A Niles teacher and Upper Peninsula native is the choice of Republicans for the state House in the 78th District. Brad Paquette won Tuesday’s primary and tells WSJM News he has many of the same ideas as a lot of candidates in wanting to get roads fixed and reform no-fault auto insurance to make it more affordable, but his classroom experience also has him wanting to make changes to the education system to get more people interested in being in front of students.
“A lot of what I want to do isn’t even policy related,” Paquette said. “It would be finding all the ‘Johnny-try-hard’ educators that are in this area and giving them encouragement, giving them a platform and saying what you’re doing is awesome, don’t give up, because we’re losing amazing educators.”
The 31-year-old was born in Marquette and says he’s also interested in addressing issues that impact communities on the border like Berrien County. He says in the 78th district, population loss is still a problem leftover from the recession, and a big part of that is the high cost of auto insurance in Michigan. Paquette is hopeful that with a lot of new lawmakers coming into office in January, something will finally be done to address the issue. He will face Democrat Dean Hill, who did not have a primary opponent, in November’s election.
