So, if we had a real sustainable energy source, I think we could bring business here in Missouri, especially in Mid-Missouri.

We already kind of embrace nuclear here in Mid-Missouri, with the Callaway power plant and the medical research reactor on MU campus. And so I think we could bring some business here when it comes to data centers. I think that data centers are going to be very important here in the future and they take massive amounts of energy, but it has to be reliable energy. So, I think overall, it would just help our grid so we don't end up having you know, power shortages and we're just real reliable when it comes to our energy.

Hinson: And as far as Columbia goes, I know some people have been a little bit concerned about crime, recent crime. Have you been seeing that as an issue and what things do you think could be done to address that?

Potter: Yeah, I think it's a lot on the forefront of people's minds. I know Columbia invests heavily in our parks and recreation areas and a lot of them have kind of been overrun by panhandlers and things of that nature. Here lately, I've heard a lot of stories about people on paths and nudity and showering in public areas and things like that and so really you know, just focusing on supporting our police. Getting, of course, creating a atmosphere and an environment to help retain police officers here in Columbia. I know one of the things that I hear a lot about is the pension issue that we have here and that we need to shore that up so we can get the best of the best here and they stay for a long time and really just be integrated in our community.

Hinson: Do you think that there needs to be any more accountability from maybe the City Council or the mayor, or any city leaders at all?

Potter: Yeah, I think I have heard that the mayor doesn't necessarily support the police like she should. I think you know, some of the pension issues comes from city council and so I think I did hear recently that the city manager is talking about you know, having more police officers in our parks and on our trails and stuff. I think that was just released a few days ago. So, I think they understand that there is an issue but we have to be able, we right now we don't really have those extra officers. So, we really need to focus on on retaining officers and creating an environment that really supports them and keeps them here long-term.

Hinson: As far as homelessness goes in Columbia, do you see that as an issue? And do you think that more needs to be done to maybe get them more resources, or how we can get that under control if you do find it an issue?

Potter: Yeah, absolutely. I think it is an issue. You know, I mean I've been here for 35 years, I've seen the panhandling escalate and just you know, it's becoming on every single corner almost. And so I think we really need to focus on community outreach and to get everybody on board that we want to help people that are in need.

But there's a problem with just giving people cash on the side of the street. I think that enforces their addictions and some of their poor spending habits. I think we can cause overdoses, right? I mean, you know you want to help somebody but at the same time, you don't want them to use your help to to overdose or to just cause harm to themselves. And so we really need to focus on getting people to the help that they need. We have a lot of organizations, nonprofit organizations, churches and community groups that really do help with the homeless a lot and I think we need to focus on steering them to those facilities that will help with mental illnesses. That will help with addiction problems, and then also help with finding somebody a place to live if that's what they need.

So you know, and there is different types of homelessness issues and panhandling issues. I think there's chronic panhandling, and I think there are people that are situationally, you know, in between houses, or have left abusive relationships or fell behind on their bills for whatever reason, lost job or whatever, and end up homeless. But there are a lot of organizations that really do help well here in Columbia with that, and that's why I think Columbia is a great community when it comes to wanting to help people in need. So, just got to steer them in the right direction and make sure that we're not incentivizing people standing on the corners trying to ask people for money, and even going to harassing people for money, or just leaving our community you know, really litter bound. There's a lot of litter shopping carts filled with stuff on the side of the roads, on the side of the highways, and so really just focusing on trying to not incentivize that.

Hinson: If you are elected, what would be your first priority?

Potter: I think education. I think that's kind of the realm that I started in. It's the realm I'm most familiar with, really providing parents with choice in their schooling. I know that in Jefferson City, they passed legislation for charter schools and I think that's really going to help. I know that CPS has already looked at that and realized that they have to compete to some extent now, which should create an environment for them to try to look at other avenues and they already have started doing that. They've hired a person to look at lottery schools, which I have three kids that have attended lottery school Ridgeway and I think that you know, with the environment of a lottery school, you get to pull people from all the way around the community. So, you get a real diverse population of students and you also have your own board to decide the curriculum of that school outside of the school board, Columbia Public Schools. And so those, the lottery schools perform better overall than the other schools. And so CPS has recognized that they need to extend that and to really build on those characteristics to try to compete with the charter schools that will probably be opening up in a few years. And it was actually something that I ran on when I was, when I was running for school board to try to get that seat. And so I'm glad to see that they're starting to try to expand those for students.

Hinson: Something big on the ballot this election is going to be Amendment 3. You know, it's been pretty controversial, heavily talked about. What are your thoughts on it? Or do you have any problem with the question that is on the ballot?

Potter: Yeah, to some extent. I think there are some, there's some things, some language there that can be concerning dealing with the school district. There's language in there that talks about reproductive rights and I think that language can be interpreted differently later on down the road. So, reproductive rights. And then there's also language in there about age restrictions and stuff. And so I really like to empower parents. I want them to know what their kids are doing if they're under their roof and under a certain age. And so as far as my understanding, I think that a child could get an abortion at 13 years old and not have to tell their parents with that legislation. And I think the parents should be aware of that.

Also, with the language of reproductive rights, I think there's some gender-affirming care that could be implied with that. Like a 13-year-old could decide that they don't want to have babies anymore so ... or want to have babies so they can you know, damage their reproductive organs and with chemicals or surgery. And then also with the not having to inform the parents I think that that could be an issue of kids going behind their parents' back to get gender reassignment surgery or take chemicals that would damage their reproductive organs. So, we really want to focus on how that language will be interpreted in the future and the rights of parents to know what their kids are doing at certain ages.

Hinson: As far as the initiative petition process goes, what are your thoughts on that?

Potter: Initiative petition? What is that exactly?

Hinson: What got it on the ballot, how they had to get the certain amount of signatures.

Potter: Oh, I remember it went through the courts and stuff like that. I mean, I think it, I think it ended up working out fairly. I think it should have been on the ballot. I think it's best for the citizens to decide. You know, I don't want to make that decision in Jeff City. I think it's best to empower the voter to decide what they want in their state.

Hinson: You mentioned a lot about education. As far as guns and kind of some recent school shootings. And there was a lot of school threats just in Southern Boone, and there was some in Jeff City recently. What are your thoughts on that? And how can we make sure that these kids are safe in schools?

Potter: Yeah, I think, I think that they've, they started that a little bit with the metal detectors at high school and stuff and I think that might help some. I've talked about having them when I ran for school board. Having more SROs in the schools and even maybe opening up the possibility for people to go through the same training as an SRO would to be able to conceal and carry in school. And that way, there's, there's less likely I think for a school shooting that way. Most school shooters target places that just don't have guns, right? And if they're going to, if they are going to target a place and somebody's openly carrying, then they're more likely to take that person out first or something like that. So, as far as school shooters are concerned, I think just putting the message out there is that there could be some people in here concealed carry that you know, could surprise you. And I think that could deter school shootings.

And then also keeping the doors locked. You know, I think they have a good lock door policy, but always having teachers and resource officers and in front of those doors when they're letting school out and letting school in. I think there was an incident here recently where somebody that was on drugs or something tried to get in the school, and they had to call the call the police. So, yeah, just making sure that the students know they can't bring guns with metal detectors and then just posing a threat to a school shooter you know, outside of just open carry with SROs. But we do I think, need some more SROs in the school. But we do have that problem with the retaining police officers and stuff like that, so that's a big issue. We need police a lot of different places but we're just, we're undermanned right now in the city of Columbia so.