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OTTUMWA, IOWA -- The raw transcript of an interview KTVO conducted with State Representative Mary Gaskill (D Ottumwa) on the phone Thursday morning.

Did you vote in the House for the bill that would give schools 0 percent allowable growth?

MG: I voted against zero percent allowable growth I have serious concerns about the increase in property taxes and I know our local school district is in need of the two percent, even two percent isn’t all that they need they need a little over four percent to just maintain but I felt that at least two percent would have been helpful

Senate did pass two percent basically on a party line vote what are you hearing about the future of that is there going to be some compromise between zero and two percent or is this a fight that is going to go one for weeks or months

MG That’s a fight that is going to continue going on this is my take on the whole thing that they are going to go on until the end of session and then there is going to be a lot of negotiations going on between the governor the senate and the house.

The republicans took over control of the house and the governor’s mansion basically tea party platform cut government spending that sort of thing are you surprised that the social issue have been coming up quite a bit, the abortion ban bills in the committee in the house and same sex marriage does that surprise you that there has been so much emphasis on the culture issues or did you kind of expect that.

MG Well I was hoping that it wouldn’t happen I thought not only did they campaign on social issues but on jobs and everybody says that jobs was the most important thing I thought that is what we were going to work on this year but we seem to be focusing on a lot of social issues

As far as jobs, what would you like to see done what should get passed that might help on the jobs issue

MG I would like to see that we at least keep our workforce development offices open so that people have that opportunity to go in and see if there are job listings there with those people so I would like to see more focus on helping people find employment

The Head of DHS said yesterday that that they are looking at somewhere between 150 and 200 lay-offs, if you have big cuts in state spending you are probably going to get layoffs of state employees isn’t that kind of counter productive if you are trying to create jobs.

MG Well you are talking in my thought quite a bit, that is my thought if you lay off state employees how many other jobs do you need to create in order to make up for that besides that you are not providing the services that state government is committed to serve

Do you thing that sometimes voters and residents in general don’t understand what workforce development, DHS does and its easy to say you should get rid of the government fat cats is there a disconnect between people understanding how government workers affect their daily lives.

MG I believe that a lot of people don’t understand the need for those services they don’t need those services so they don’t see the need for those services but those services keep society more whole than what it would be without those kind of services particularly for the children getting them into pre-school so you can prepare them for the future job market its going to be crucial for the future of our state and social services when we have so many kids out, we’ve laid social workers off I think that is the wrong approach, I think they are already overwhelmed with the responsibilities and the number of cases they have and the number of clients they have

On preschool if push comes to shove could you live with some sort of school voucher program like the governor proposed or do you think it is absolutely necessary to keep the program as its been the last couple of years.

MG Unfortunately his plan would reduce preschool access and quality for thousand of middle class families and I don’t think that is the approach you use for middle class families I actually view that as a tax increase on middle class families personally

Because while they aren’t paying that tax to the state they are writing checks out of their own pocket

MG That’s right and now they are able to have some preschool they can add to the preschool that their children get if they so choose its just that kids will get a basic preschool  and that will help all children and then if you want to add to it as a parent

(THE GOV. Preschool plan) it says in there that preschool programs wont be required to have certified teachers in the class room is that your understanding.

MG That’s my understanding, it ends a requirement that preschool be taught by a certified teacher.

I don’t know if you saw Sen. Chelgren's comments on preschool do you have any comment.

MG The only comment I have is that we have a disagreement about preschool