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-A clinical psychologist, a minister, a businessman, and former commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Children's Services.

Hello, I'm Steve Beverly, and coming up next on Tennessee is Talking.

We are one-on-one with State Senator Page Walley.

We'll find out what was accomplished in the last general session in Nashville and what's next on the Senator's agenda.

Let's get the conversation started.

-That's so cool.

-Then that's when I said that-- -The problem with that idea is-- -Wow, that was amazing.

-Then I came up with a solution.

-What was that about?

-Here's what I think about it.

-Now, we're talking.

-West Tennessee PBS presents Tennessee is Talking.

Let the conversation begin.

-Thanks for joining the discussion on this edition of Tennessee is Talking.

I'm Steve Beverly.

State Senator Page Walley represents Tennessee's 26th.. and has since 2020.

The 113th General Assembly wrapped up in this past April and saw lots of debates on topics like school vouchers, teachers carrying guns, and a state budget of almost $53 billion.

Welcome to Tennessee is Talking.

Senator Walley is with us.

Let's start with the latest things that we want to get to.

First off, it's good to have you with us.

-Great to be with you, Steve.

Thank you for having me on the program.

-Let's talk about, from your vantage point, what were the most significant accomplishments of General Assembly 2024?

-I think, as always, the biggest accomplishment is Tennessee very proudly has and is required to have by our Constitution a balanced budget.

We have to make sure that we are tracking accurately our revenues and our expenditures and making sure that we're good stewards of taxpayer dollars.

We passed what is a balanced budget, where it is about a $52 billion budget for the fiscal year that began July 1.

We'll go through June 30 of 2025.

There are a lot of features in it, I think, that our citizens will be very proud of.

First of all, as I say, it is balanced.

It does help us maintain our status as the lowest tax per capita, the lowest indebtedness state per capita in the country.

It recognized that our revenues are slowing down a bit from what they had been.

It also recognized that a lot of that federal money that had come into the system through the post-COVID investments has been depleted and has been invested.

We had to make sure that we pared back.

We did that.

We also did it by making certain that we added another $100 million to our rainy day f.. so that we have an extremely healthy balance that we have never had as high before, over $2 billion.

We continue to invest in all of those important programs to Tennesseans, education, health care, mental health services, roads.

That was some of the big accomplishments was our budget.

Then, one of the things that's been very much on the minds o.. and order and safety and security and immigration and those.

We shored ourselves up there, particularly working with some of our friends in Memphis and Shelby County who's had real challenges in that area in the last couple of years.

The mantra that Memphis matters was reiterated and it does matter.

We have invested in that.

We also, I'm very proud, Steve, made sure that we continue to prioritize the economic development and even miracle here in West Tennessee that in the form of BlueOval City, with Ford and SK Innovations there.

Another fun announcement for our district that I think people all over West Tennessee were really cheering about was a Buc-ee's is coming here.

The first Buc-ee's in West Tennessee.

-I'm telling you, we are all on top of the world about that.

The day that announcement was made, I happened to be at a Buc-ee's in Birmingham.

-How about that?

-People don't understand who have never been to one.

What's it like?

Now, I have, but what's it like that experience, and why is this so big for West Tennessee in particular?

-I think people have experienced it, as you say, maybe over in Crossville or in Pigeon Forge area or traveling out of state.

This just massive facility full of all kinds of food, particularly the brisket, the beef jerky, all of these kinds of things that are not what you might typically find at just a roadside gas station.

They must have 100 or 200 pumps.

This is interesting: they don't allow truckers there just because of the traffic.

Then they have this beaver that the kids are crazy about.

-Buc-ee Beaver.

Yes.

-Buc-ee the Beaver between the t-shirts and the live beaver, I say live beaver, the costume live person and beaver outfit greeting the kids.

It has become a phenomenon.

One of my fellow senators from Memphis, she was so giddy about it.

She sent me a photo that morning of her at another Buc-ee somewhere from this last year wearing a t-shirt and saying, "Now I'm going to get to stop going and coming from Nashville when I'm passing through Fayette County."

It might have even gotten more attention than BlueOval City got, at least in the short term.

