The Hadley Township community in Saint Louis County is another example of the devastation that Tax Increment Financing (TIF) and eminent domain abuse in Missouri can cause. Residents have been stuck in a state of uncertainly for years now as the city and various developers have planned to buy and/or take their homes for commercial development. That uncertainty has had a devastating impact on the neighborhood as some residents let their properties deteriorate (understandable in the situation) while others tried valiantly to maintain their homes and the historically African-American neighborhood they love. The Show-Me Institute sat down with residents to discuss the situation in Hadley Township in this series of videos.
KIPP Inspire Academy: Steady Improvement in Student Achievement
On Wednesday, I recounted my visit to KIPP (Knowledge Is Power Program) Inspire Academy, also known as KIA, in South Saint Louis. I mentioned that KIA’s executive director, Kelly Garrett, was excited about the school’s performance on the state standardized tests. I have since been able to crunch the numbers myself and the results look good.
Below I display a graph of KIA student achievement in math and communication arts. Please note, the graph has two separate figures for each subject, cohort and overall. The overall figure contains all students tested in a specific subject. The cohort figure follows one group of students as they progress through the grades. Thus it contains students in fifth grade in 2010, sixth in 2011, and seventh in 2012. I display the cohort figure because Kelly and others involved with KIPP believe students continue to grow the longer they stay with KIPP.
As it turns out, the cohort of KIA students have shown impressive growth in both math and communication arts for the past two years. As always, one must be concerned about selective attrition, where lower performing students leave the school at faster rates. Without having examined the attrition rates, I could not address that directly. Nevertheless, the test score results are improving not only for the cohort of students, but for all students.
It seems safe to say, at least from this snapshot, that KIA has a positive impact on student achievement. I hope to see these numbers grow even more in the coming year.
A Voter ID Victory In Pennsylvania: Missouri, Take Note
Yesterday, a Pennsylvania judge rejected a challenge to a state law that requires photo identification to vote in Pennsylvania. Far from a radical finding, the Washington Post reminds us that photo ID requirements are legal under the U.S. Constitution according to the U.S. Supreme Court, and, in the Court’s view, are a reasonable step toward addressing a serious public concern.
While the [Pennsylvania] challenge was brought under the state constitution, Simpson’s opinion was heavily influenced by the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2008 decision that seemed to give states the green light to require voters to present photo IDs. In the court’s lead opinion, Justice John Paul Stevens, now retired, said that such a law in Indiana was a reasonable reaction to the threat of voter fraud, “amply justified by the valid interest in protecting the integrity and reliability of the electoral process.”
The Supreme Court’s ruling in that case had a very clear majority, 6-3, and received the support of one of the most liberal justices on the Court at that time, John Paul Stevens. Photo voter ID is not some radical proposal. It is a rational reaction to the concerns attendant to a system where we want every legal voter’s voice to be heard. As I have argued, if even 1 percent of the vote is fraudulent in an election, how many important races could that swing? If there are ways to prevent that sort of fraud and reaffirm our commitment to ensuring voters’ votes are protected, why wouldn’t we pursue them? Missouri elections would benefit from similar photo ID rules.
Shenanigans In Ellisville!!!
At tonight’s Ellisville City Council meeting, a charter amendment is being introduced to amend the rules for recalling elected officials in Ellisville. Then, because of the looming deadline to get things on the November ballot, they have scheduled a special meeting for the next night (Thursday) to pass the charter amendment because they likely will not have unanimous support to pass it in one night.
“They,” of course, are the “Walmart 5,” the members of the city council who supported the Tax Increment Financing (TIF) for Walmart despite substantial community opposition. There is a recall effort underway in Ellisville against some of the “Walmart 5” (not all are eligible for recall for technical reasons). The TIF was a terrible idea, but this recall charter change idea is so awful that it makes the TIF idea look like the invention of the wheel.
The attempt to alter the rules of the charter after citizens have instituted a recall effort is one of the most atrocious abuses of power I have seen in Missouri in the 20 years I have been following politics and government. Thankfully, even the Walmart 5 cannot find a way around the rule that voters must approve charter changes. Hopefully, this naked attempt to silence widespread opposition to the TIF will fail, either at the polls or through a successful blocking of it in the next few nights.
Tom Pendergast is not dead. He just moved to West County.
