Voice For Liberty

Tag: Wichita and Kansas schools

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Friday May 6, 2011

    Wichita downtown sites draw little interest. Wichita Business Journal: “Interest from developers in eight city-owned “catalyst” sites in downtown Wichita was minimal — unexpectedly so. ‘I was a little bit surprised how light the response was,’ says Scott Knebel, downtown revitalization manager for the city of Wichita.” With the city soliciting informal proposals for eight sites, only two proposals were received.

    KPERS. It appears that the Kansas Legislature will pass a pension “reform” bill that does not include a shift to a defined-contribution plan for new employees. Instead, the tough decisions that need to be made about the Kansas Public Employees Retirement System have been placed in the hands of a study committee. More information about the seriousness of the KPERS problem is at Economist: KPERS must undergo serious reform and KPERS problems must be confronted. Video is here, with two parts following.

    More flexibility for school funds. Kansas Watchdog reports that Kansas schools will now have more flexibility to spend funds that are presently stashed away in various funds. Of interest in the article is a chart showing the growth in these fund balances. School spending advocates protest that these funds are needed to because revenue doesn’t arrvie at the same time bills do, which is true. But these fund balances have been growing, because schools have not been spending all the money they’ve been given. While this bill is a good idea, schools have always been able to tap into these funds by simply contributing less to them, thereby spending down the balances. But schools have not wanted to to do this.

    Growth in Kansas spendingGrowth in Kansas spending. Click for a larger view.

    Despite “cuts,” spending grows. For all the talk in Kansas of budget cuts, state spending still manages to grow year after year. Kansas Watchdog is again on top of this topic, noting “Each year various adjustments push state spending above the approved budget, but in 2010 that extra spending took a big jump that will require even more spending in the future.” Of particular interest is the chart showing spending rising every year.

    Sandy Springs a model. Common Sense with Paul Jacob: “Local governments suffer from a big problem: bigness. Too often they expand their scope of services, and, in so doing, progressively fail to cover even the old, core set of services. You know, like fire and police and roads and such. The solution is obvious. Mimic Sandy Springs. This suburban community north of Atlanta, Georgia, had been ill-served by Fulton County. So a few years ago the area incorporated. And, to fend off all the problems associated with the ‘do-it-all-ourselves’ mentality, the city didn’t hire on a huge staff of civil servants. Instead, it contracted out the bulk of those services in chunks. Now, the roads get paved and the streets are cleaned and the waste is removed better as well as cheaper than ever. Reason Foundation, a think tank known for its privatization emphasis, has been on the story from the beginning. A 2005 appraisal predicted that the town would become a ‘model city.’ That prophecy seems to have been on the money, and a Reason TV video emphasizes this with the shocking fact that the town ‘has no long-term liabilities.’ As the rest of the nation’s cities, counties and states lurch into insolvency, Sandy Springs shows a way out.” … The City of Wichita has had success in outsourcing the mowing of parks. Currently, the city has several dozen pieces of commercial mowing equipment at auction.

    States’ war for jobs. Bloomberg Businesweek: “State and local governments eager to recover some of the more than 8 million jobs lost during the recession are giving away $70 billion in annual subsidies to companies, according to calculations by Kenneth Thomas, a political scientist at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. States have long relied on fiscal incentives to lure businesses, or keep existing employers from decamping to other locales. Such largesse is coming under renewed scrutiny during this time of strapped budgets. State deficits could reach a combined $112 billion in the fiscal year starting July 1. ‘The tragic irony of it is that in order to pay for these things, they’re cutting other areas that really are the building blocks of jobs and economic growth,’ says Jon Shure, director of state fiscal strategies for the Washington-based Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. … With the national unemployment rate at 8.8 percent, the threat of a company pulling up stakes is enough to open states’ wallets. ‘States and communities are afraid to play chicken,’ says Jeff Finkle, who heads the International Economic Development Council. … Kansas has offered movie theater chain AMC Entertainment a generous incentives package to move away from Kansas City, Mo., The New York Times reported in April. Officials in Missouri are considering making a counteroffer. Neither the company nor state officials would comment. The bidding war helped prompt an Apr. 5 letter signed by 17 corporate executives asking the governors of the two states to quit offering inducements to lure businesses across state lines. ‘At a time of severe fiscal constraint the effect to the states is that one state loses tax revenue, while the other forgives it,’ the letter said. ‘The only real winner is the business who is ‘incentive shopping’ to reduce costs.’” … Governor Brownback’s economic development plan speaks of “A more uniform business tax policy that treats all businesses equally rather than the current set of rules and laws that give great benefit to a few (through heavily bureaucratic programs) and zero benefit to many.” It will be a while before we know if the state is able to stick to this plan.

