Fall 2022 Internships

Posted on by Show-Me Institute Staff

Positions Open

The Show-Me Institute is pleased to offer internship opportunities for Fall 2022.
  • Internships are open to current undergraduate and graduate students, as well as recent graduates.
  • Summer internships will last approximately three months. The exact starting and ending dates are flexible, but each intern is expected to work at least 10 weeks. No internship shall start prior to September 6.
  • Fall interns will work a part-time schedule in the office, with exact hours to be determined later.
  • Interns will be involved in many aspects of the Institute’s operations. Interns will work closely with senior staff on a wide variety of projects. They can expect greater responsibility and personal attention than they would receive at larger organizations.
  • Interns will assist staff members with a variety of public-policy related tasks. These may include researching public policy topics, organizing events, and writing and editing op-eds, newsletters, blogs, studies, and other documents. Some administrative and clerical tasks will also be required.
  • A Show-Me Institute internship is an excellent opportunity to improve your research and writing skills. Each intern will produce regular blog posts and an op-ed on a public policy topic of interest to him or her. Each intern will receive feedback and assistance from SMI staff members throughout the process.
  • All internships are at the Show-Me Institute’s offices in Saint Louis, Mo.
  • Interns will be paid on an hourly basis.

Those wishing to be considered for an internship should submit an application and the requested supporting materials. The deadline for applications is August 29, 2022. However, we will begin conducting interviews as applications are received. Applicants can expect a decision no later than early-September.

About the Show-Me Institute

Founded in 2005, the Show-Me Institute is a nonpartisan, nonprofit public policy research organization. The mission of the Institute is advancing liberty with responsibility by promoting market solutions for Missouri public policy. For more information:

Phone: (314) 454-0647

Email: [email protected]

Part 6: Does Kansas City Have and Affordable Housing Problem?

Posted on by Elias Tsapelas

(You can read part one, part two, part three, part four, and part five in this series here.)

As earlier posts in this series have explained, defining an affordable housing problem is complicated. So too, is solving one. Because the issue is so complex, the definitions and data used to characterize the issue are incredibly important. Over the next two posts, I’ll walk through an analysis that sheds light on the affordable housing situation in Kansas City, which can then serve as a jumping-off point for a discussion of potential solutions for the region.

Even though the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) defines “affordable housing” as a household spending no more than 30% of their income on housing, it is important to distinguish between situations where households exceed that threshold out of necessity because of a lack of sufficient options versus situations where they actively choose to spend more than 30% of their income on housing even when more affordable and still viable options are available.

Every household is free to choose where they want to live and pay what they feel they can afford to pay regardless of whether the government would view their choice as “affordable.” Conversely, there is nothing wrong with choosing to spend as little on housing as possible. The point is that while an aggregate story tells a tale, the personal stories of individual Kansas Citians shouldn’t be lost in our discussion.

For these reasons, this post focuses on estimating the potential demand for affordable housing–namely, the number of units needed at different cost points to accommodate Kansas City households if they were to spend no more than 30% of their income on housing. This analysis is primarily about households making less than the area’s median income (AMI), as the term is defined and published by HUD. In Kansas City, the AMI for a family of three is $78,000 per year.

To determine the potential demand for affordable housing, we need an estimate for the number of households in different income ranges, and then we can multiply each income range by 30% and divide by 12 to arrive at the monthly housing cost range that would be affordable to those households. The definition of income we use comes from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS) and encompasses labor market earnings, self-employment income, interest and dividends, retirement income, and “any public assistance or welfare payments from the state or local welfare office” but not other sources of government assistance such as Medicaid.

In principle, one could consider augmenting this measure to include non-cash benefits like Medicare for retirees, Medicaid, employer-provided health insurance and other such fringe benefits in the income measure for purposes of calculating the 30% affordability thresholds. But obtaining data on each of these items is quite difficult, and deviating from the widely used ACS definition would entail making judgment calls about the cash value that households attach to them.

