Democratic candidate for governor gets behind CCI Action's "People First Iowa" agenda

Hatch Signals Support For CCI Action Fund’s “People First Iowa” Agenda

Democratic candidate for governor Jack Hatch stands up for local control of factory farms, closing corporate tax loopholes on out-of-state corporations, raising the minimum wage, cracking down on wage theft, and publicly-financed elections during hour-long meeting with 200 CCI Action Fund members

State Senator Jack Hatch (D-Des Moines), the Democratic candidate for governor running against incumbent Terry Branstad, publicly spoke out in favor of Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement Action Fund’s “People First Iowa” agenda today during an hour-long meeting with more than 200 CCI Action Fund members at the Henry Wallace Building Auditorium.

“I’m not afraid to agree with you, we need a new agenda,” Hatch told the gathered crowd.CCI Action Fund board president Barb Kalbach, a fourth-generation family farmer from Dexter, Iowa facilitated the meeting where family farmers, low-wage latino immigrants, and everyday people from across the state told personal stories about how factory farm pollution and wage theft impact their daily lives and asked Senator Hatch to back a bold progressive policy platform.Garry Klicker, a CCI Action Fund member and independent family farmer from Bloomfield asked Senator Hatch to support local control of factory farms and explained what it was like living next to 20,000 corporate hogs and the ensuing air, water, and quality of life issues that result.Nataly Espinoza, a low-wage immigrant who was a victim of wage theft by Kelly Services, the second-largest employer in the country, until CCI Action Fund members helped her recover her stolen wages, asked Senator Hatch to support an amendment that cracks down on wage theft and add it to a bill to raise the minimum wage.Susie Petra, a CCI Action Fund member and retired teacher from Ames, asked Hatch to support combined corporate reporting and Voter-owned Iowa Clean Elections.Hatch expressed support for each of these initiatives and took the opportunity to fire a few shots of his own at incumbent governor Terry Branstad.“The question isn’t government spending,” Hatch said at one point,” it’s about who we’re spending it on.”“When Branstad talks about low unemployment, he doesn’t mean my neighborhood in Des Moines or your small towns out in rural Iowa,” Hatch said at another point.Earlier in the day, CCI Action Fund members – and two large, show-stealing puppets dressed up as Governor Branstad and a corporate ag lobbyist – held a raucous rally at the state capitol that included speeches by Senate Ways and Means Committee chair Joe Bolkcom (D-Iowa City), Communication Workers of America Iowa State Council president Steve Henry, Des Moines pastor and immigrant from Guatemala Alejandro Alfaro-Santiz, a low-wage worker named Nereida Castro, and Debbie Bunka of Ames.CCI Action Fund members also met with dozens of legislators in small and large-group meetings.Iowa CCI Action Fund is a grassroots, statewide people’s action group that believes community and political organizing is the most effective way to build a more just and democratic society that puts communities before corporations and people before profits, politics, and polluters.