    Shale gas to be topic in Wichita. This Friday (may 6) the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Malcolm C. Harris, Sr., Ph.D., Professor of Finance, Division of Business and Information Technology, Friends University, speaking on the topic: “Shale gas: Our energy future?” Harris also blogs at Mammon Among Friends. … “Shale gas” refers to a relatively new method of extracting natural gas, as reported in the Wall Street Journal: “We’ve always known the potential of shale; we just didn’t have the technology to get to it at a low enough cost. Now new techniques have driven down the price tag — and set the stage for shale gas to become what will be the game-changing resource of the decade. I have been studying the energy markets for 30 years, and I am convinced that shale gas will revolutionize the industry — and change the world — in the coming decades. It will prevent the rise of any new cartels. It will alter geopolitics. And it will slow the transition to renewable energy.” … Critics like the Center for American Progress warn of the dangers: “The process, which involves injecting huge volumes of water mixed with sand and chemicals deep underground to fracture rock formations and release trapped gas, is becoming increasingly controversial, with concerns about possible contamination of underground drinking water supplies alongside revelations of surface water contamination by the wastewater that is a byproduct of drilling.”

    Economics in one lesson this Monday. On Monday (May 9), four videos based on Henry Hazlitt’s classic work Economics in One Lesson will be shown in Wichita. The four topics included in Monday’s presentation will be The Curse of Machinery, Disbanding Troops & Bureaucrats, Who’s “Protected” by Tariffs?, and “Parity” Prices. The event is Monday (May 9) at 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm at the Lionel D. Alford Library located at 3447 S. Meridian in Wichita. The library is just north of the I-235 exit on Meridian. The event’s sponsor is Americans for Prosperity, Kansas. For more information on this event contact John Todd at john@johntodd.net or 316-312-7335, or Susan Estes, AFP Field Director at sestes@afphq.org or 316-681-4415.

    Voters favor cuts, not tax increases to balance budget. “A survey of Kansas voters conducted on behalf of the Kansas Chamber of Commerce found widespread support for cutting spending rather than raising taxes as the way to balance the Kansas budget. Support was also found for cutting state worker salaries, or reducing the number of state employees.” More at Kansas Chamber finds voters favor cuts, not tax increases to balance budget.

    Here’s the Kansas data. “KansasOpenGov.org provides a repository of data about Kansas state and local governments, giving citizens the data they need to hold officials accountable.” More at Kansas OpenGov: Here’s the Kansas data.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Tuesday May 3, 2011

    Why not school choice in Kansas? WhyNotKansas.com is a website that holds information about the benefits of giving families the freedom of school choice. The site is new this week, and is a project of Kansas Policy Institute and Foundation for Educational Choice. Innovation in school choice programs is common in many states. Kansas, however, still grants the education bureaucracy a monopoly on the use of public dollars in education.

    Economics in one lesson this Monday. On Monday (May 9), four videos based on Henry Hazlitt’s classic work Economics in One Lesson will be shown in Wichita. The four topics included in Monday’s presentation will be The Curse of Machinery, Disbanding Troops & Bureaucrats, Who’s “Protected” by Tariffs?, and “Parity” Prices. The event is Monday (May 9) at 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm at the Lionel D. Alford Library located at 3447 S. Meridian in Wichita. The library is just north of the I-235 exit on Meridian. The event’s sponsor is Americans for Prosperity, Kansas. For more information on this event contact John Todd at john@johntodd.net or 316-312-7335, or Susan Estes, AFP Field Director at sestes@afphq.org or 316-681-4415.

    Sowell on government intervention. Must government intervene to fix the economy? Politicians face tremendous pressure to be seen as active, writes Thomas Sowell: “It is not politically possible for either the Federal Reserve or the Obama administration to leave the economy alone and let it recover on its own. Both are under pressure to ‘do something.’ If one thing doesn’t work, then they have to try something else. And if that doesn’t work, they have to come up with yet another gimmick. … The idea that the federal government has to step in whenever there is a downturn in the economy is an economic dogma that ignores much of the history of the United States. During the first hundred years of the United States, there was no Federal Reserve. During the first one hundred and fifty years, the federal government did not engage in massive intervention when the economy turned down. No economic downturn in all those years ever lasted as long as the Great Depression of the 1930s, when both the Federal Reserve and the administrations of Hoover and of FDR intervened. The myth that has come down to us says that the government had to intervene when there was mass unemployment in the 1930s. But the hard data show that there was no mass unemployment until after the federal government intervened. Yet, once having intervened, it was politically impossible to stop and let the economy recover on its own. That was the fundamental problem then — and now.”