For example, if a household receives $20,000 of income a year according to the ACS income definition, the 30% of income affordability threshold for the household would be $500 (= $20,000 x 30% x 1/12) in rent or mortgage payments. If the household also receives Medicaid benefits that cost the government $6,000 to provide—and if the household would have otherwise chosen to spend that same $6,000 itself absent Medicaid—then the household’s income effectively rises to $26,000, and one could argue that the affordability threshold should increase to $650 (= $26,000 x 30% x 1/12). However, if the household would not have spent a full $6,000 to obtain alternative health insurance in the absence of Medicaid, the cash equivalent value is less, and the affordability threshold would be between $500 and $650. Thus, you cannot assume that various government benefits are the equivalent of income.

You can see in the table below based on data from the ACS and compiled by HUD that there are approximately 820,000 households in the Kansas City metropolitan area. Additionally, the majority of those making less than the AMI are renters (which should make some intuitive sense).

The table below gives an idea of how much a family of three with various incomes below the AMI can pay for housing that is considered affordable using the 30% rule of thumb from HUD.

Taken together, we have an idea of how much housing could be needed in Kansas City, and at what price points. The next question is how those figures compare to the reported supply of housing in Kansas City, which will be the topic of the next post.

We Gave DESE a Report Card

Posted on by Susan Pendergrass

2020-2021 Data Now Available at MoSchoolRankings.org

Missouri Has an Education Emergency

Missouri schools are failing to teach the core subjects of reading and math and the most recent test scores show that students are falling further behind.

Missouri’s Department of Secondary and Elementary (MO DESE) has not offered the level of transparency regarding student performance that is necessary to create an education system focused on higher standards, reducing achievement gaps, and results-based accountability.

The status quo is leaving thousands of students behind without the fundamental skills to pursue higher education or compete in the modern labor market.

About the Project

In response to DESE’s failure to perform one of its most basic functions, we launched The Missouri School Rankings Project and MoSchoolRankings.org.

The mission of The Missouri School Rankings Project is to make student performance data more transparent by providing parents, policymakers, educators, and taxpayers with access to easy-to-understand information about every Missouri school and school district in order to motivate actions that will result in dramatic reforms to Missouri’s education system.

Visit MoSchoolRankings.org

Eureka Water Privatization Is a Very Good Thing

Posted on by David Stokes

The Post-Dispatch had a very long story about the just-finalized sale of Eureka’s (an outer suburb of St. Louis) municipal water system to Missouri American Water. Missouri American paid Eureka $28 million for its water and sewer systems, which will now be operated by the private company instead of the city. A few years ago, Missouri American paid Arnold (another outer suburb of St. Louis) $21 million to buy its sewer system. Liberty Utilities just purchased the water and sewer systems in Bolivar in Southwest Missouri. The trend for these privatization sales is growing.

These privatization deals are a wonderful thing that should be encouraged and expanded in Missouri, including for our largest cities and their water divisions. More stringent health, environmental, and other regulations (both necessary and not) are making it harder for local communities to operate their water and sewer systems properly. The Post-Dispatch article mentions right at the start how bad the water in Eureka is currently: “It’s the worst water I’ve ever tasted in my life,’ said Eureka resident Thomas Ferrari.”

The main complaint about privatization is that rates will increase. Yes, they often do, and that is typically a necessary thing. Municipal utilities frequently underprice water, electric, and gas rates because those pricing decisions are made by politicians who want to keep voters happy. That may help with re-election, but it makes necessary system investments more difficult. From the Post-Dispatch story:

Arnold sold its sewer system to Missouri American in 2015 for $21 million. “The system was not in good shape. It was not well maintained,” said City Administrator Bryan Richison. “And city council members were running on not raising rates, so it put us in a bad position.”

The water in the City of St. Louis may taste great (it does), but the city water division there has done a poor job of reinvesting in its system and incorporating new technology into service. As astounding as it may be, the City of St. Louis water division has still never installed water meters in most homes to measure water usage and bill accordingly. You get charged for water based on a variety of physical factors, so if you want to water your lawn for 12 hours a day you pay no more than your neighbors. That’s terrible public policy and results in inefficient, wasteful use of water.

