Candidate faults ‘five Gs’

01/24/2006

IP’s Hutchinson says major parties divisive on social issues

BY BILL SALISBURY
Pioneer Press

As he prepares to launch a long-shot, third-party campaign for governor, Peter Hutchinson contends Democrats and Republicans have maintained a chokehold on political power in Minnesota by scaring the bejesus out of voters with the “five Gs.”

“They are guns, gays, God, gambling and gynecology,” Hutchinson has been telling small audiences around the state in recent months.

Hutchinson, a high-powered policy wonk who has advised state and local governments across the nation, instead wants to shift the focus in the governor’s race from such wedge issues as gay marriage and abortion to what he calls the “main things” — education, health care, transportation and the environment.

“The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing,” said Hutchinson, who will formally announce Wednesday
that he is seeking the Independence Party endorsement for governor.

Hutchinson’s entry into the race is sparking interest for several reasons. One, the former state finance commissioner and Minneapolis school superintendent is widely respected for his creative work with city, county and state officials of all political persuasions in diagnosing and solving governmental problems. Two, in a state where neither Democrats nor Republicans can claim a lock on the majority of voters, a third-party candidate can have a significant impact.

Minnesota voters have not been terribly kind to third-party candidates. They elected Gov. Jesse Ventura in 1998, but he was the exception to the rule. Minnesota has elected just three third-party governors in its 148-year history.
But political insiders say Hutchinson could become an important player — either as a contender or a spoiler.

Besides his high-level jobs in government, he is a former Dayton Hudson Corp. executive and a founder and former president of the Public Strategies Group, a St. Paul-based consulting firm that bills itself as “designing creative solutions for governments seeking organizational transformation.” He’s also co-author of the 2004 book “The Price of Government: Getting the Results We Need in an Age of Permanent Fiscal Crisis.”

Born in Faribault, Minn., Hutchinson spent his childhood bouncing around the country with his family. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth College and a master’s degree in public administration and urban planning from Princeton.

He returned to Minnesota in 1975 to work for Dayton Hudson (now Target), where he became vice president for public affairs and chairman of its foundation. He left the company in 1989 to become Gov. Rudy Perpich’s finance commissioner for a year. Since then, he has been a public policy consultant to governments across the nation, mostly straightening out financial messes.

Now he wants to fix Minnesota’s political mess.

“When I came back here in ‘75, people thought of Minnesota as a public policy incubator,” he said. “Good, smart ideas were coming out of here: the Metropolitan Council, tax-base sharing, a strong commitment to education and higher education.

“Thirty-one years later, that is not the case,” he said. Minnesota is no longer considered the leader in government innovation, but “we should be.”

“On so many levels, we’re not attending to the stuff that needs doing. I, personally, think it’s because our politics has gone off the rails. We’re more divided than ever. The political argument is mostly about fear and loathing, instead of about the possibilities and opportunities.

“Our state could be a whole hell of a lot better.”

Hutchinson blames the Democratic-Farmer-Labor and Republican parties, which he argues have moved to the extreme left and right. They’ve alienated mainstream voters by focusing on the five Gs, “to which we’ve now added a sixth G: green cards,” he said, referring to Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s election-year emphasis on illegal immigration.

He sees a political opening in the center.

On health care, he supports the recommendation by Pawlenty’s citizens forum on health costs, headed by former U.S. Sen. David Durenberger, that the state take the lead in remaking the health system. He wants consumers to be able to “buy the best result for the best price from the best provider.” To help them, the state should “publish a list of where we get the best medical care at the best price.”

On transportation, he wants to see more money — he supports a gas tax increase — to pay for purchasing more buses and passenger trains, eliminating Twin Cities freeway bottlenecks and expanding major regional highways.
Like every candidate, Hutchinson believes he can win. Here’s how: In a three-way race, a candidate needs about 40 percent, or 900,000 votes, to carry the state. Based on the votes for Reform and Independence Party candidates Ventura in 1998 and Tim Penny in 2002, he believes the party has a base of 500,000 to 600,000 voters.

He hopes to get the rest of the votes he needs from moderate Democrats and Republicans who feel alienated from their parties and from voters under age 30 who don’t identify with either party.

“The math is doable,” he said. “The campaign is the hard part.”

Hutchinson faces two huge campaign hurdles, said Larry Jacobs, director of the Center for the Study for Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs. The first is name recognition. While he is highly respected by the Twin Cities’ “chattering class,” Jacobs said, Hutchinson is unknown to the hundreds of thousands of voters he needs to win.

The second hurdle is the Independence Party, he said. It doesn’t have the organization, volunteers and fundraising and research abilities that the DFL and GOP have, and it lacks “brand-name status.” Democratic and Republican candidates each get about a third of the vote because of their party’s brand name, but Minnesota voters don’t have the same psychological attachment to the IP.

If Hutchinson becomes a major contender, “that’s going to be a very serious problem for the Democratic Party,” Jacobs said. Republicans are very loyal to Gov. Tim Pawlenty, and he’s likely at least to get the 44 percent of the vote that elected him in 2002. If Hutchinson and the Democratic candidate split the anti-incumbent vote this year, he predicted Pawlenty would win again.

State Republican Party Chairman Ron Carey acknowledged he would not be unhappy to see Hutchinson run. “I feel it’s going to be like having two Democrats in the race,” he said.

State DFL Chairman Brian Melendez said he’s not very concerned about Hutchinson’s candidacy.

“If he gets into the race, his only prospect is of being a spoiler,” Melendez said. “That’s unfortunate, because he’ll probably take away votes from whoever our candidate is. But I just don’t think he’s going to have that much traction.”

Peter Hutchinson

Party: Independence Party candidate for Minnesota governor

Age: 55

Born: Faribault, Minn.

Residence: Minneapolis

Family: Wife, Karla Ekdahl; two college-age daughters

Education: Bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth College; master’s degree in public affairs and urban planning from Princeton University; post-graduate work at Harvard Business School.

Experience: Dayton Hudson Corp. vice president of public affairs and corporate foundation chairman, Minnesota state finance commissioner, founder and president of the Public Strategies Group Inc., Minneapolis Public Schools superintendent.