Rick Koster for County Commissioner 2010

The following are my answers to the League of Women's Voters Questionnaire for the Primary.  The full guide can be found at http://www.lwvcollin.org/VGCommissionersMarch2010.pdf

1. Please describe the education and experience that qualify you for the position of Collin County Judge or Commissioner.

Education: BSEE Yale University 1982

Experience: 25 years of engineering and sales experience in private industry; 2 years of government experience as a civilian employee of the US Southern Command; a lifetime of experience as a native speaker of both English and Spanish, and of being natively at home in both US and Latin culture.

2. What are the biggest environmental concerns in our county and what steps would you take to solve them?

My biggest environmental concerns are regional air quality, energy. Improving public transportation in the region and focusing on energy conservation will go a long way toward improving air quality. Improving capacity on our main roads will help lower emissions and save energy.

3. What measures would you support to improve transportation? How should they be funded?

I support an extension of public transit to cities and towns beyond Plano and Richardson. This should be paid with user fees and county subsidies. Road expansion should not be our only option. An example of projects I would support would be express busses that feed the DART system and link it to our courts and county facilities. I also believe that some of our roads do need expansion to meet regional traffic and housing patterns.

4. Collin County is overall affluent but many of its residents live in poverty. How do you think the county should address the physical and mental health needs of these residents?

The county must maintain an infrastructure that addresses the physical and mental health needs of less affluent citizens. Since there are no county owned facilities in Collin County, it is proper that the county contract with private and regional public facilities for these needs.

5. Collin County has strict financial guidelines for providing court-appointed attorneys. What measures do you support to ensure the right to counsel for all defendants?

I support the current Collin County rules to implement the Texas Fair Defense Act. I would support a provision that enables non-indigent defendants to access the County list of defenders and to retain lawyers at the County rate.

6. What other issues do you believe will be most pressing in Collin County, and what is your position on these issues?

County government should partner with local school districts to provide a county program of vocational education. Such a program, which might be modeled on

Collin College, would give our young people career options that would benefit the county and help lower the dropout rate in our schools.

County government needs to make sure that water, sewer, power and other utilities keep up with regional growth.