Water and wastewater privatization is very good public policy that we need more of in Missouri. Private utilities adopt technology more quickly, expand the tax base, invest in their systems more reliably, and are regulated by the state’s public service commission on their rates. More municipalities with their own water, electric, and gas utilities should follow Eureka and Arnold’s lead and privatize for everyone’s benefit.

The Show-Me Curricula Project

Posted on by Patrick Ishmael

In 2021, the Show-Me Institute began a new transparency project focused on whether schools in Missouri are teaching critical race theory (CRT) concepts in the classroom. Similar to the Show-Me Checkbook and Show-Me CBA projects, the Show-Me Curricula Project seeks to find out from Missouri schools what Missouri tax dollars are buying Missouri parents.

In July of 2022, the Show-Me Institute kicked off a repeat of its Show-Me Curricula Project.

Click Here to Review the Documents We Have Received

At Least Hazelwood’s Honest

Posted on by Quin Rizer

Last week, the Show-Me Institute kicked off a repeat of its Show-Me Curricula Project from last year. The purpose of the project is to use Missouri’s Sunshine Law to find out what is being taught to students and told to teachers in Missouri schools, in connection with critical race theory (CRT)  and its associated concepts.

Overall, the responses we’ve received so far in 2022 look generally like what we saw in 2021. Most schools either have not responded to our request for information or have denied teaching CRT. Some schools have opted to try and charge the Institute hundreds of thousands of dollars to get access to school curriculum, and many more wanted to charge smaller fees. What has been rare, however, is schools openly providing documents that include CRT-type material. Last year, the most prominent example of this was the Kansas City Public School District.

But another notable example from last year was the Hazelwood School District. Hazelwood was one district that provided CRT-related materials when the Institute sent requests last year, and at that time its curriculum included excerpts of the 1619 project being taught to fourth graders and materials provided by the Southern Poverty Law Center about “Teaching for Tolerance.” When Hazelwood responded to this year’s request, the district sent basically the same documents it did last year, though this time without any fourth-grade curriculum, indicating that content was removed from the curricula.

Our director of government accountability, Patrick Ishmael, has been critical of CRT concepts. But it’s important to remember that regardless of the content of the instruction, the public has a right to see it and districts have an obligation to provide it.

Hazelwood should be commended for its honesty and forthrightness in response to our inquiries, both last year and this year. Through two iterations of the project, it is the only district that to date has twice released the pertinent curriculum without any fees, delays, or complaints.

The point here is that if school districts are going to spend taxpayer money to educate students regarding a subject, including CRT, they should make the information available to parents. Ideally, all districts would be transparent with curriculum and would post it on their website or send it to parents before the start of a school year. After all, sunlight is the best disinfectant, and if government transparency can improve curricula, our schools and our kids will be better off for it.

School Districts Should Follow Their Own Rules

Posted on by Patrick Ishmael

I mentioned in my recent blog post about our curricula transparency project that a significant amount of the more than $800,000 price increase between this year and last year’s total payment required by districts came from three school districts in central Missouri. Those districts? Malta Bend, Blackwater, and Gilliam.

What I didn’t mention was that all three of those districts broke three classic classroom rules I’m sure their students follow (or are supposed to follow, anyway).

  1. Never copy your neighbor’s homework.

    The letters sent by all three school districts in response to our request were very similar. Each cited the same list of terms and asked for similar amounts to provide records—Blackwater requested $207,584, while Malta Bend and Gilliam charged $196,908. In fact, the Gilliam School District sent us the form letter copied onto its letterhead but written as if it were from Malta Bend. Interestingly, all three schools are within twenty miles of each other. It seems like Gilliam, Malta Bend, and Blackwater might need to learn to keep their eyes on their own papers.

