Bill Diamond

Democrat

Office Sought: Senator – District 26
Age: 71
Occupation: Business owner

Education: Masters Degree plus 30 credits
Family: Wife, Jane, two married daughters and 8 grandchildren
Hometown: Windham

Political experience

I served in the Maine House of Representatives, Maine Senate and eight years as Maine’s Secretary of State. During that time I have stepped away from government service for various intervals of time to run my businesses, teach all levels of public education and serve as a principal and superintendent of schools.

Why are you running for office?

There are so many problems to solve and I have too much energy to sit back and
not do all I can to help. Many of my constituents depend on my assistance when dealing with governmental agencies and my biggest reward is helping them find the answers to their problems. The Senate is where a definite difference can be made and that’s why I’m running.

• Income Tax: Gov. LePage would like to lower Maine’s income tax rate and eventually eliminate it, by increasing the state’s sales tax and expanding it across a broader range of goods and services. Do you support this proposal?
  • No

    I support the lowering the income tax whenever possible as we have already done, however increasing AND expanding the sales tax would have be a significant negative impact on Maine citizens at all economic levels. Higher sales taxes would be especially hard on lower income families. Also, there is no guarantee that the equivalent amount of sales tax increase would be used to lower the income tax. Having served as Senate Chair of the budget writing committee (AFA) I can say with experience that the final days of putting together the two-year state budget requires looking for money wherever possible – new income from sales tax increases would be mighty tempting.

• Background Checks: Do you support background checks for privately sold firearms in Maine?
  • No

    I assume this is in reference to Referendum Question 3 which has significant flaws as written. The Sportsmen Alliance of Maine is now working with the gun shows around the state resulting in much stricter regulations in terms of prohibiting outside-the-building private sellers from selling their guns, thus that problem is being addressed. This question needs to be rewritten to take into consideration Maine’s culture of hunting and history of safety precautions already in place.

• Minimum Wage: In light of the ballot question facing voters this fall, do you support raising the state’s minimum wage from $7.50 to $12 an hour by 2020?
  • Yes

    Even though I support this referendum question, it does have significant problems specially the negative impact it will have on restaurant service staff. These hardworking people depend on being able to work long shifts, provide professional service and get paid based on the quality of their service. Another concern – home care professionals used primarily for the elderly, are provided by staffing agencies, however the hourly rate paid to the workers is controlled by the state. If the hourly rate goes to $12/hr and the state doesn’t increase the cap paid to the agencies, then the agencies will not be able to afford to provide the health care professionals, thus reducing the options for those elderly to nursing home care which is much more expensive and unnecessary.

• Marijuana: Do you support legalization of marijuana for recreational use?
  • No

    We are in the middle of severe drug crisis and legalizing the use of marijuana at this time would send the wrong message. ALSO, during the last legislative session it became obvious that the effort to establish an OUI level for marijuana lacked sufficient background data to support any set level equal to 0.8 for alcohol. As a result, we have no base level for law enforcement to use.

• Addiction/Overdoses: Do you believe the state is doing enough in response to the rise in heroin/opiate addiction and overdoses? If not, what else should be done?
  • No. We need to commit to a more intense and thorough effort to educate our youth and others (as we did with dangers of smoking, not wearing seatbelts, etc), provide treatment for those already addicted and focus on at catching the distributors. This should be a multi state-agency approach where the executive branch works closely with the legislative branch to approach this problem in a unified effort.