-I wouldn't doubt that whatsoever because everybody talks about Buc-ee's.

Let me ask you about a couple of things.

As the folks at home are seeing this program right now, we're only about two months away from a brand new session in the legislature.

One of the key things in this past year's session that did not succeed in passing was school vouchers.

That was something that Governor Lee has been certainly very much behind.

Where do we stand with that?

Is that something that you anticipate will come back to the table again this coming year?

-You're right, Steve.

There was a push by the governor and some of the pr.. that want to see this school choice.

Sometimes you hear the term education freedom, parental choice, vouchers.

In Tennessee currently, we have three counties that already have this: Shelby County, Davidson County, and Hamilton County, Chattanooga, where it has been a pilot project for the last two to three years.

Trying to provide those kinds of choices for parents in these areas where we have significantly challenged school systems.

One of the things that we know, Steve, from the data we've collected so far, is we're not seeing the improvements that were anticipated.

I think that's important because one of my real hesitations in wanting to support an expansion is, if it isn't working yet, why am I going to want to expand it to 92 other counties and also risk the loss of important funding for our school systems in Haywood County, in Fayette County, in Hardeman County, in Chester County, and throughout my district in West Tennessee?

That's a concern.

If it's shown that it's not working, the financial element of it too is very much, I think, unclear.

While an initial investment the first year might look modest, we know what happens.

Once a program is started and it grows, revenues have to come from somewhere.

We saw this year in Tennessee shrinking revenues.

-Which is true in many other states across the country.

-That's right.

We know already the needs and demands in our public schools as they exist.

We cannot divert funds from our public schools in order to fund a program that we are not sure even works.

It sounds good when we say choice and parental choice.

One of the things that is also unclear to me, Steve, is that choice involves a two-way transaction.

Because I choose you doesn't mean you have to choose me.

I might want my child to go to your school, but you might say, "No, your child has a hist.. of academic struggles, of truancy."

Now if your child has a history of being the valedictorian or the star three-point shooter, we might want to talk.

There's some real inequities there.

Then the last issue that was really unresolved, accountability.

We put so much of a burden on our public schools now to produce.

We have extraordinary testing and evaluations, too much in my mind.

We need to be relieving our public schools of some of those challenges.

I think then they can compete better with the private, parochial, and home schools.

We inundate them with bureaucracy.

We're talking now about giving $7,000 vouchers to folks with no accountability for what becomes of that and the outcomes for those students.

There's just a lot of questions to be ans.. That said, I feel certain that it'll come back for further debate.

Maybe there are ways that people find to bridge some of these concerns that I've expressed, but I have been very reluctant to be a supporter of it.

Even though I'm a supporter of anyone and everyone, you can choose where you want to go, but when it comes to taxpayer funding, we can't rob Peter to pay Paul, and we've got to have accountability to do that, and that just wasn't part of the plan.

-We have so much ground to cover because of things that are happening here.

One of the things that you mentioned earlier is about BlueOval City, and certainly, your counties and your district are some who are going to benefit greatly from this.

How much do you sense the momentum building for economic development and that counties are ready for what BlueOval City could mean to all of West Tennessee?

-That's such an insightful question because we are highly desirous, anticipating, and that question, are we ready, is a wonderful one.

I don't know that we could ever really be ready as much as we're going to have to build it as we fly it and adjust quickly.

When you drive down there and you go by Exit 42 on Interstate 40 between here and Memphis and you see all these cranes in the sky, the only other place I've seen anything like that is downtown Nashville, where you're having this explosive development and growth.

We are being inundated with suppliers who have bought properties and are building the necessary facilities.

We have just finished a new Tennessee College of Applied Technology there next to the campus and have cut the ribbon on that.

Buc-ee's, as we mentioned, is going in several miles further toward Memphis.

We have so many people who are enthusiastic and it is bringing a hope that we haven't seen here in rural West Tennessee in decades, if not generations, where we have been seeing population loss, youth moving away and not coming back because of opportunity.

That is all changing.

Now, it's not without its growing pains.

As I mentioned, we're having to figure out residential development in particular.

