Nick Gosnell: Richard Winger, he is running for District 4 for the County Commission as a Republican. He'll be on your ballot if you live in most of the city of Hutchinson here for the November 5th ballot, but there are parts of the city that have different County Commissioners, but it's mostly the city of Hutch. That's what the district is for, District 4. So I guess, Richard, most folks may know you from your days at Pools Plus. Why throw yourself into the deep end of the pool to run for County Commission?
Richard Winger: Well, when I was working at Pools Plus, you work some long hours and you, of course, are all over the state. But over the course of a number of years, I've had a number of people saying that I should run and to think about it at least. And so after I retired from Pools Plus, I went to actually went to work for the county in the maintenance department, worked there for about six months. My body was telling me I enjoyed the job, but my body was saying no. And so then I went to work for the college and I've been there almost a year now. And so I actually have more time available. I still love this city and this county. And so I thought it was the right time for me to put my hat in the ring. And I like I said, I've lived here since 1973. I've always enjoyed this city and the surroundings around it.
Nick Gosnell: All right. So a county commissioner, because they have a permanent administrator that they've hired, the day to day stuff anymore is usually done through the administrator's office or if it's a legal matter through the county counselor's office. The chief piece of what a county commissioner does is budgeting. What do you know about that and about how the county is doing it and anything that you might have to say regarding the county budget?
Richard Winger: Of course, you run a budget in your house, so you start there, hopefully when you're younger and stuff. Working through Pools Plus, we would do bids and quotes. And of course, you have a budget to do that and you have to be able to get it done under budget or at budget, but try not to go over the budget. As for the county, I would love to see the county be more effective and efficient. I know we were talking about at the forum forward thinking and sometimes that's great and in most cases it is, but there's times though where forward thinking means that you're going to need to raise taxes and that's not always a necessary thing. You can look at the budget and maybe skimp or not have something in a budget in this area that is not utilized like it used to be and use it for something else.
Nick Gosnell: Now, there is one area of the county that has been particularly used over the time since I've been here in Hutchinson. And just to remind folks, my official hire date was December 31st of 2019. I started in January of 2020, so immediately prior to the pandemic. So, the health department kind of got pushed to the front of the line a little bit during the COVID period, but they do a whole lot more than just the emergency stuff that happened during COVID. And I know that your wife worked at the health department for a long time, so you have at least a little bit of inside information on the workings of that. How important is the work of the health department?
Richard Winger: It's very important. It does a number of age groups from infants and toddlers all the way up to elderly people. It actually brings in a revenue stream. Most people don't realize that. They just think they use taxes to support it, but it actually does bring in a revenue stream. They do shots. Women's, infants, and children's department is very important for those young mothers with young children. I use it. I've used it since I was here. I got a TB test when I first went to work at McDonald's, so that tells you how long ago that's been. But I also go there for my shots. They work on, they have foot clinics for those people with diabetes and other things where they can't reach their feet anymore, so they help you take care of that. They do all kinds of things that most people don't realize, not just, you know, emergency care and things like that.
Nick Gosnell: Okay. There are a lot of areas of the county that, for want of a better way of putting it, are branch offices of the state. By that I mean, like your county treasurer's office is, generally speaking, locked in to do whatever the statute tells them to do as far as county treasurer is concerned. County appraiser is much the same way. The statute and the parameters within that kind of control what happens there. So, how much real change can you make in those departments that are basically controlled by things that were passed at a level higher than yours? And how much can you say, hey, listen, what can we do operationally here? Where does that line get drawn?
Richard Winger: Well, operationally, it would probably be the most area that we can control because it would incur, you know, the facility that the operations in, the people that work there, talking about if it's a mandated thing from the state, then there really isn't much you can do. The money is supposed to be allocated and used for that part, and so you really can't do a whole lot with that. That being said, if you have access to, you know, the House and Senate members at the capitol, you might be able to visit with them about some of those, you know, things that are being done and see if you can get them lowered.