    Salina’s first TIF district. The Salina Journal looks at issues surrounding that city’s first TIF district. Of note: “TIF districts are prevalent in other cities and states. For instance, Manhattan uses TIF districts so much that it no longer considers it an incentive, [Dennis Lauver, president and CEO of the Salina Area Chamber of Commerce] said.”

    Charles on energy and stuff. “We are making it cool to use less stuff,” says Charles, Prince of Wales, KG KT GCB OM AK QSO CD SOM PC AdC(P) FRS. Irish documentary film makers Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer have a new short film that looks at the activities of England’s Prince Charles as compared to what he wants the rest of us to do. Write the documentariasts: “Prince Charles is the latest to be exposed as an eco-Hypocrite in our short film series. The Prince is coming to the US this week to speak at Georgetown University about ‘sustainability’ so we decided to see just how he lives up to his own standards. We’ve made a short film that exposes just how hypocritical the Prince is as he lives a fabulous, luxury life whilst lecturing the rest of us that we have to live with less. Prince Charles — Hypocrite exposes the double standard that is at the center of so much environmentalism. … He is coming to the US to lecture on sustainability and tells people they must live with less in order to save the planet but tells us we must end our ‘age of convenience.’ He wants to make our lives more inconvenient to save the planet from alleged climate change but the Prince refuses to make any changes in his own life.”

    Government and entrepreneurship. From an essay by Dane Stangler titled Entrepreneurship and Government, contained in Back on the Road to Serfdom: The Resurgence of Statism, edited by Thomas E. Woods, Jr.: “The third way in which the state can intrude on entrepreneurship is through distorted incentives: either with misguided regulations or unintended consequences, the government could end up creating the wrong incentives for entrepreneurs. Will Baumol discussed such institutional incentives in a famous article in which he argued. ‘How the entrepreneur acts at a given time and place depends heavily on the rules of the game — the reward structure in the economy — that happen to prevail.’ Problems arise when these rules of the game encourage ‘unproductive’ entrepreneurial behavior. The principal example of such unproductive behavior is rent seeking, which occurs when companies pursue a bigger slick of economic activity by means other than market competition — that is, when they graduate to seeking favors from Washington rather than seeking a competitive edge by means of innovation. A company’s entreaties to government for protective action often indicate a returns curve that has already turned negative.” … While the article mentions “favors from Washington,” we can easily substitute state capitols, city halls, or county courthouses. For example, Wichita’s economic development policy is firmly rooted in the belief that the city can direct entrepreneurial activity with no wrong incentives or ill consequences. Listening to the recent summit of aviation industry leaders with Kansas Governor Sam Brownback, it is apparent that this industry thrives on, and will continue to expect, large doses of incentives and special treatment and favor from government. But is the aviation industry best for the future of Wichita? While government leaders across Kansas pledge not to lose most important industry, we know it can happen (see Detroit). We have to be careful to make sure that our government policies don’t hasten this loss.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Monday May 2, 2011

    Shale gas to be topic in Wichita. This Friday (May 6) the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Malcolm C. Harris, Sr., Ph.D., Professor of Finance, Division of Business and Information Technology, Friends University, speaking on the topic: “Shale gas: Our energy future?” Harris also blogs at Mammon Among Friends. … “Shale gas” refers to a relatively new method of extracting natural gas, as reported in the Wall Street Journal: “We’ve always known the potential of shale; we just didn’t have the technology to get to it at a low enough cost. Now new techniques have driven down the price tag — and set the stage for shale gas to become what will be the game-changing resource of the decade. I have been studying the energy markets for 30 years, and I am convinced that shale gas will revolutionize the industry — and change the world — in the coming decades. It will prevent the rise of any new cartels. It will alter geopolitics. And it will slow the transition to renewable energy.” … Critics like the Center for American Progress warn of the dangers: “The process, which involves injecting huge volumes of water mixed with sand and chemicals deep underground to fracture rock formations and release trapped gas, is becoming increasingly controversial, with concerns about possible contamination of underground drinking water supplies alongside revelations of surface water contamination by the wastewater that is a byproduct of drilling.” … Upcoming speakers: On May 13, Craig Burns and Glenn Edwards of Security 1st Title Co. on the topic “Real Estate Transactions, Ownership, Title, and Tales From the Trenches.” On May 20, Rob Siedleckie, Secretary, Kansas Social Rehabilitation Services (SRS) on the topic “The SRS and Initiatives.” On May 27, Todd Tiahrt, Former 4th District Congressman on the topic “Outsourcing our National Security — How the Pentagon is Working Against Us”.

