A Bad Idea That Sounds So Good

Posted on by Michael Rathbone

I love my dog Wiley. She is sweet and loyal and kind. I adopted her nine years ago, and I can’t imagine my life without her. That’s why I can’t begrudge someone who wants to encourage others to adopt pets. Senator Maria Chappelle-Nadal wants to do just that with her bill that would offer a $300 tax credit for adopting pets from licensed shelters.

In all the areas of government overreach and wasteful spending, this doesn’t come close to taking the cake. Honestly, it’s an appealing prospect. I mean, look at the picture below. Who would be against this puppy getting adopted? It shouldn’t take a tax credit for someone to support adopting puppies.

GoldenRetrieverPuppyDaisyParkerBut this proposed bill wants to do just that, subsidize pet adoption, and the subsidy is the bad idea.

I want dogs to be adopted. I have a soft spot for dogs, and whenever a dog dies in a movie, I turn into Niagara Falls (don’t judge me—a lot of guys cry at the movies). However, the government shouldn’t be in the business of helping people pay for pet adoption. It should be in the business of providing basic goods and services necessary for a functioning society (police, firefighters, and prisons jump immediately to mind). Pet adoption is the purview of individuals and private organizations. If the government kept its spending down to the bare essentials, taxes would be low enough so that taxpayers would have more money to spend on a variety of admirable things: adopting puppies, saving the spotted owl, and preserving the rain forest.

Missouri has issued tax credits to things that frankly don’t need them, like country clubs and movie stars. Adopting pets isn’t nearly an egregious waste of taxpayer dollars as the former two, but it still shouldn’t occur. I hope it will never get the chance.

Puerto Rico: A Transportation Privatization Example for Missouri

Posted on by Joseph Miller

With its reputation for tourism, rum, and sun, many might be surprised to find out that Puerto Rico actually is a leader of using the private sector to improve infrastructure under tight fiscal constraints.

Puerto Rico has entered a privatization boom in the last few years, due mostly to past financial mismanagement. Both the port authority (which owns Luis Munoz Marin International Airport) and the Puerto Rico Highways and Transportation Authority (which is responsible for highways and transit) spent heavily in past decades on projects like the Tren Urbano, a $2.25 billion rail line with low ridership and large operating deficits. After the financial crisis hit, Puerto Rico’s transportation authorities had large debt problems and a transportation system in need of investment.

To simultaneously reduce debt and raise capital for transportation improvements, the government privatized major transportation assets. In 2011, Puerto Rico leased two of its toll roads, PR-5 and PR-22, to Autopistas Metropolitanas de Puerto Rico, LLC. The company paid the government $1.1 billion upfront and agreed to make $350 million in capital improvements.

In 2013, Puerto Rico leased Luis Munoz Marin International Airport, the island’s largest, to Highstar Capital and Grupo Aeroportuario del Sureste SAB de CV, the first such lease of a large airport in the United States. The consortium agreed to pay more than $600 million upfront, along with additional yearly payments. The good news for travelers is that the consortium plans to invest over a billion dollars modernizing what can be a hectic airport.

Aside from major privatization deals, Puerto Rico (in contrast to other U.S. cities) continues to rely heavily on the private sector to operate public transportation. In fact, the most popular form of transit on the island are publicos, small vans and buses that cover much of the island’s metropolitan areas. Publicos are privately owned, and the system has the distinction of being the only primary bus system of a large U.S. city that uses almost no public subsidies. San Juan’s municipal bus system, which operates large city buses, also leverages the private sector by contracting out the operation of its buses to a private company, First Transit.

Missourians should take two major lessons from Puerto Rico’s experience. First, the private sector is capable of maintaining transportation infrastructure. The commonwealth’s largest airport, toll roads, and public transportation system are privately operated. Second, the private sector can provide significant capital for improvements. The lease of Puerto Rico’s toll roads and airport netted $1.7 billion in upfront payments and commitments for an additional $1.35 billion in infrastructure improvements. Missouri residents should learn from Puerto Rico’s example and explore areas where the private sector can help the state improve transportation. Missouri would be better off if these options were explored before the next funding or debt crisis.

Kansas City Public Schools Embraces Charter Education

Posted on by Brittany Wagner

On Wednesday, the Kansas City Public Schools (KCPS) Board of Education voted to submit an application to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) to sponsor a charter school.

