“My fellow Hoosiers, we’ve become known around the world as ‘A State that Works.’ I want Indiana to become known as ‘A State that Works for All.’ Where every citizen – no matter their background or age or who they love or whether they grew up here or arrived last week – has equal access and opportunity to go as far as they wish and are willing to work to get there. That’s what I’ll continue to fight for.”

 

-Governor Eric Holcomb, 2020 State of the State

 

Friend,

 

On Tuesday, Governor Holcomb gave his annual State of the State address. 

Unsurprisingly, the Governor’s speech was all about his passion — Putting People First. The Governor laid out his vision for Indiana’s future and touched on the major successes we’ve had over the past year. 

It’d be impossible to include everything (if you’re interested, you can watch the whole speech here), but we thought we’d share some of the biggest highlights below. 

Governor Holcomb highlighted how we’ve helped Hoosier kids thrive and discussed how we could do more in 2020, including: 

• Bringing the infant mortality rate to a 12-year low in 2019. 
• Working to find permanent homes for Hoosier children when parental rights have been terminated. 
• Cutting the time it takes to adopt to under a year

 

Governor Holcomb also doubled down on his commitment to Hoosier educators and students, including:

• Recommending that the General Assembly direct an additional $250 million toward teacher retirement funds in the next budget, which would make an extra $50 million per year available for boosting teacher pay.
• Freeing up an additional $115 million per year for teacher pay in the current budget.

 

Governor Holcomb also pledged to reduce administrative burdens on our teachers and make sure schools have the resources they need by:

• Working with the K-12 community to eliminate unnecessary paperwork. 
• Making sure every school has a relationship with a mental health provider in order to help ensure every student can thrive

 

The Governor also committed to making sure Hoosiers can afford being healthy by: 

• Committing to an "All-Payer Claims Database," an important first step toward giving Hoosiers more transparency in health care costs.
• Requiring that providers give a good-faith cost estimate five days before care is provided.
• Requiring that in-network facilities provide care at the network rate.

The Governor also discussed the huge wins for Hoosier workers in 2019 (and what they have to look forward to in 2020), including:  

• Fiat-Chrysler investing $400 million to diversify its facility in Kokomo
• Our new goal of tripling defense investment in Indiana by 2025.
• Our efforts helping Hoosiers skill-up for high-wage, in-demand jobs. 
• The number of Hoosiers with higher education has increased by 10 percentage points since 2008.
• More than 23,000 Hoosiers have enrolled in Workforce Ready Programs (like Next Level Jobs) in the past three years.

 

The Governor also highlighted our efforts to turn offenders into neighbors again, including: 

• The more than 3,000 inmates that have now graduated from certified programs in two years. 
• Supporting legislation that makes the education available to offenders more holistic – incentivizing addiction recovery treatment, mental health management, and vocational development.

 

The Governor covered a lot in his speech and Hoosiers have a lot to be proud of. We accomplished a lot in 2019 and there are great things on the horizon in 2020. If you want to stay up to date on the progress we’re making towards these goals and more, please consider following Governor Holcomb on social media.

 

Sincerely, 

Holcomb Crew

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