    Wichita City Council this week. On Tuesday the Wichita City Council will decide whether to spend $316,000 on capital improvements to the Wichita Ice Center. Improvements will include “HVAC system upgrades, new flooring, signage, interior and exterior painting, upgrades to the locker room facilities, ice skates, and a new point of sale system that will track program revenues and attendance.” This spending was already agreed to in a contract with the new managers of the facility, so approval seems certain. … On the consent agendas one item proposes to spend $36,087 on study, design and bid services to replace the passenger loading bridges at the Wichita airport. In 2003 the city budgeted $4 million for this project, but it was put on hold due to plans for a new terminal building. Now the city wants to go ahead and replace the existing bridges. Being on a consent agenda, this item will receive no discussion unless a council members wants to “pull” it for individual discussion.

    Williams on the role of race in economics. Thomas Sowell reviewing a new book by Walter E. Williams, Race and Economics: How Much Can Be Blamed on Discrimination?: “Walter Williams fans are in for a treat — and people who are not Walter Williams fans are in for a shock – when they read his latest book, Race and Economics. It is a demolition derby on paper, as Professor Williams destroys one after another of the popular fallacies about the role of race in the American economy. … In recent times, we have gotten so used to young blacks having sky-high unemployment rates that it will be a shock to many readers of Walter Williams’ Race and Economics to discover that the unemployment rate of young blacks was once only a fraction of what it has been in recent decades. And, in earlier times, it was not very different from the unemployment rate of young whites. The factors that cause the most noise in the media are not the ones that have the most impact on minorities. This book will be eye-opening for those who want their eyes opened. But those with the liberal vision of the world are unlikely to read it at all.” … An interview with the author is available at Lew Rockwell interviews Walter Williams on his two new books.

    Spending cuts preferred to taxes. A survey of Kansas voters conducted on behalf of the Kansas Chamber of Commerce found widespread support for cutting spending rather than raising taxes as the way to balance the Kansas budget. Support was also found for cutting state worker salaries, or reducing the number of state employees. See Kansas Chamber finds voters favor cuts, not tax increases to balance budget.

    Except some prefer taxes. A coalition of groups is advocating for more revenue so that Kansas government can spend more. Some of the groups in the coalition advocate for those who truly can’t help themselves. But it’s no coincidence that the spokesman for the group is Mark Desetti, who is the lobbyist for Kansas National Education Association (KNEA), the state’s teachers union. Other school spending advocacy groups are prominent members of this coalition. Fortunately, many are starting to realize that the aims of school spending advocates like the teachers unions are not in the best interest of students, as shown below.

    Teacher evaluation systems. Brookings Institution: “Of all the things that are under the control of policymakers and schools, teacher quality is at the top of the list in terms of impact on student achievement, and so there is a great interest in evaluating teacher performance.” Says Russ Whitehurst, director of the Brown Center on Education Policy: “If you’re unlucky enough to get a bad teacher three years in a row, you’re basically ruined — that’s 30 percentile points, it’s hard to recover from that. So we know that teachers are important, and we know that for the first time for reasons other than intuition.” Brookings is working on systems to evaluate the systems that school districts use to evaluate teachers, so that state and federal money can be distributed fairly, as a way to incentivize good teacher evaluation systems. … According to National Council on Teacher Quality, Kansas ranks very low among the states in policies relating to teacher effectiveness. For example, the report states: “Fails to make evidence of student learning the preponderant criterion in teacher evaluations.” … The prospects for reform in teacher evaluation and quality in Kansas are not good. Proposals that would improve Kansas in this regard have not been discussed — at least meaningfully — in this year’s session of the Kansas legislature. For example, this year the Legislature spent quite a bit of time on a policy where the period before teachers are awarded tenure could be increased from three to five years in certain circumstances. This is what qualifies as “school reform” in Kansas. Remember, Kansas ranks very low in policies that promote teacher quality. Tinkering with the policy on teacher tenure is not going to improve our teacher quality, as tenure is a system that ought to be eliminated. In Kansas the teachers union is Kansas National Education Association (KNEA), and it works overtime to block meaningful reform of our state’s schools.