Kansas City currently has 25 charter schools, enrolling more than 40 percent of all public school students in the city. Last year, KCPS decided to partner with Academie Lafayette, the French immersion charter school, on a program at Southwest High School. However, none of the existing schools have been sponsored by the district itself. This is the first step in the district becoming a sponsor of charter schools. It will be the second school district in the state to do so—Saint Louis Public Schools sponsors Construction Careers Academy.

Since their inception, charters often have been met with suspicion by public school officials. In Kansas City, it seems that perception is changing as the district recognizes that charter schools may have something traditional public schools need—niche educational opportunities.

Charter schools are independently run and typically have more freedom. This gives them the flexibility to reach students whose needs aren’t being met in the traditional setting. For example, a Pennsylvania public school district sponsored the Pennsylvania Virtual Charter School in 2001. The virtual school now enrolls 3,000 students across the state and grade levels.

The sponsorship of charter schools by traditional public schools is an opportunity public school districts throughout the state should not pass up. It is the competitive advantage to offer more options within one school district. Imagine if a rural or suburban school district sponsored a charter with a science and engineering focus. Perhaps a student who felt his needs weren’t being met in a private school would enroll at the local charter school instead.

Students in any type of district, whether urban or rural, low-income or high-income, need options. Educational partnerships and traditional public school sponsorships have the potential to provide those options.

Missouri Ranks 33rd on New Quality Counts Report

Posted on by James V. Shuls

As they do at the beginning of every year, Education Week released their “Quality Counts” state report cards. Once again, Missouri ranks in the middle of the pack, 33rd overall with a C- grade. For regular readers of the Show-Me Daily blog, this should come as no surprise. Missouri has been stuck in the middle for years.

Why is Missouri perpetually in the middle when it comes to academic rankings? After all, we are several years into an initiative launched by the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education to get Missouri into the top 10 by 2020. This initiative has spawned changes at nearly every stage of education, from pre-kindergarten to teacher preparation. One could argue that these changes just haven’t had time to take root, and once they do, Missouri students will be making academic gains like gangbusters. I doubt it.

Missouri is not likely to make significant improvements, because Missouri’s education policies are predicated on getting things right—if we get certification right, teachers will get better; if we get standards right, instruction will improve; if we get accountability tests right, achievement will rise. The list could go on and on. The problem is that we don’t know the “right” way to do these things for every child and every teacher in every school, and we never will. Until our education policies shift from a “getting things right” mentality to one that fosters continuous improvement, we should not expect marketable differences in outcomes.

How do we do this? Andy Smarick outlines a nice plan in his book, The Urban School System of the Future. He starts with a somewhat controversial but true premise, “The traditional urban public school system is broken, and it cannot be fixed. It must be replaced.” Smarick goes on to substantiate this claim and offer a solution, creating an educational market where new schools regularly open and bad schools regularly close. This is how improvement happens in every other sector.

Smarick’s proposal would require substantial legislative changes, but here are two easy places for Missouri to start moving in the right direction.

  1. Allow charter schools to enroll students across district boundaries.

  2. Expand options for students by establishing an Equal Opportunity Scholarship program.

These changes themselves will not get us anywhere near what The Urban School System of the Future outlined. They will, however, begin moving Missouri toward that system of continuous improvement.

School Visit Series: A Charter School With a Goal

Posted on by Brittany Wagner

The South Building of Ewing Marion Kauffman School in Kansas City looks much more like a new academic building than a charter school serving low-income middle-school students. Streams of natural light flood the high-ceilinged lobby. On the wall next to the entrance is a portrait of the school’s late benefactor paired with the former Kansas City Royals owner’s quote, “You, you, and every one of you can go to college if you choose.”

kauffman entrance

Kauffman’s goal to “create college graduates” pervades the three-building campus. University flags hang on the walls. Students are divided into groups named after the universities teaching faculty attended. Teachers connect with students by sharing personal photographs, fight songs, and university traditions from their own college years. “It continues to invest kids in this idea that the people around you want you to have the same opportunities as they had and we don’t want socioeconomic status or zip code to hold you back from that,” said Candace Potter, talent recruiter for the school.

flags

“Kids who grow up in low-income communities, about 10 percent graduate from college by the age of 24 … and we want to break that statistic,” she added. The school seems to be on its way.

