Public Interest Podcast

This is the one hundred and fifty-first episode of Public Interest Podcast with Peter Franchot, Democratic Comptroller of the State of Maryland, member of the Board of Public Works, former Delegate representing District 20 in Montgomery County, former Capitol Hill staffer, attorney, former Democratic nominee for Congress, former delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 2008, 2012, 2016, and U.S. Army veteran. Franchot, a self-styled fiscal watchdog and warrior for the public interest, speaks about elected office as a noble profession in which empathy, compromise, and independence are virtues that he hopes will reverberate across society, generating a future generation of public servants. Subscribe by Email PETER FRANCHOT is the Comptroller of the State of Maryland. Peter is also a member of the Board of Public Works. He's a former Democratic delegate representing District 20 in Montgomery County, Maryland, is a former Capitol Hill staffer, an attorney, and a veteran of the United States Army. He's a former delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 2003, 2012, and again in 2016, and is also a former Democratic nominee for the United States Congress. Franchot: I have been a warrior for public interest issues all my life. I think my mother taught me always to stand up the police and in school and I always felt much better when I was sticking up for some of the kids that were not good athletes, so that is the genesis of my altruism that I've carried forward in my public career. Now that I'm Comptroller I find that every day I am working in the public interest primarily by helping individuals who are in financial situations that are difficult and complicated but also in being available as a state elected official. Cooper: After college you enlisted in the United States Army, which is associated with more politically conservative individuals, yet you made a career out of serving as a liberal elected official. How did you end up in the Army with such liberal views? Franchot: Well I actually didn't finish college. I was at Amherst College and halfway through my sophomore year I dropped out to go to New Hampshire to work on the “Clean with Gene” campaign with Gene McCarthy who was running in the 1968 Democratic Primary on an anti-Vietnam War platform. Ironically, while organizing college campuses against the war for Gene McCarthy, I got a draft notice saying: “Dear Sir, You no longer are protected by your college involvement and you are to report for the draft law,” which was a shock to me. Cooper: You left college to join a political campaign because of the anti-Vietnam war platform of those campaigns. And by virtue of your civic activism you actually ended up getting embroiled in the war. Franchot: My parents actually said I was pretty clueless that I didn't realize I was giving up my student deferment but such as it is it actually in retrospect proved to be a tremendous experience. I was drafted for two years. I spent 21 months not 24 months because I was allowed to get out early to return to college. But the Army was a great experience for me not in the sense that I enjoyed it but I was put on a troop train in New York City and sent down to Fort Jackson, South Carolina with the other draftees, who were a different group of people than those with whom I was previously associated in my life. Cooper: Despite your experience in the Army, you’ve never seemed to use your experience and your status as a veteran to your political advantage as have others, most notably former Lt. Governor Anthony Brown in his 2014 bid for Governor. Why? Franchot: I didn't have the kind of long-term career that Lt. Governor Anthony Brown had; I was just a very ordinary cog in a very big machine. But I will say that the machine the military proved to be enormously beneficial to me as an individual and I would recommend the military as a terrific stabilizing force for young people who are looking for direction in life. Cooper: So running off that idea, Peter I'd like to ask your opinion on a matter that you don't have jurisdiction over as a comptroller but that you might have theoretically had jurisdiction over the course of your 20 years representing the People's Republic of Takoma Park in the Maryland House of Delegates. As you know, many nations in Western Europe and perhaps in other parts of the world have service requirements for their youth. Military conscription is something that's widespread around the world and that clearly led to your experiences in the U.S. Army. My question is do you think that there ought to be either mandatory requirements or guaranteed opportunities for all youth between certain ages to either join the military or perform some other form of civil public service? Franchot: I generally support that concept. I think it should be mandatory that every young person puts at least a year of their lives towards some constructive public purpose by serving in the military, teaching in a school, or being involved in some other fashion in supporting our infrastructure. And I would like to see veterans included in some leadership capacity. I don't suggest that everybody has to go through boot camp, but I do think it's an opportunity to install some structure, discipline, and to give a sense of purpose to some young people's lives, [which is] particularly important now [since] the economy is changing in front of our eyes [under the influence of] globalization and modernization using technology. [As a result] a lot of jobs are being eliminated, which is causing a tremendous amount of dislocation in the country and around the world. I think that a mandatory one or two year program for young people where they are involved in some kind of public interest activity would give them the chance to learn about the new economy rather than the old one. Cooper: And the one thing that kids lack when they leave high school or college is professional experience and perhaps one of the greatest obstacles to finding entry-level employment is a lack of professional experience. A mandatory service project will give them the opportunity to do the give back to a state that has given them so much. This service experience will complement a free public education by providing youth with an opportunity to gain real on-the-job experience that will make them more marketable in the new economy. Franchot: To finance this national effort [taxes could be levied on industries composing the new economy] or it could be some kind of national or state equivalent of war bonds where you ask people to participate. Cooper: But the key is that such a program would include every person between 18 and 25. That would provide youth with one to two years of skill-building while teaching them how to show up on time for a job and demonstrating what it takes to hold a job in the private sector. Franchot: I think it's more imperative now because this whole job situation is changing. Driverless cars [may replace] taxi cab drivers and it may be possible for robot [drones] to deliver food at a restaurant. I know it's a little bit far-fetched but we're in the process of replacing people in the workforce with machines. So we have to come up with new jobs and new ways of employing people, especially young people. And so I think you're onto something there with the mandatory service requirement but the jury's still out on how to pay for it, how it's structured, and what exactly a job of the future will look like. Cooper: So I’d like to transition back to the topic of you being Comptroller. We've just been discussing how to find jobs, gain job experience, and how to pay for it. But once someone has a job, they pay income taxes and the Comptroller collects those revenues. So I'd like to ask you to define the role of the Comptroller? Franchot: The Comptroller of the State of Maryland is a statewide elected position, which makes it somewhat unique since many other states do not have elected comptrollers; instead most states have appointed budget officers. [The role Comptroller of Maryland] was established in 1851 to oversee the finances of the state. The state was in bankruptcy because the bank and the Treasury made all sorts of unwise investments and so they created in the state constitution the position of comptroller. I'm the chief fiscal officer of the state according to the Constitution. As [Maryland’s] fiscal steward I 1) collect all taxes, 2) process 3.2 million tax returns each year, 3) am heavily involved in issuing tax refunds, and 4) am responsible for fighting tax fraud, which is an emerging problem. Those are the core responsibilities of the office. I'm additionally a member of the Board of Public Works (BPW) which is an extremely powerful entity in Maryland and is unique in the country as a three person panel that also includes the governor and the state treasurer. [The governor and I] happen to come from different parties. He's a Republican and I'm a Democrat. The Treasurer is elected by the legislature. This panel approves 9-10 billion dollars in state contracts every year. We meet every two weeks and it's an enormous kind of clearing house of taxpayer funding for different contracts. Cooper: You mentioned that you sit on the BPW and you alluded to the fact that you sit on the Board with the governor and the Treasurer, the Treasurer being Nancy Kopp, a Democrat, alongside you, a Democratic Comptroller, with both of you being joined by Republican Governor Larry Hogan. You previously mentioned that in the House of Delegates you represented a very liberal, progressive, somewhat socialist-leaning constituency in the Takoma Park and Silver Spring area of Montgomery County. Since Governor Hogan was elected in 2014 you and he have come, at least in the public eye, to have quite a personal friendship and furthermore you seem to have forged a successful working relationship tog