    Misguided efforts to improve capitalism. From Eamonn Butler: Ludwig von Mises — A Primer on how efforts by government to intervene in markets fail: Indeed, our efforts to manipulate the market economy, and make it conform to a particular vision, are invariably damaging. Capitalism is superbly good at boosting the general standard of living by encouraging people to specialise and build up the capital goods that raise the productivity of human effort. But when we tax or regulate this system, and make it less worthwhile to invest in and own capital goods, then capitalism can falter. But that is not a “crisis of capitalism,” explains Mises. It is a crisis of interventionism: a failure of policies that are intended to “improve” capitalism but in fact strangle it. One common political ideal, for example, is “economic democracy” — the idea that everyone should count in the production and allocation of economic goods, not just a few capitalist producers. But according to Mises, we already have economic democracy. In competitive markets, producers are necessarily ruled by the wishes of consumers. Unless they satisfy the demands of consumers, they will lose trade and go out of business. If we interfere in this popular choice, we will end up satisfying only the agenda of some particular political group. A more modest notion is that producers’ profits should be taxed so that they can be distributed more widely throughout the population. But while this shares out the rewards of success, says Mises, it leaves business burdened with the whole cost of failure. That is an imbalance that can only depress people’s willingness to take business risks and must thereby depress economic life itself.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Friday April 29, 2011

    George Soros: Not just sinister; also stupid. Thomas E. Woods, Jr. gives us another reason to ignore George Soros. Commenting upon an article in which Soros placed Friedrich Hayek in the “Chicago school” of economists, Woods wrote: “If you think Hayek was a member of the Chicago School, you are not entitled to an opinion on matters of economic thought, period. Hayek was of course an Austrian [economist]. The Austrians are not the same as the Chicago economists, differing in method, capital theory, monopoly theory, monetary theory, policy implications, and quite a bit more. … That is a freshman mistake, one that nobody who knew anything about Hayek or either of the relevant schools would have come within a million miles of making.” … An introduction to Austrian economics is Economics for Real People: An Introduction to the Austrian School by Gene Callahan, available to read at no cost.

    Legislators at work for you 372 days a year. At least according to the way their annualized pay is calculated for the purpose of Kansas Public Employees Retirement System (KPERS). Mary Clarkin of the Hutchinson News reports on a method of calculating KPERS benefits for legislators that goes out of its way to calculate a large benefit for legislators. For example, legislators, when calculating their salaries for the purposes of KPERS, are treated as through they receive their daily legislative pay every day of the year, and then a few on top of that. Also, their subsistence pay, which is intended to cover the expenses of being in Topeka, is also included in salary calculations.

    Kansas doesn’t benefit from alternative certification. This excerpt from Death Grip: Loosening the Law’s Stranglehold over Economic Liberty by Clint Bolick illustrates the harm that excessive regulation of occupational licensure works against economic freedom and the public schoolchildren of Kansas. “Equally pernicious are teacher certification schemes. As a certified teacher, I can attest that none of my required classroom instruction (all of which was state-required) enhanced my core subject-matter competence. Despite the fact that they often turn out ill-trained teachers, schools of education fiercely defend their monopoly status over teacher certification, resisting alternative certification and entry into teacher ranks by professionals who are demonstrably competent in their subject matter. The scheme ensures that many bad teachers enter the school system while many good teachers are kept out. Licensing is not a proxy for competence, neither in teaching nor in many other professions. However, because licensing typically requires many hours of prescribed training, it is an effective means of limiting entry into professions. Licensing requirements are lucrative for schools that teach the prescribed courses and insulate licensed practitioners from competition. But they result in higher prices and fewer choices for consumers and destroy economic opportunities.” … According to National Council on Teacher Quality, alternative teacher certification policy in Kansas is among the most restrictive in the nation. These policies, as Bolick writes, give the state’s low-functioning schools of education a monopoly over the production of teachers, and deprives schoolchildren of many excellent would-be teachers.

  • In Kansas schools, follow the money

    When the Kansas Policy Institute found that Kansas schools were sitting on large unspent fund balances, the initial reaction of school bureaucrats is that these balances were an illusion — they didn’t exist. Then the schools admitted that the balances existed, but contended that they couldn’t be spent in a way that would help schools make it through a few tough budget years. Now it’s apparent that Kansas public schools simply don’t want to spend the money they’ve saved — money that was given to schools for educating children but wasn’t spent for that purpose. Instead, they’d rather ask for tax increases and sue the state’s taxpayers. KPI’s Dave Trabert explains and asks “How much cash does your school district have?” (You can find the answer to that question at KansasOpenGov.)