Though 82.4 percent of students are eligible for free-reduced lunch, Kauffman earned 88.6 percent of possible points on the state’s Annual Progress Report. This means the charter is only 1.4 percentage points from being classified as Accredited with Distinction, which is stunning considering, according to Potter, most students begin below grade level.

One of those students is fifth-grader Aunecia Smith. She reports both her behavior and academics have improved since arriving at Kauffman, having previously attended George Melcher Elementary, a Kansas City public school. “It’s really not like this school. Their expectations weren’t as good,” she said.

Aside from rigorous academic expectations, the school invests in four PREP values, which serve as “current and future tools for success.” At frequent awards ceremonies, students are recognized with “PREP stars.” Aunecia, who wants to be a pediatrician when she grows up, has received two. “I have to change the channel on the TV when I see kids with cancer,” she said.

Quality charter schools like Ewing Marion Kauffman exemplify how school choice can set students on the course for success. Aunecia is just one student for which a charter school has made a difference, but if charters were able to expand regardless of district accreditation status or geographic location, many more students might be affected.

Before heading back to class, Aunecia said to me, “Every kid should go to a charter school.” I think what Aunecia really means is that every child should have access to the type of high-quality education she is receiving.

School Choice, Let Me Be Me

Posted on by Brittany Wagner

Where did you go to high school?

“The question” is as much a part of the Saint Louis identity as the Gateway Arch, Cardinals baseball, or Gooey Butter Cake. Last year, I decided that I’d take a stand against high school-based judgments by asking a question myself: What high school do you think I attended?

From there, it got interesting. “Ladue, Incarnate Word, Lafayette” are just a few school names that I heard. The variety and wide range of schools was interesting to hear, but no one came close to the school I actually attended. The truth is that I graduated from an often-underperforming, low-income public high school just below the Saint Louis City line. In 2013, only 20 percent of graduates had completed a four-year degree, according to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

For many students who attend a high school within their zip code, their school often is not a reflection of who they are. They must fit in, instead of choosing a school that fits. With school choice, a high school becomes less of a description about where the student lives and how much money the student’s family has, and more about what makes the student unique.

Join us in Saint Louis or Kansas City to learn more about how educational options allow students to be themselves. If you plan on attending, use the hashtag, #letmebeme, for all event-related tweets.

 

Thoughts on the Latest Rams Press Conference

Posted on by Michael Rathbone

With the recent news that Rams owner Stan Kroenke is planning to build a new football stadium, the chances of the Rams leaving Saint Louis have increased substantially. Late last year, Gov. Nixon appointed a two-person team whose mission was to investigate options for keeping the NFL in Saint Louis. The team, which consists of former Anheuser-Busch executive Dave Peacock and Clayton area attorney Bob Blitz, presented their report on Friday. Below are key points raised in that report:

  • Plans are for a new stadium located on the riverfront, north of Lumiere Casino and northeast of the Edward Jones Dome.

Stadium2.0

  • The stadium also would be available for professional soccer.

  • It would be a public asset owned by a public entity and leased to the team. Also, the new stadium would come with a new lease, 30 years or more.

  • Cost estimate: $860-$985 million, at least half of which would be privately financed (minimum $200 million from Stan Kroenke and another $200 million from the NFL).

  • No new tax burden, although there would be public money involved.

  • Estimated completion date: 2020.

After listening to the press conference and going over some of the points raised here, I have my misgivings about this project. First, I would like to know specifically where the money is coming from to pay for this new stadium. During the press conference, Peacock said that the sources of public financing would not be ascertained until there was a commitment from the NFL and from the Rams on moving forward with this project. Second, the $860-$985 million price tag would only be for the new stadium. Additional money (it wasn’t said how much) would be needed to upgrade the current Dome so it will be a full-time convention center. How are we going to pay for that as well?

My biggest misgiving is the fact that we will be publicly subsidizing this thing at all. Kroenke’s proposal in Los Angeles would be completely privately financed. Why should the public put up money when Kroenke can afford to pay for the costs himself? The most recent trend in stadium construction is toward private investment. That’s what happened in San Francisco and New York, so why should Saint Louis be different?

I know it is easy to be wowed by beautiful pictures of sparkling developments like the one above. Yet, nice pictures aside, these kinds of plans do not produce the economic benefits that would make these developments worthwhile. I want Saint Louis to remain an NFL town, but I don’t want to spend taxpayer dollars to do it.

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