I think the commercial development is going to come because we have entrepreneurial spirit.

I believe what we're really going to see initially is a lot of the employment coming out of Jackson, out of Memphis, and out of some of these adjacent counties that.. like Haywood and Fayette, and commuting in, but then we're going to start to see that fill in with residential development.

These developers are circling and looking for the best opportunity and the best price.

I know that we have many people, and I understand this, who in some ways bemoan the loss of the simplicity of life that we've had in the area.

If we're going to also provide these same people that are concerned with the security of a stable tax base and not dramatically increasing property taxes to fund basic services, you've got to grow.

Part of the growing has been, and people don't see this, nor should you, the development of water and wastewater treatment systems, the internet connectivity being built up, and I just find it, extremely exciting and hopeful.

I know some people don't believe, and I understand that, gee, these electric vehicles, are they going to sell?

The federal government has been providing incentives for green energy and the development of electric vehicles, but these are what's coming.

While we've had a little bit of a slowdown in the projected full-on production date from-- it was going to be early 2025, now it's late 2025, early 2026, they still are going just full speed ahead with construction.

You go over there, the buildings are up, now the internal machinery is being instal.. Workers are going to be hired beginning soon to begin their training and preparation.

Production is going to start next year on a smaller scale as it ramps up to 2026.

I'm so excited because when I ran for office in 2020, two of the things that I made deep commitments to that I saw we had to have, we had to revisit and recapture rural healthcare opportunities and the loss we've had of our rural hospitals.

We had to replace them, and then we had to find employment opportunities for this reg..

The largest investment ever made in the state of Tennessee by a private entity in Ford right here in Haywood County.

The largest plant they've ever built in the world right here in Haywood County.

God is good, and he answers prayer.

Then we also had, just before that, because of the hard work of a lot of people, the reopening of the first rural hospital in America, which had previously closed, the Haywood Hospital reopened.

-Yes.

Absolutely.

-Right now, we are reopening the one in Decatur County.

We've been able to successfully pass legislation that allowed for Magnolia Hospital in Corinth, Mississippi to come over, and they're going to be building an ER, a hybrid ER and acute care facility in Selmer, where we'd lost the hospital in McNairy County.

We're working on one in Fayette County.

We're gradually starting to provide emergency hospital health care for our people again.

Those things go hand in hand to me, and those are two of the biggest accomplishments that I'm grateful for in this first four years.

-You just mentioned something in your previous comments about rural internet, high-speed internet.

That for many years was a frustration of anybody who lived outside the center city that you would get into the rural-- Let's face it.

We have many rural counties in West Tennessee, and now we're beginning to see movement in that direction so that it's everything's equalized on that.

Where do we really stand in getting out to the far reaches of the counties?

-You're going to be encouraged to hear that the partnership between the state government, the federal funding, and local effort, and partnering with good local partners like Aeneas, we have been able to open up already many of our community's most remote areas to high-speed, reliable internet.

I'll use Hardeman County for an example.

The Bolivar Energy Authority, working with Aeneas, was able to wire the entire county in just less than two years, under budget, and on time or ahead of schedule to provide that kind of access.

We're seeing it all over my district filling in these pockets.

Now, I'll grant you, it never comes fast enough, and when it comes, it's never fast enough.

[laughter] -I've been there before.

-I called my internet provider yesterday because I was ha.. that I'd not had before.

You're in the middle of a Zoom call, and all of a sudden you freeze.

Broadband internet access.

I remember vividly back when I first was a young man representing Fayette, Hardeman, and Chester County in the House of Representatives between 1990 and 2000, Governor McWhorter, from just up in Wheatley County, right here in West Tennessee, would tell us regularly that the formula for success are going to be education and roads, produce employment, produce opportunity.

He was exactly right, and I think if he was alive today, he would agree that the roads include the information superhighways you've got to have.

Internet is, it is not just a luxury, it is a necessity as much now as electricity and water and sewer.

If you're going to work, if you're going to have entertainment, if you're going to have opportunities to study and further your education, you've got to have it in the home.

We're filling it in rapidly, and I'm really pleased with the progress we're making.

