Candidates fight for seat in Dist. 26

TIPPECANOE COUNTY, Ind. (WLFI) - The fight for a seat at the Indiana State House continues for two candidates running for State Representative in District 26.

Incumbent Republican Randy Truitt will square off against Democrat Rick Cornstuble for the State Representative seat in District 26. Truitt was elected to the General Assembly in 2008 and has served District 26 since then.

"I have an understanding of how the process works and how important it is to be able to understand how to move something through the process," Republican candidate for State Representative District 26 Randy Truitt said.

Cornstuble served two terms on the Lafayette city council and also worked on the Area Plan Commission. The Democratic candidate spent three decades as a teacher and in the teacher's union.

"I have been unhappy with the direction the state has taken, particularly in public education over the last 8 years and decided maybe I should do something about it so that's why I decided to run," Democratic candidate for State Representative District 26 Rick Cornstuble said.

At the top of both of these candidates agenda is education. Both said they have what it takes to make education a top priority in the state of Indiana.

"One of the things I've always focused on is education. I think having Purdue and Ivy Tech here from a higher education stand point, I spend an incredible amount of time with individuals from Purdue," Truitt said.

"In my 33 years of working with the association, I've represented school systems as small as 45 teachers and as big as 2700 teachers," Cornstuble said.

Next on the list for the two candidates is job creation.

"I'm a small business owner. It's something that I take very seriously. It's always a different feeling when you can actually personally relate what it takes to make ends meet from a business stand point," Truitt said.

"We create jobs via infrastructure," Cornstuble explained. "Those are salaries, that is spending and creating other jobs locally and that's one way we can produce jobs and turn the economy around."

Both said they believe they have what it takes to turn Indiana around, but now it's up to the voters.