    In Kansas schools, follow the money

    Kansas public schools hold cash while threatening cuts
    By Dave Trabert, President, Kansas Policy Institute

    If someone told you public school districts are talking about closing schools and firing teachers because of funding challenges, but aren’t using millions in cash they built up over the last few years, you’d probably say “that can’t be true.” But it’s happening in Kansas.

    Districts began this year with $1.6 billion in unencumbered carryover cash reserves. “Unencumbered” means the cash is not subject to any lien, encumbrance or other creditor claims. Some cash comes from property tax levies and must be spent accordingly, such as for capital projects and debt service. But even subtracting that money plus federal funds and a few small amounts that can’t be touched according to state legal authorities, Kansas school districts still had $742 million in other operating funds.

    That’s an average of $1,633 per-pupil in cash. Governor Brownback’s proposed 2012 budget increases state aid but non-returning federal stimulus aid would result in a net loss per-pupil of about $232, or 1.9% of combined state, federal and local funding. With the average district having seven times that amount in carryover reserves, one would think most districts would say they could cover the difference and still be able to increase spending by using a portion of their reserves. Some plan to do so. Many others, with more than adequate reserves, say they will be “forced” to lay off teachers and take other drastic steps.

    The cash is held in dozens of funds, some of which have statutory restrictions on how fund balances can be used. Still, the state department of education says districts can access some restricted reserve balances by simply not transferring as much in as needs to be spent. Legislators could and should lift transfer restrictions so schools can use their reserves as needed.

    The vast majority of that $742 million represents state and local tax dollars given to schools in prior years for education purposes that instead were used to increase cash reserves. The total increased by $306 over the last five years, going from $436 million to $742 million.

    School funds operate on a cash basis just like your personal checkbook; the balances only increase if more is deposited than is spent. Since Kansas school districts added $306 million to their cash reserves over the last five years, one might ask if this would be a good time to use some of that money as originally intended.

    The projected decline in total aid next year is about $106 million, so schools would only have to use about 14 percent of their carryover cash to hold funding steady. Using cash reserves isn’t a long term solution but there’s plenty there to allow time to find other solutions, including operating more efficiently. Independent audits have disclosed tremendous savings opportunities. Kansas public schools spent an average of $12,330 per-pupil last year. That was down 2.6 percent from the previous year but still a 27 percent increase over the previous five years.

    One legitimate reason schools give for holding cash is that Kansas has not always made school aid payments on time as a result of recession-driven revenue declines. The state is working to resolve that problem by trying to reduce spending.

    Another reason is likely related to a new lawsuit filed by a group of school districts, contending the state is not meeting its constitutional funding obligation. A 2005 Kansas Supreme Court ruling in Montoy vs. State of Kansas ordered the Legislature to spend an additional $853 million on K-12 education. The Legislature complied with the court’s ruling and that case was closed. But the recession forced state aid to decline in 2010. Total state aid has since increased but is not back to previously-scheduled levels. So now some districts are using taxpayer money intended for educational purposes to sue the state again.

    Here’s the conundrum districts face regarding the use of their carryover cash reserves. How can they contend they are under-funded if $306 million of the aid received since the last lawsuit was used to increase cash reserves? Holding on to their cash build-up might help their lawsuit, but it certainly doesn’t help students or the teachers who are being laid off.

    School districts need some degree of carryover reserves but it should be determined how much can be made available and take whatever steps are necessary to put it to work in schools. It makes no sense to raise taxes or let teachers go when there are tax dollars sitting the bank.

    How much cash does your school district have?

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Monday March 14, 2011

    Kansas Democrats: EITC cut is a tax increase. In this week’s Democratic legislative update recorded by Kansas House of Representatives Minority Leader Paul Davis, the distinction between welfare and taxes became muddled. Referring to HB 2347, proposal to cut the Kansas Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), Davis said that Kansas House Republicans had “come forward with proposals to increase taxes on the working poor.” He called the proposal “a $60 million tax increase for the working poor.” … The EITC program at both federal and state levels is a program that spends money through the tax system. Sometimes called tax appropriations, these are economically equivalent to grants of money, both for government (whose tax revenues are reduced) and for the recipient (who receives a dollar-for-dollar reduction in tax liability, or in the case of the refundable EITC credit, a payment). … Whether or not you agree with this form of welfare, the proper way for Davis to have framed the debate is as a reduction in welfare payments for low-income people, not an increase in their taxes.