-I know something that you are absolutely thrilled about because I know it's been something that has been long overdue for the people in the Savannah area, and that is funding for a new marina.

-Steve, you are exactly right.

Some of our communities, like we've been talking about, their employment opportunities really rely on industry, like BlueOval.

In Hardin County, and in McNairy County to some degree, down in that area, with the Tennessee River as a wonderful asset, tourism, Shiloh Military Park, the River Pickwick, Clifton Marina, which exists, all through that area, tourism is what people know is going to be the economic engine for growth and development.

Savannah is an amazing town right on Highway 64 and the Tennessee River.

Right now, you go down there any weekend during the summer months in particular and you will see these large riverboats that are cruising the Mississippi and Ohio rivers coming there and docking and staying overnight.

It's interesting, they dock at a landing.

It probably looks the same as when Mark Twain was traveling on the rivers.

You throw a rope off, you wrap it around a tree, and you let the gangplank down.

We have a bigger vision.

Mayor Bob Schutt there and the city leaders for years have been saving money for the purpose of building a marina.

Probably will look something like those that might be familiar with Florence, Alabama.

They have a nice marina that actually receives these same ships after they leave Savannah.

There's no marina between Clifton in Wayne County and way down at Pickwick.

This will put one there.

It's going to be an economic driver, and so we were able to get a significant appropriation in our budget to supplement what Savannah is already doing.

We're not doing it for them.

They needed just some additional help and to push them over.

Now it looks like we're on our way to constructing a marina there.

I don't know how soon it will be done, noth.. as you would wish, but we're on the way.

-This has to be huge for the people there because of what ultimately the economics could mean for all of that.

I wanted to touch on one subject because you are a clinical psychologist, and we are finally nationwide beginning to pay more attention to mental health, which is long overdue.

It is something that has touched my family, me personally.

-Sure.

Absolutely.

-Where do you feel like we are as far as funding things such as mental health counselors in our schools and making the improvements that we need to make for people of all ages and dealing with mental health?

-You are so correct, Steve, that whether it's because there are more behavioral and mental challenges and more trauma or we're just diagnosing it better and more accurate than we used to, we've seen a proliferation of it.

I was reading just an article earlier this morning that since COVID in particular issues around depression and even self-identity have been just so pronounced.

We in Tennessee have done a good but not good enough job in trying to provide for.

We are blessed with a remarkable commissioner of our Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services right now, Marie Williams.

I know Marie is such an extraordinary leader, and I've worked with her closely on issues in the Western Mental Health Institute in Bolivar and in our community mental health systems across Tennessee.

We have had to really put a lot of resources and we have from the legislature into recruiting and retaining mental health service workers in our community mental health system because they're hard to recruit, they're hard to retain, not surprisingly, particularly in our more rural areas as compared to the urban.

We've recognized in schools, too, the importance of an awareness of this.

Every school has funding for school nurses and for folks who can make the appropriate referrals for mental health services.

I'm going to stray over into another area that I think is related and important to you.

-I want to give you a time cue right .. We've got about a minute and a half left.

-Very quickly as we talk about issues around guns and gun safety, the mental health issue is interspersed with that, as we saw the person that did the killing in Nashville.

-In Nashville, that wa..

Severe issues around mental health that were not reported as they should have been by the therapist to the authorities or that might have been a preventable occurrence.

Everyone agrees we have to work on these mental health issues at both our psychiatric hospitals, our community mental health centers, and in our schools, we are putting significant resources in there to tr.. and provide people with that healing and hope.

-I wish that we had a full hour to go through everything because there's just such a volume in going through a legislative session and we've got one that's going to crank up in about two months.

I want to thank you for coming to visit with us here in Tennessee is Talking, and I hope we get a chance to do this again real soon.

-I'd love to, Steve.

Thank you for the privilege, and thank you to the people of the 26th District for allowing me to serve as senator and to serve West Tennessee and all of our state.

-State Senator Page Walley.

In this edition of Tennessee is Talking, we do want to thank Senator Page Walley for joining us today.

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I'm Steve Beverly, and I thank you for joining the conversation on .. Tennessee is Talking.

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