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This is the one hundred and thirty-sixth episode of Public Interest Podcast with Dr. Zach Kaufman, Senior Fellow at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government and former U.S. Supreme Court Fellow, who speaks about genocide as the 'crime of crimes' and his research into war crimes tribunals and his work in the legal profession as a means of preventing these atrocities from recurring. Subscribe by Email

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John Colmers, former Maryland Secretary of Health, speaks about the unique all payer rate setting health insurance and hospital pricing system in Maryland within the context of its use to contain healthcare costs.  Subscribe and leave a review on iTunes:

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Jeff Rosen, CEO of The Constitution Center in Philadelphia and a law professor at GWU, speaks about the modern day applicability of the U.S. Constitution to everyday life.  Subscribe and leave a review on iTunes:

Pete Weichlein, CEO of the Association of Former Members of Congress, speaks about his work facilitating dialogue among legislators and between the public and their elected officials with the goal of fostering trust through respectful, issues-driven debate. Pete Weichlein, CEO of the Assn Frmr members of Congress, tells of his efforts to foster trust across the aisle by facilitating peer to peer relationships among legislators here and also abroad #theta360 - Spherical Image - RICOH THETA Subscribe and leave a review on iTunes:

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This is the ninety-fifth episode of Public Interest Podcast with Jeff Waldstreicher, Maryland state delegate representing District 18 (Chevy Chase, Kensington), who speaks about his work advancing progressive issues pertaining to environmental protection and criminal justice. Subscribe by Email Subscribe and leave a review on iTunes:

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