Judicial Elections and Parkland Sales

The Arch City Chronicle links to two stories, one from Detroit and one from DC, on issues of interest to Missouri and the Show-Me Institute. The first one, from Detroit, regards the city’s plans to sell 92 of its parks, just as the city of St. Louis recently sold (or leased, whatever it was) a small area of Forest Park to Barnes Hospital, over much protest. The Detroit Free-Press article in very interesting, particularly in that parks abutting schools might just be transferred to the school district. I also think it would be a good idea for neighborhood associations to have the first crack at buying the parks, at a discounted rate, provided they commit to maintaining them.

The other article is from the Washington Post on judicial elections. While changes may indeed be necessary for our own Missouri Plan, this article clearly shows the problems that come from large-scale judicial elections. I hope we make needed improvements to our judicial selection system, but I in no way want to move toward the elections we see over in Illinois that are described in this article.