This Is What Democracy Looks Like?

Posted on by Michael Q. McShane

A never-ending talking point of school choice foes is that public schools are “democratically controlled” and charter schools or private schools supported by vouchers are not. Tracing their argument back to the “Common Schools” that Horace Mann envisioned, they argue that elected school boards represent the will of the community and are the best safeguard of children and taxpayers.

On April 5, even though four seats on the Kansas City School Board are open, not a single name will appear on a ballot. One of those seats has already been filled because only one person qualified to run.  No one qualified for the other three seats and they will thus have to be filled by write-in candidates.

Yes, one-third of the 9-member school board that controls a budget of $328 million will be write-ins. And this isn’t even the first time this has happened. Back in 2012, 3 of the 4 open seats were filled by write-in candidates.

This is not democracy. This is despondence.

Schools of choice are accountable to the families that send their children to them. No one in Kansas City has to send their child to a charter school. No one in states that have voucher programs have to use them. They can if they want to, if they find a school that meets their needs. The people in the best position to determine what is right for their children are the ones that are empowered to make the decisions.

Kansas City is the polar opposite of that. Whoever wins those seats were unable to find 250 people to sign a petition to get them on the ballot.  They will be elected by the tiniest fraction of the community that they represent.  They will have no mandate to hold schools accountable or to represent the community they live in.

And now comes the hard question:  If we cannot recruit people willing to clear an incredibly low bar to be part of this body, why does it still exist?

Giving Non-Violent Offenders a Second Chance

Posted on by Jonathan Brown

Alongside 14 other states, Missouri is currently trying to advance legislation that would reform the scope and qualifications for the expungement of criminal records. “Expungement” here refers to sealing or erasing a record of arrest, conviction, and related proceedings.

Why should we expunge some criminal records? Because an arrest record, even from years ago, can stand between a person and a job. Low-level offenders who have served their time and have demonstrated their successful rehabilitation should not be held back by their past mistakes. They should be given an opportunity to move forward and contribute meaningfully to society. Expungement provides this opportunity.

Missouri currently allows the opportunity for expungement of a limited number of non-violent, low-level felonies and an approved list of misdemeanor offenses (see here for a link to the Missouri Revised Statutes for Expungement) after a period of time. In this current legislative session, Missouri Senate Bill 588, House Bill 1889, and House Bill 2224, would increase the number of times that an offender can petition for expungement and reduce the waiting period between the end of the sentence and eligibility to petition for expungement.

Currently, offenders have to wait 20 years if they committed a qualified (non-violent) felony, or 10 years if they committed a misdemeanor or ordinance violation or were arrested. These reforms would shorten the time for felons to five years and all others to three. Most importantly, these bills would expand the eligibility for expungement of records to include a wider range of misdemeanors, low-level, non-violent felony convictions, and arrests.

As Senator Bob Dixon of Springfield has said: “[this allows] the legislators to have a very frank discussion about a real expungement process that provides a path of restoration to those who have done wrong but have learned from their mistakes and have corrected their ways over a period of time so that they can, among other things, find employment.”

The best way to prevent recidivism is to help rehabilitating offenders get jobs. A 2009 study by the Missouri Department of Corrections (here, p. 26) found that Missouri offenders who were unemployed or employed only part time consistently had higher recidivism rates than those who were employed full time (working 35 hours or more a week).

Reforming criminal expungement strengthens Missouri’s program of restorative and rehabilitative justice and ultimately promotes greater economic opportunity for individuals who have paid their debt to society. That goal is worth pursuing.

Should Ladue Take on $85 Million in Debt?

Posted on by Michael Q. McShane

On April 5, voters in Ladue will be asked to increase their taxes to pay for $85,100,000 in new debt for the school district.  The district wants to borrow to renovate some buildings, to build new science labs and performing arts facilities, and to update other infrastructure.

Right now, residents of the Ladue school district pay 39 cents per $100 of assessed value of their property to service the existing debt of the school district.  The April 5 ballot measure would double that, to 78 cents per $100 of assessed value.

According to Zillow, the median home price in Ladue is $814,000. Because Missouri assesses home value at 19% of market value, the proposed tax increase is a $603.17 hike per year for the median home owner. Half of homeowners will pay more than that.

Ladue is a lovely place for a variety of reasons, but one thing that makes it so attractive to residents is that it takes advantage of the high value of its property by charging a relatively low rate of property tax. As my colleague James Shuls pointed out in talking about the proposed levy increase in St. Louis, Ladue’s levy is well below the St. Louis County average, but it is still able to generate a lot of money for its schools.  It’s an ideal situation.

