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Article by Olivia Lupia, Tennessee Conservative News –
In a Tuesday interview on Yaffee Live, Republican Senator Bo Watson discussed an array of topics including infrastructure, his reelection campaign, Tennessee’s new governor, healthcare and the MAHA movement, state economic drivers, and school choice as early voting gets underway across the state.
Watson (R-Hixson-District 11), has served in the Tennessee Senate for 20 years, first elected in 2006 before becoming the Chair of the Senate Finance, Ways, and Means Committee in 2017. This top leadership position affords Watson a significant amount of power in determining how taxpayer dollars are spent by the state and what bills receive funding.
Regarding Tennessee’s recent explosion of growth as people flee blue states and the resulting new construction and corresponding infrastructure, particularly concerning water accessibility, Watson said that while Tennessee has “lots of water,” the challenge is “getting the water to people.”
“It’s really expensive… a lot of the pipes that deliver the water out are old and are small, as compared to the modern pipe for fire suppression and that kind of stuff. These new neighborhoods have nice infrastructure in them but it’s the line that it hooks up to that’s the challenge,” he elaborated. “And then you have a lot of utility districts that because they really work on very thin margins, their ability to repair and maintain their water lines is limited and their ability to invest new capital to develop those water lines is limited.”
To help with those costs, he said the Tennessee General Assembly funds a program that provides low-interest grants and a “revolving fund” for utility districts. Watson also discussed how local governments were asked and directed to use COVID-era economic stimulus programs for investment into water and wastewater infrastructure as opposed to recurring expenses since the money was not going to be distributed forever.
He also reiterated that “grants are not mystical money. It doesn’t just appear, I mean, it comes from somewhere, meaning sometimes it’s federal, a lot of times it’s state…And replacing those [pipes] just takes a long time. But all the water companies in the process of doing that, we’re trying to help our utility districts fund some of those things.”
Should he win reelection against Democrat Tim Roberts on Nov. 3, Watson touched on his priorities for the next legislative session which will begin in January 2027.
“My main priority right now is getting reelected. That’s the most important thing. You can have a lot of good ideas, but if you’re not elected, then it doesn’t really matter,” he quipped. “And I take every election serious. I respect every opponent that I’ve ever had. And so we’re running a normal campaign.”
Part of what Watson said he was looking forward to in a new session is a new governor, who he hopes will be Marsha Blackburn whom he has endorsed.
“I think that bodes well for the legislature and for the state of Tennessee if Marsha is elected because of the alignment that exists between the legislature and Marsha Blackburn. If someone else gets elected, then we’ll address that if that happens,” he said.
The Senator also pointed to infrastructure, roads, bridges, water, and wastewater as important focuses for the General Assembly, stating they are “critical to the citizens of the state of Tennessee.”
And concerning education, Watson said it continues to see emphasis from the state, noting that it is the “highest funded part of our budget, so it’s always gonna be important, and it’s gonna be important again in this cycle as well.”
On the flip side, Watson suggested one of the state’s biggest struggles is the overall health of Tennesseans.
“The area that everyone, every state across the country has struggled with is, how do we improve our health and our health outcomes? And that’s more than just healthcare. People usually get on shows, and they talk about the cost of healthcare. It’s really about health,” Watson offered.
He mentioned Rep. Michele Reneau’s (R-Signal Mountain-District 27) work in the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement, commending her for “trying to improve people’s eating habits and behavioral habits.”
“Everything in Tennessee is on an upward trajectory. The one area that we continue to struggle with is just around health in general. We continue to have a population that is unhealthy,” he said. “You know, we’re in the stroke belt, strokes are a big problem for us. Cardiovascular disease is a big problem for us. Lung cancer is a big problem for us. Interestingly enough, low birth weight babies is a big problem for us, and nobody can figure out exactly what causes all that. Obviously, having educational attainment, economic prosperity are two key drivers to health, and we’ve made incredible progress there, right? But these things take not just, you know, one governor’s term, these things take generations to turn around.”
The conversation then pivoted to the state’s “school choice” programs, with Watson saying that the past 20 years of Republican leadership in the legislature has “driven us into economic stratosphere that people never imagined Tennessee would be in. It’s also driven our education system, which it’s not where we wanna be, but every metric tells you it’s much better than it was 20 years ago.”
“And one of those drivers, I believe, is educational choice. And not just the education freedom scholarships that everybody wants to focus on. We’ve created choice in a lot of different spaces,” he explained. “In the public school system, you have choices within that system. You have magnet schools, you have academies, you have dual enrollment, we have homeschooling, you have virtual schooling. I mean, we’ve created so many different options that we believe. And then sprinkled in there is the three school choice programs.”
Watson finished, “So we believe that creating this kind of competition has made everybody better. And if all the academic systems are better, then the beneficiaries of that are the families and the students that are using that.”
Constituents in Senate District 11 can decide whether Watson has earned a vote for his reelection during early voting until Oct. 29 and on Nov. 3, Election Day.
Listen to the full interview HERE or below.
Interview starts at 1:27.
Sources:
Yaffee LIVE.
Tennessee General Assembly.
Tennessee Conservative News.
BoForTN.com.
About the Author: Olivia Lupia is a political refugee from Colorado who now calls Tennessee home. A proud follower of Christ, she views all political happenings through a Biblical lens and aims to utilize her knowledge and experience to educate and equip others. Olivia is an outspoken conservative who has run for local office, managed campaigns, and been highly involved with state & local GOPs, state legislatures, and other grassroots organizations and movements. Olivia can be reached at olivia@tennesseeconservativenews.com.