  2. Don’t start your assignment before you read it.

    All three districts responded to a Sunshine Law records request in their reply to us, but they didn’t respond to ours. Instead, they each sent a form letter written in response to another organization’s request on similar topics, which asked the school districts to look for 78 key terms compared to our request’s eight. Malta Bend even neglected to change the name of the addressee in its response letter. It’s concerning that all three districts either didn’t take the time to read our request or chose to send a response written for a completely different situation, rather than understand our inquiry and provide a real estimate.

  3. Don’t wait until the last minute to finish your work.

    Gilliam and Malta Bend both responded to our request on the last day allowed under the Sunshine Law. Maybe these districts panicked knowing they hadn’t studied for this transparency “exam.” Whatever the reason, mistakes were made as the response window closed.

In the end, after we reported them to the attorney general’s sunshine office, all three districts charged us nothing to inform us they had no responsive documents, and I had a useful conversation with the superintendent of Gilliam, who only recently assumed his position. To some extent, the unhelpful responses we initially received were understandable, since all three districts have two or fewer schools and, given their relative anonymity compared to big districts, have limited experience handling Sunshine Law requests.

Ultimately, Gilliam, Malta Bend, and Blackwater chose a fast, last-minute, and incorrect reaction to our request rather than taking the time to respond fully and accurately. Our districts and schools should hold themselves to a higher standard.

Small but Mighty Huntsdale, Population 25

Posted on by Quin Rizer

When I first started working on the municipal checkbook project this year, I thought that many of Missouri’s smallest cities might have trouble getting information back to us. After all, cities with populations under 100 often have few if any full-time government officials. These cities also generally have few expenses, as their fire protection and police services are usually provided by other departments.

But as it turned out, some of the smallest cities I worked with were the most responsive and welcoming of our checkbook inquiries. The Village of Huntsdale, Missouri, is an example. Located 20 minutes west of Columbia, Huntsdale has a population of only 25 people. All of its government officials are unpaid and work part time in addition to their full-time jobs. Considering these factors, one might expect that the city would just ignore our request, as many small towns have. However, that wasn’t the case.

Ana Lopez, a Huntsdale city official, replied to us within a week of our request. She acknowledged that the village has very few expenses due to its size, and only has a single monthly bill (totaling a little less than $800) for landscaping work. She provided us with a digital copy of this bill, showing the exact cost, who the amount was paid to, and the date. Of the over 600 requests that the Show-Me Institute sent, Huntsdale is the smallest city to respond thus far. As it turns out, being a smaller city may mean fewer resources for officials to marshal, but it also means fewer stones to turn over when asked about its operations.

This isn’t to say that Huntsdale’s response would be the exact format for what we would want a submission to the state to look like someday, when a statewide mandatory checkbook reform comes to pass. We have talked before about the importance of reporting spending in a standardized format, and that format when submitted to the state would probably look (to enter the weeds briefly) like an Accounts Payable report or some equivalent. In that scenario, the state would need more than a lonely bill from Huntsdale for it to be in compliance. Of course, that isn’t the circumstance today.

Moreover and as with every city, receipt of a city’s documents is not itself a confirmation of their contents. Our presumption in our Sunshine Law requests is that the responses we receive will be in good faith. Lacking an independent basis to affirm the truth of a document we receive; however, we can only observe how well respondents adhere to the transparency process and the nature of the documents we got. The state, empowered by a mandatory checkbook reporting system, will be far better positioned to confirm the truth of local spending documents, and we will leave those determinations to when that time comes—as we always have. With that in mind, Huntsdale’s response was nonetheless sufficient for our purposes now.

It has now been over three weeks since we sent requests for spending information out, including many to middle-sized and large municipalities. But if Huntsdale, a town of 25 with zero paid officials, can respond promptly, so can larger cities with one or more full-time staff. Government transparency requires officials to use their power in a responsible manner, with an eye toward stewardship, and that’s something that can happen in small towns and sprawling cities alike.

Municipal transparency doesn’t really depend on city size at all.It depends on city culture. Fortunately, it seems Huntsdale’s culture of transparency is a good one.

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