Ladue should think long and hard before mitigating its competitive advantage over neighboring municipalities. Are there other efficiencies that it can find? Could it take on less debt, or wait until it has paid off what it has already incurred?  Is it buying new bells and whistles that aren’t associated with better student learning? The answers to these questions would tell voters whether they are getting additional value for their money.

At Session’s Midpoint, Reforms Loom Large On Legislative Agenda

Posted on by Patrick Ishmael

If you visit Jefferson City this week, you might notice that the Capitol's a bit quieter than usual. That calm will soon give way to the storm, of course; the chambers are on a regularly scheduled mid-session break and will return to work next Monday to finish out the session. But while the legislature is out, the break provides supporters of good government to take stock of where the policy debates have gone so far in 2016. Here are a few items I'm following:

Kansas City Star Defends Corporate Welfare, Again

Posted on by Patrick Ishmael

Yael Abouhalkah of the Kansas City Star blogs today in defense of the earnings tax and against my call to curb cronyism in Kansas City. The Star's position in favor of corporate welfare won't surprise our readers, since the newspaper has been a longtime beneficiary of the city's tax largesse and frequent interlocutor for City Hall. Although it was disappointing, Yael's endorsement of the city's trickle-down development culture was expected—the latest in a long line of such columns.

But I was more disappointed that in his quest for an interesting headline, Yael again shuttled past a decade's worth of Show-Me research on the earnings tax. Rather than simply Google "Show Me Institute replace earnings tax," Yael chose to bowlderize a recent Show-Me blog post and ignore a host of detailed Show-Me reports published since the mid-2000s, showing how the earnings tax is destructive to growth and how it can be replaced. The newspaper didn't need a Woodward or Bernstein on staff to discover the research: just a passing familiarity with the Internet and glancing engagement with the earnings tax issue.

The research is there. It's been there for a long time.

Yet the argument against an earnings tax doesn't just spring forth from some economics lesson. That the Star doesn't find a city taxing the paychecks of the poor and subsidizing the rich a "compelling" reason to phase out the tax is its own commentary on the present state of the paper. I can accept that the Star has an entrenched and dire interest in maintaining the current taxing system, which at least explains the content and tenor of so many of the Star's editorials these days.

But I don't have to accept the self-serving cronyism that the Star would have us all perpetuate by keeping the earnings tax gravy train running. Neither does anyone else.

Kansas Citians deserve a serious discussion about the negative impact—on families, on businesses, and in the aggregate—of funding city government through an earnings tax. Fortunately for the city's taxpayers, the Star won't be mediating that debate. Not this time. Not anymore.

Texas Toll Road Goes Bankrupt, but Taxpayers Don’t

Posted on by Joseph Miller

This month, a major toll road company filed for bankruptcy in Texas. The company in question is the SH 130 Concession Company, which manages segments 5 and 6 of SH 130 between Austin and San Antonio. Like the bankruptcy of the Indiana Toll Road Concession Company in 2014, the problem for the SH 130 Company was that traffic estimates turned out to be optimistic following the recession.

Some toll road opponents have latched onto this bankruptcy as an example of how privatized toll roads are a bad idea. But when we look closer, the case of SH 130 (as well as the Indiana Toll Road) teaches the opposite lesson. A private, international investment consortium—and not the Texas Department of Transportation—spent almost a billion dollars improving highway infrastructure in Texas. Traffic estimates did not live up to expectations, but that is a normal risk with highway expansion, a risk that would normally be that of state taxpayers.

SH 130 received no money from the state of Texas. The only public support for the project came in the form of over $400 million in Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA) loans from the federal government. If the SH 130 Company is unable to restructure its debt and cannot find a buyer for the toll road, the federal government (and hence the taxpayer) is at risk of taking some loss on the loan. But as we have pointed out before, financing part of infrastructure projects with federal loans (with the risk of losses) is a vast improvement over the current modus operandi, where the federal government provides 80 to 90 percent of a highway project’s funding with no mechanism for getting a return.

So what is the future of SH 130? While the bankruptcy is proceeding, SH 130 Concession Company will continue to operate the road. The company will then either restructure its debt or the toll road will be sold to a new operator (as happened with the Indiana Toll Road). It is too early to say whether the company will default on any federal TIFIA loans. Whatever the end result, Texas residents will continue to enjoy the highway that private investment built. 

How Much Testing Is Too Much?