    Historian to visit Wichita. This week historian Gregory Schneider will speak in Wichita at two events. Schneider, of Topeka, is professor of history at Emporia State University. His most recent book is The Conservative Century: From Reaction to Revolution (Critical Issues in American History). … On Thursday (March 17th) Schneider will speak on the topic “The Conservative Century Revisited,” based on a Bradley Lecture that Dr. Schneider presented at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy in October 2010. This event is sponsored by the Wichita chapter of Americans for Prosperity, Kansas. It will be from 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm at the Wichita Downtown Public Library at 223 S. Main, in the third floor meeting room. For more information on this event contact John Todd at john@johntodd.net or 316-312-7335, or Susan Estes, AFP Field Director at sestes@afphq.org or 316-681-4415. … Then on Friday (March 18th) Schneider will speak at the Wichita Pachyderm Club on the topic “Requiem for a Railroad: The Collapse of the Rock Island,” which is the topic of a book he is currently writing. The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club.

    Kansas parents’ property tax challenge is dismissed. From Kansas Reporter: “A small group of parents of children in Johnson County’s Shawnee Mission Unified School District 512 filed a federal suit in December contending that lids Kansas places on property taxes for education essentially discriminate against schools in wealthier districts by holding spending to lower levels nearer those that less affluent districts can afford. U.S. District Judge John Lungstrum dismissed the suit Friday, ruling that the parents lacked sufficient authority to bring such a suit because the district ‘has no inherent or statutory authority outside the statutory funding scheme to impose a local tax to benefit the district.’” … ‘We won and the people of Kansas won,’ Robb [John Robb, chief counsel for Schools for Fair Funding] said.” Well, except for the people of Kansas who brought the lawsuit.

  • KNEA, the Kansas teachers union, open to reform?

    Do the teachers unions in Kansas, particularly Kansas National Education Association (KNEA), have the best interests of schoolchildren as their primary goal? Are teachers unions open to change and reform?

    An op-ed written by Claudette Johns, who is executive director for KNEA, claims that the union is open to new ideas, and that the goal of the union is “to make public schools great for every child.” But when we look at what teachers unions in Kansas actually do, we see that the unions are a roadblock to better schools.

    There are many ways that teachers unions work against the interests of children. For example, the contract for teachers in USD 259, the Wichita public school district, provides for two ways for teachers to earn a higher salary (besides taking on extra duties like coaching): they can teach more years, and they can gain additional education credentials.

    There are several problems with this approach to teacher pay. First, there is compelling research that indicates that beyond the first few years, additional years of experience contribute nothing to teacher effectiveness in the classroom, with one exception.

    As to gaining extra education: “The evidence is conclusive that master’s degrees do not make teachers more effective,” according to a summary of research prepared by the National Council on Teacher Quality. Amazingly, some studies have found that as teachers gained more credentials, their effectiveness in the classroom declined. Yet, the contract negotiated by the Wichita teachers union — and most unions across the country — requires that districts pay teachers more as they gain these credentials which do nothing to increase effectiveness.

    Even if you discount these studies, are we to believe that all teachers increase in effectiveness in lockstep as they advance in seniority and gaining additional training? Of course not. But the teachers union contract says this is the way teachers are to be paid. Effectiveness in the classroom — which is what children need — is not a consideration.

    The teachers unions have created a system where teaching effectiveness — how well someone does their job — means nothing as to how much teachers will be paid. That’s important, as we are becoming aware that there is a very large difference in the learning experiences of students based on teacher effectiveness. Even President Obama recognizes the absurdity of this situation, and he and Department of Education Secretary Arne Duncan have advocated merit pay. This is a system where teachers are evaluated on their effectiveness and paid accordingly, just like almost all private sector workers are paid and rewarded.

    But the teachers union will vigorously oppose any efforts to implement anything that smells like merit pay. It’s one of the union’s most important reasons for existing, and it perpetuates a system that drives motivated teachers out of the schools.

    Another important goal of teachers unions is to protect the policy of granting tenure, after which it is virtually impossible to fire a teacher for poor effectiveness. This is another teachers union policy that works against teacher effectiveness and student learning. In Kansas, the teachers union strongly opposes changing the probationary period before the granting of tenure from three to five years.

    The teachers union, when it promotes these policies, has an argument on their side that has some validity. It is said that school administrators — in a system without tenure and rigid salary schedules — would practice “crony” hiring and promotion practices. They would reward their friends and family and punish their enemies or those they simply don’t like.