Nick Gosnell: There will be two new members of the county commission for certain. Your race is one where both people would be new, and then there's another race that's where both people would be new. But three of the five county commissioners, at least in theory, assuming that there isn't a huge write-in vote in Hirst's district, will be ones that come back that are still there from before. So you have the three that have done it for a long time, or relatively, or that have done it before, and the two that have not done it yet. How do you persuade the majority to not just keep doing what they're doing?
Richard Winger: That's the point we were just kind of talking about. You have to have a quorum, I mean, of voters. And so there's five of us now, would be five of us. So you have to have a three to two vote or four one, or even five oh if it's unanimous. I'm one of those guys, I don't believe in kicking the can down the road, but I also am pretty persuasive when I'm visiting with somebody about something that needs to be done, and I feel strong about it. I can usually get my point across and my goal would be to convince the other commissioners that this is the way we need to go. I've also known a number of the commissioners for a while just through work, and I've worked for them and done things with them, volunteer and other things. So I think I can be a team player, but also not just sit on the bench and not participate either. I want to be one of those that would contribute.
Nick Gosnell: All right. So the big areas of the budget that are things that need to, the county needs to work through, public works is a huge part of the budget as far as dollars are concerned, but that's kind of another one of those areas where, for want of a better way of putting it, if the bridge needs fixed, the bridge needs fixed. So there's a lot of that that is difficult to do much about other than just be proper with maintenance and those sorts of things. How do you say to those folks the difference between we want to do maintenance now so that we have longest life that we possibly can for everything we have to, well, we don't have the budget to do everything all the time. It's something you had to deal with in maintaining things in the business you were in too, I suppose.
Richard Winger: Exactly. And I really, that's one of the things that I noticed when I first moved here. And even as a younger person, a lot of times things, the maintenance wouldn't get done and then it would be broke. And then it's like, okay, we have to fix it. And it's always easier to keep that car longer. If you do that, those minor details and oil changes and things early on, and it makes it last longer. So in the county, you just got to figure out the budget and do a timely schedule on different things. Most people don't see the infrastructure around the city. They just see the city unless you're out a farmer or you're driving out in the county for another reason. You don't see the roads, you don't see the bridges, and they are utilized a lot around this city. We have some great interstate or four lane highways now, but the county roads are still utilized a lot.
Nick Gosnell: Well, and so part of the constant maintenance is that the county commission has a certain number of lane miles. And I don't have the number off the top of my head. I apologize. Don Brittain will probably send me an email saying, it's this number. And that's fine, Don, go ahead and send it to me later. And I'll be sure that I know what it is. But there's a certain number of lane miles that you have to do each year to be able to get through the entire county over the course of several years. Because you can't, there's not an infinite amount of money. You can't do them all every year. So sometimes when budgets are tight, that's one of the things that gets cut back on is that maintenance stuff like we talked about. Are there other areas where the county could go, you know, maybe we don't do this, but we focus on the other things for the purposes of those folks outside of the city of Hutchinson, like we just talked about?
Richard Winger: Well, so there are, Don Brittain is great for that department. And there's 19 other department leaders, and they all work to keep their budgets within the limits that they're supposed to. I know like in roads and bridges, there's also where they go out and they do ditches and they do this or that with heavy equipment. And maybe it's one of those things where they can't do that because they need that money to go to a road. Maybe they have a bridge that had an accident on it and it damaged part of the bridge and that would have to come from that expense to be fixed.
Nick Gosnell: Again, Richard, if people want to find out more about you, what's the easiest way to find out more about your campaign or get a hold of you if they want to talk to you between now and election day?
Richard Winger: Well, I have my cell phone and I answer it. I've heard a few people that are running say that. So it's 620-664-0662. If I don't answer, pardon me, leave me a voicemail and I'll be glad to get back with you. I also have a website on Facebook that my wife put together. It's Winger for County Commission on Facebook. And then we also have an email. It's [email protected]. That's W-I-N-G-L-A-F, the number six at yahoo.com. That's correct.