Posted on by Elizabeth Morrison

From a student’s point of view, standardized testing is stressful, particularly in the elementary school years. It can also be very disruptive to the material students are normally learning. When I was a kid, any kind of testing put me on edge, especially when the tests were hours long. Some testing is certainly necessary as a source of information about our education system and what it’s getting right or wrong.  Still, testing takes up a substantial amount of school resources—both time and money—and anyone with a stake in our schools should take an interest in why we do so much of it.

Before we can decide if there is too much or too little testing, we should lay out some facts:

·         Missouri spends roughly $30 million a year on standardized tests

·         On average, students spend 20–25 hours per school year taking standardized tests. Over the course of grades 3–12, that totals out to be 180–225 hours of testing.

·         Grades 3–8 are required to take the yearly MAP (Missouri Assessment Program) test which assesses students understanding of concepts in language arts and math. Grades 5 and 8 are also tested in science.

·         Grades 4, 8, and 12 are administered the NAEP (National Assessment of Education Progress) which tests all students in the areas of math, science, reading, and writing.

·         High school juniors are required by the State Board of Education to take the ACT (at no charge)

·         High school students must pass a personal finance assessment in order to graduate. This assessment can be taken by students who are enrolled in a personal finance course or students who wish to test out of the course and still receive the half credit.

·         End of Course (EOC) evaluations are administered to students enrolled in Algebra I and II, Biology, English I and II, Geometry, Biology, American History, Physical Science, and Government courses.

Rep. Kurt Bahr of St. Charles is sponsoring a bill that would allow students to opt out of Missouri standardized testing if they or their parents request it. What would this accomplish, though? Students will simply have to wait for school to resume while other students take the tests they opted out of. And if the tests are administered only to the students who want to take them, they wouldn’t be a representative sample of the student body.

Is there a better way we can retrieve this information and not overwhelm students and teachers? Knowing how well our students and schools are doing, and what should be improved on, is important. However, we need to remember that the only “right” amount of testing is that which gives us the information we need in the most efficient way possible, so that teachers can spend more time teaching and students can spend more time learning. Determining the purpose and use of each test might be the key. 

Tax Levy Increases by the Numbers

Posted on by Michael Q. McShane

Two weeks from today, voters in 10 school districts across the state will be asked to increase property taxes to provide more funding for their local schools.  The proposed tax levy increases vary from 17 cents per $100 of assessed valuation in the Bloomfield school district in Stoddard County to 96 cents per $100 of assessed valuation in the Newburg district in Phelps County.

First, a quick primer on property taxes. Homes are assessed at 19% of their market value. So, for example, a school levy rate of $3.00 per $100 of assessed value applied to a house with a market value of $100,000 would mean that person pays $570 per year in tax.  An increase of 50 cents per $100 in assessed value would mean paying an additional $95 per year.

As a reference point, the statewide average millage rate is $3.69 per $100 in assessed value, and the state calculates “local effort,” the amount local districts are expected to contribute before the state adds its funds, at $3.43 per $100 of assessed value.

Sometimes tax levy increases are necessary.  For districts that are growing and need to build new school buildings, or districts that operate efficiently but are facing aging infrastructure, modest increases to the tax levy are perfectly appropriate.

That said, there are reasons to be skeptical. First, many school districts are not currently operating as efficiently as they could be. By comparing teacher/student ratios and administrator/student ratios, we see that many schools do more with less.  The same is true with the average salaries for those positions—there is serious variation across districts (even in what seem to be similar labor markets) in how much teachers and administrators get paid. Also, some districts ask for levy increases to build new buildings when it is clear that their enrollment is on the decline.  They should be figuring out how best to use what they already have.

We should also always be on the lookout for the pernicious effect of TIF deals that erode the tax base of school districts.  Kansas City and St. Louis are chronic abusers of this system, which diverts tax revenue that should go to schools back into the pockets of developers, but TIF projects take place all over the state.  If a district has hollowed out its tax base through TIF, why should ordinary citizens have to pick up the slack through increased property taxes?

To better inform voters, we have put together a series of information sheets on the proposed mill levy increases that are on the ballot on April 5. We provide data on what the mill levy means for homeowners in terms of the increased taxes they will be paying every year.  We also provide data, drawn from publically available spreadsheets on DESE’s website, on the school district and the school districts that surround it so taxpayers can compare and contrast how well or how poorly the district is being managed.  

Links to each of the info sheets are below.

Update, March 23: We now have an info sheet for the Maplewood-Richmond Heights school district.

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