We are looking more and more like those Third World countries with a Grand Canyon between the haves and have-nots and a disappearing middle class.

What concerns me is the unevenness . You have peaks and valleys in median income throughout the state.

There's a statute in the minimum wage law that allows municipalities and cities home rule to [set their own minimum wage rates]. We don't want to see [that] changed.

There's a statute in the minimum wage law that allows municipalities and cities home rule to [set their own minimum wage rates]. We don't want to see [section] 50-4-29 changed and we support the right of the municipalities to set their own rates.

It should be an engine of job growth and an improved economy in the Hispanic north.

We don't have enough job growth, and the right kind of job growth to pull the working-class people out of poverty.