By Matthew K. Roy
Staff writer
—
PEABODY — Charlie Baker does not want to one day have to board a plane to visit his grandchildren.
The Republican gubernatorial candidate said he wants his three kids to choose a future in Massachusetts. But he yesterday told the senior citizens who filled the chapel at the Brooksby Village Retirement Community that he is worried.
"I've been watching that next generation leave," he said. "If you look at a lot of the demographic data that measure the 18- to 35-year-old population, they don't stay here the way they used to."
His desire to make the state a place where young people settle and raise a family is the "main reason" he decided to run for governor, Baker said.
A Swampscott resident, Baker said it is just a 15-minute drive to see his parents at a senior living community in Danvers.
"That's the way it should be," he said.
Brooksby Village in Peabody has recently been a popular stop for candidates for governor. Before Baker, State Treasurer Tim Cahill, running as an independent, visited last month and Democratic Gov. Deval Patrick stopped by in June.
Baker, 53, is the former CEO of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care. He worked as the state's secretary of Health and Human Services and secretary of administration and finance during the 1990s. He also served a three-year term on Swampscott's Board of Selectmen.
The state needs to "cultivate the next generation" by becoming an easier place to do business, Baker said. Now, Massachusetts is too expensive, with a set of rules for businesses that keep changing, he said. Both hinder long-term investment and job creation.
"I was impressed," Brooksby resident Barbara Kovas said after Baker finished. "Of course, he was in the health care business, so he knows a lot about it."
Baker said he would make health care providers publicly disclose their prices to correct the dramatic disparities in pricing among providers that now exists. The cost for the same service and result can vary 300 to 400 percent from one provider to the next, he said. Baker also argued that primary care doctors should be paid more, which would allow them to spend more time with their more complicated patients.
Responding to a question about the public pension system, Baker said he supported raising the retirement age, now as low as 50 in some cases, and capping pensions at $90,000 a year for employees who are not yet vested.
He called the system "completely unsustainable and completely unaffordable."
"There's a problem when we're presuming that we can fund 30 to 40 years of retirement for somebody who only worked 20 to 30 years," he said.
Baker strongly opposes adopting national education standards.
"That's a really bad idea," he said, "I positively believe that Massachusetts standards are going to come down (as a result)."
On immigration reform, Baker said he supports measures passed by the state Senate, which would mandate people prove their citizenship to access public housing, register a car and retain the services of a public defender, among other requirements.
Baker is against scrapping the Electoral College. "I don't know why, after 200 years of pretty much getting it right, we would suddenly decide there was something wrong with the way we've elected our president."
"I enjoyed it, and thought he was very good," Brooksby resident Al Evans said.
"He had a lot of good ideas," Kovas said. "I don't know if he'll be elected. I'm just afraid that with Cahill and Baker running, they're going to split the vote."
Baker said his political ambition does not go beyond the job he is seeking.
"I'm not a politician. This isn't about the next act of my political career," he said. "I don't want to be president of the United States. I don't want to be an ambassador. I'm not looking to write a book."
