Days start early for Idaho House Minority Leader Wendy Jaquet.
Her alarm goes off at 4:50 a.m., and she heads to a pre-dawn spin class before riding her bike through the quiet streets of Boise to the state Capitol.
"I think that makes a huge difference with how much energy I have," the Ketchum Democrat said Friday after a morning committee hearing where she presented a bill for printing.
The Legislature is winding down with a projected wrap-up at the end of this week. It has been a relatively short session during which Jaquet believes not much was accomplished. She cited shortcomings on a variety of legislation, including the grocery tax, property taxes, health care, education and highway funding.
Just the same, this veteran lawmaker has come into her own during her years representing District 25 in Boise. Friday, as her 11th legislative session drew near to a close, she recounted her progression from a literally shaky-kneed freshman to a more confident veteran legislator and a coming-into-her-own party leader.
Jaquet's 11 years in the Idaho House of Representatives have been a progression that can be summed up in three relatively distinct phases. She was a nervous freshman, but as she matured the nerves waned. She found herself attempting to reach across the isle to build bipartisan support for policy.
"I would stand up, and my knees would crash together," she said. "I would have my notes all typed out. Even as a leader, I wouldn't always object when they crossed the line. I feel very comfortable objecting now—and I will."
Now in her eighth season as House minority leader, Jaquet said she feels like she is maturing as a lawmaker and party leader.
"I feel like I'm Leo the Late Bloomer because I'm doing my bills better, relaxed," she said. "I'm able to anticipate questions. When you first come here, you don't know, for example, you should take your bill to the appropriate agency for a sign-off. Coalition building—that's the core of it."
One of the unique undercurrents at work at the Legislature this year involves the November pick-up by Democrats of six additional seats in the House. It practically goes without saying that Idaho is widely considered the most Republican state in the country.
While the additional seats have given Democrats more of a voice in committees and on the House floor, the increase also triggered a partisan chess match that Jaquet believes has stagnated policy development this session.
"In a lot of ways, I would say not a lot was accomplished," she said. "But with the picking up of seats, we have been punished. The undercurrent is that because we were bad and picked up seats we were not going to get any bills through this year. There's an arrogance among the leaders of the most 'red state' in the country."
She said she spends a lot of time going onto the House floor and checking with her caucus, keeping tabs on pending legislation. "I have to be ready all the time and to look at things in development. Things move so quickly here. But that's part of my job as a leader, to help people be their very best."
But the leader's job is also to get along with the other party, and that's something Jaquet said she is doing increasingly well. It's a balancing act that tips between taking hard stands and extending a cooperative hand. If done well, it earns esteem.
"I've earned that respect, and I think that's good," she said. "It's a two-way street. If you don't call them on it, they'll walk all over you and all over your caucus."
Jaquet, a former executive director of the Sun Valley-Ketchum Chamber of Commerce, has represented Blaine, Camas, Lincoln and Gooding counties—collectively District 25—at the Legislature since 1995 and has been the House minority leader since 1998.
With the addition of the six freshman Democrats Jaquet is taking seriously her position as leader of this growing minority. The addition brings her party's representation up to 27 percent, the biggest it's been since she arrived in Boise. When she arrived a freshman in January 1995, there were 13 Democrats, and that number dipped to nine several years later.
"Nineteen is big," she said. "A lot of what we've done is try to increase that voice."
For Jaquet, increasing the voice means working to recruit Democratic candidates and raise money for her party. They're responsibilities she continues to take seriously, even in the midst of the busy legislative session.
Last weekend, for example, she continued a tradition started seven years before in which members of he Democratic caucus travel around the state to offer updates about the session. The working weekend would take her to Garden Valley, Cascade, McCall and Caldwell.
Another part of being a party leader for Jaquet is positioning herself as a role model for young people from her district. Friday afternoon, she and Rep. Donna Pence, D-Gooding, had lunch with a group of juniors and seniors from the Gooding Accelerated Learning Center.
"When people say nobody has fun here, it's not true," Jaquet told the group of teens. She proceeded to facilitate discussion about issues like a new bill that would ban smoking in bowling alleys, and she shared snippets from her life and experiences.
When push comes to shove, Jaquet said she is a go-getter type personality, someone who must always forge ahead, "not a maintainer," in her words. And from her list of accomplishments and ongoing growth as a lawmaker, that appears to be true.
"Yea, we do work hard," she said. "But I do have fun here, too."
House Minority Leader Wendy Jaquet, D-Ketchum, and Senate Minority Leader Clint Stennett, D-Ketchum, consult about pending issues at the Statehouse in Boise Friday morning. Jaquet, in her 11th year at the Legislature, said she feels like she is maturing as a lawmaker and leader. Photo by Greg Stahl