Who is Hurt by Eminent Domain Abuse and TIF in Richmond Heights? – Part 2
The Hadley Township community in Saint Louis County is another example of the devastation that Tax Increment Financing (TIF) and eminent domain abuse in Missouri can cause. Residents have been stuck in a state of uncertainly for years now as the city and various developers have planned to buy and/or take their homes for commercial development. That uncertainty has had a devastating impact on the neighborhood as some residents let their properties deteriorate (understandable in the situation) while others tried valiantly to maintain their homes and the historically African-American neighborhood they love. The Show-Me Institute sat down with residents to discuss the situation in Hadley Township in this series of videos.
KIPP Inspire Is Truly Inspirational
 St. Francis de Sales, where KIPP Inspire Academy is located. Photo Credit: (CC) Phillip B. Roussin |
At the corner of Lynch Street and Ohio Avenue in South Saint Louis stands one of the city’s most beautiful buildings, St. Francis de Sales Oratory. Walk just past the church’s exquisite edifices and I believe you will see something just as wonderful: students learning.
In the adjacent building, students of KIPP Inspire Academy are working hard to “climb the mountain to college.” The school, part of the national network of public charter schools known as Knowledge Is Power Program, opened in 2009 and is now in its fourth year. Yesterday, I had the pleasure of visiting KIPP Inspire Academy. The school’s executive director, Kelly Garrett, took me on a tour of the renovated facilities, pointing out upgrades that KIPP has made and introducing me to faculty. We popped into several classrooms and saw students and teachers hard at work. As is characteristic of KIPP schools, classrooms were well-managed and full of learning.
After our tour, I had a chance to sit down with Mr. Garrett. He had been pouring over recently released achievement data from the state. I have yet to examine these data myself, but he showed me numerous graphs he had made and noted on several measures that the students of KIPP Inspire were outperforming state averages. Though, he always paused and reminded me of the long road ahead and how the school must continue to improve. That constant desire to evaluate, celebrate success, and continually improve is also a hallmark of every KIPP school I have visited.
Today, KIPP Inspire serves students in fifth through eighth grades and is the only school from the nationally renowned KIPP network in the Saint Louis area, but that may change because Garrett has plans to expand. The biggest obstacle to growth, as he sees it, is finding talented individuals to staff the classrooms. Hopefully, the success of KIPP Inspire will inspire more individuals to take up the mantle of education and will increase the pool of talented teachers in Missouri.
Stadium Subsidy Surprise
There is a controversy brewing in Kansas City over the Royals, and for once it does not have anything to do with yet another disappointing season on the field. According to one report, the Royals collected close to $13 million in taxpayer money and spent close to $5 million of that money on employee salaries and payroll taxes. In effect, the Royals are accused of using taxpayer money to pay their own taxes. The taxpayer money comes from a fund (named the RMMO account, which stands for repairs, maintenance, management, and operations) that originally was sold to taxpayers as a fund focused on repairs and maintenance at Kauffman Stadium. I am not going to pass judgment on whether the Royals are guilty of doing anything improper nor am I going to accuse anybody of malfeasance. I will let the facts come out and be what they are.
That said, why do government officials put taxpayers in this position of their money possibly being misspent? Well, cities usually put up taxpayer monies in order to prevent their local sports teams from leaving town. The justifications for doing so can range from a city striving to create an economic boom or just for a sense of civic pride. Kansas City got an All-Star Game after it helped fund renovations to Kauffman Stadium. Yet combined with the fact that public financing of sports stadiums cannot be justified economically, taxpayers have to go through headaches like the one mentioned here.
Sports stadiums should not be subsidized with public money. If a sports franchise wants a new stadium, it should pay for the stadium with its own money. Not only would it prevent public money from being spent on activities that would not benefit the local economy, it would avoid creating such issues in the first place.
Who is Hurt by Eminent Domain Abuse and TIF in Richmond Heights? – Part 1
The Hadley Township community in Saint Louis County is another example of the devastation that Tax Increment Financing (TIF) and eminent domain abuse in Missouri can cause. Residents have been stuck in a state of uncertainly for years now as the city and various developers have planned to buy and/or take their homes for commercial development. That uncertainty has had a devastating impact on the neighborhood as some residents let their properties deteriorate (understandable in the situation) while others tried valiantly to maintain their homes and the historically African-American neighborhood they love. The Show-Me Institute sat down with residents to discuss the situation in Hadley Township in this series of videos.
McGraw Milhaven – David Stokes on KTRS
David Stokes has a recurring spot on McGraw Milhaven’s KTRS radio program.
In this appearance, Stokes and the host discuss topics such as Mitt Romney’s selection of Paul Ryan as his running mate, Claire McCaskill’s “Truth About Todd Akin” website, Stacey Newman’s victory in the primary by just one vote, and Stokes’ personal experience appealing his property tax assessment (“It was fun!”).
