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Governor Edward Schafer
interviewed by Brian Hecht on 23 October, 1995
Abolish the State?
"North Dakota would never let that happen."
Last weekend, the New York Times Sunday Magazine published a feature suggesting that, due to its large size, small population, and slow growth, the state of North Dakota might be abolished, perhaps to be combined with South Dakota. The feature has caused much discussion- -- particularly in North Dakota. Today, the Governor himself answers the question: Why North Dakota?
Tripod: How does it feel when someone suggests that the state which is the focus of all your efforts -- your whole career -- should simply be dissolved? Is that personally insulting to you?
ES: No, it isn't. And I think because, growing up here, North Dakota has always had the image of, it's too cold, or too far out of the way, or too isolated. You hear it all the time. And the people who live here say, "Well, people are happy to have their own opinions."
But it is an insult. And I think we've got to make sure that the people who live out here appreciate it. I think one of the things that is bothersome is that we're looking at investments -- and you're looking at trying to build for the future -- and you hear some of that negativism. And some people are like, "Why should we increase funding for education," or "Maybe we should downsize this." So it affects us there. But I think the general populace, and myself included, don't take that stuff seriously.
Tripod: What should people think of when they think of North Dakota?
ES: We're trying to convert them from thinking it's cold to -- What we see in North Dakota is, we're number one in environment. We've got the cleanest air, the cleanest water, and all that stuff. Number one in education. If people want to send their kids to schools with metal detectors for a mediocre education in New York, they can do that. Here, a kid rides his bike to school, leaves it unattended in the playground, and gets the best-rated math scores, the best reading comprehension scores, and the highest rate of graduation from high school. That's the contrast.
And I think what we're seeing is that, as environmental problems creep up on the coast, as the social structures and crime change, there's more focus on the Midwest. And when people focus on the Midwest, one of the places they're seeing, of course, is North Dakota. So we want them to see open spaces, great environment, friendly people, and a performance atmosphere.
Tripod: So this is a time when people should maybe be thinking about moving to North Dakota? Why is the population decreasing?
ES: I disagree, I don't think the population is decreasing. We've lost 50,000 people here in the state from '85 to '92, but since '92, I think we've seen a turnaround, or at least a bottoming-out. The U.S. Census Bureau says there's a thousand more people, some of the stuff that comes out of NDSU, unfortunately, I think that the professor there is a member of the doom-and-gloom party. You talk to movers, you talk to developers around the state, you talk to people who are investing and creating jobs here, and I don't think the population is decreasing anymore.
One of the factors of that, of course, is telecommunications. We're the first state to be fully fiber-optically linked. We've got digital, state-of-the-art switching equipment. What's happening is we've got people now who've got dial-up access for data transmission anywhere in the world. Companies like Unisys ... are investing in North Dakota saying, "We can do our service centers there, we can do credit card applications, we've got people looking at internal operations, expense account handling." They're coming in because they know people show up for work, and they leave the equipment there when they go home [laughs]. We're the highest productivity state, with the least rate of absenteeism. So people are looking at investing in North Dakota because they just get the quality work.
Tripod: It seems like a lot of this is just image problems. Are you getting good PR help?
ES: Yeah, we are. In the end, it's happening not so much from our efforts, but from the reality of the marketplace. People are dying out there for good employees.
Tripod: What are some of the reactions you've received, personally, to the New York Times Magazine article?
ES: Most of it is, "You've got to do something about that, you can't let them say that about North Dakota."
Tripod: Are you planning a response?
ES: Probably not. We do the things here that are appropriate, invest in our state, move forward. Response I don't think gets you anything. Actually, at the end of the article, the author was saying, "Hey, if you want clean air and safe streets and a good education, what's so bad about that?"
Tripod: Is there any actual motion afoot to abolish North Dakota, or was this just one journalist's flight of fancy?
ES: It was one journalist. I mean, you hear it all the time, "Where is North Dakota?" That kind of thing is not uncommon ... But the reality is, there's a good life here. And as the life crumbles in other areas, they're finding it out here.
Tripod: Can you outline some of the differences between North Dakota and South Dakota?
ES: You know, in reality, there aren't a lot. In reality, we probably should have run that border, instead of east and west, we should have run the border north and south. Eastern North Dakota is quite different from western North Dakota -- topography, economically. And the same thing in South Dakota. Really, the economies are similar, the work ethic's similar, the moral fortitude is similar.
Tripod: They don't tell South Dakota jokes in North Dakota?
ES: No, we all tell Montana jokes!
Tripod: Surely there are some problems which are particular to running a very sparsely popualted state. Could you highlight one or two of those?
ES: The two major ones are education and health care. In a rural state, we have 53 counties here, we've got about 10 counties that don't even have a physician. Look at access to health care, emergency access to health care, we've got to map out a plan to deliver that. That causes some situations -- helicopters help. But it's difficult to support because you don't have the population base or the user base to provide education and health care in rural North Dakota.
Tripod: So if there were a referendum, "Should North Dakota be discontinued as a state?" -- it wouldn't get any support at all?
ES: You will find a very fiercely independent and dedicated and committed North Dakota that would never let that happen.
Tripod: And you sound like you're proud of that ...
ES: That's right ... One other thing. Some months ago, President Clinton had suggested this. He was someplace, saying that, really, with Vice President Gore's efforts to rightsize government, they ought to eliminate North Dakota. I had a chance to engineer a letter from us that was four pages of single space, things that North Dakota is rated number one through five in, of all the states. We dashed that off to the President. And he conceded. He said that, with all these things, maybe we need more states like North Dakota, not less.
Tripod: ...Well, he wants your electoral votes.
ES: We only have three, you know, it's not that big of a deal!
Tripod: Well, that's where you benefit -- you've got more senators and more electoral votes per person.
ES: That's right.
What are your feelings about the future of North Dakota? Contact the state's senators and representatives -- er, representative (singular) -- in Tripod's Political Playbook.
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