    These things happen in a system insulated from market competition, and institutions don’t suffer when they do. In the private sector, when a manager makes staffing decisions based on cronyism — rather than hiring and retaining the best possible employees — the profitability of the company suffers. If managers’ compensation is tied to profitability, they suffer when making staffing decisions based on cronyism rather than merit. The company could perform so poorly that it goes out of business.

    A system of market competition, however, forces each institution — schools, too — to be the best they can possibly be. When schools compete for students and funding, principals might learn to like, promote, and reward their very best teachers.

    School administrators also might learn how to evaluate and recognize the best teachers. This is vitally important, because of the factors under the control of schools, teacher quality is by far the most important factor in student success. It’s much more important than class size, which is another thing teachers unions constantly advocate for.

    The merits of this argument don’t mean that we should have teachers unions that operate more like industrial unions than a group representing workers that seek to be treated as professionals. Instead, it means we need more ways to hold school administrators accountable for the actions, and in turn, teachers. The best way to do this is to introduce market competition through various forms of school choice. Charter schools in Kansas would be a good start. But school choice and market competition is another reform the teachers unions oppose — again putting their own interests first.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Monday February 14, 2011

    KRA guide to elected officials. The Kansas Republican Assembly has created a guide to Kansas elected officials. Besides contact information, it also holds things like committee membership for legislators. The links to the information are on the right side of KRA’s home page.

    Wichita Eagle voter guide. Click here. You can get a list of the candidates, along with their responses to questions, customized for your address.

    Campaign signs. The placement of political campaign signs can be an issue. Here is a City of Wichita letter describing placement rules, and a diagram. … If you live in a neighborhood with covenants prohibiting campaign signs, the covenants don’t apply at election time. See In Kansas, political signs are okay, despite covenants.

    Rasmussen polls last week. “Most voters continue to strongly favor repeal of the national health care law and they’re evenly divided as to whether the new law will force them to change insurance coverage.” Survey is here. … In a video Scott Rasmussen explains explains that 1954 was the last year that government spending declined from the previous year. Video is here, and an article is here. The article holds a chart that compares the difference between what government spending would be if it grew at the rate of population plus inflation, versus its actual growth. It’s a big difference.

    Organ recital tomorrow. On Tuesday (February 15) Wichita State University’s Lynne Davis presents a faculty organ recital. The event starts at 7:30 pm and has a small admission charge. The location is Wiedemann Recital Hall (map) on the campus of Wichita State University. For more about Davis and WSU’s Great Marcussen Organ, see my story from last year.

    Funny campaign stuff. Funny or sad, you decide. Proofreading always helps. A candidate for city council’s campaign website — right on the front page — reads: “The future of our great city rest in the voter’s hands, your hands.” Another page for this candidate states: “We must realize that things that use to work in our community, may no longer work.” … The Wichita Eagle voter guide has a spot for candidates to list their endorsements. Usually candidates would list prominent people or organizations that are supporting them. But one candidate used this opportunity to list a number of products that he recommends.

    Wichita teachers union contract. Public school teachers want to be treated as professionals. But their union contracts read like something we’d expect to see in a United Auto Workers contract, and we know what that union did to the American automotive industry. Here’s an example from the contract between USD 259, the Wichita public school district, and United Teachers of Wichita: “The ending time of the school day in each building shall be seven (7) hours and ten (10) minutes after the beginning time. The Superintendent and the UTW President will review all requests submitted to extend the school day prior to April 1 of each year. Their joint recommendation shall be subject to Board approval. All requests must be first supported by 80 percent of the affected staff as determined by a secret ballot election conducted by the UTW.”

    What public sector union leaders think. Speaking of public sector unions, here’s a video featuring John Gage, who is president of American Federation of Government Employees, and what he thinks of those who want to control federal spending. It’s not complimentary.

    City council candidates to meet. This week’s (February 18) meeting of the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Wichita city council candidates from district 3. Scheduled to appear are James Clendenin, Clinton D. Coen, Mark S. Gietzen, and Hoyt Hillman. The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club.

    Politicians’ Top 10 Promises Gone Wrong. This Monday (February 14) Americans for Prosperity will show the 2010 John Stossel documentary “Politicians’ Top 10 Promises Gone Wrong.” For a preview and interview with Stossel, click here. For my reporting and review of the show, click on Stossel on politicians’ promises. … This event, sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, will be held on Monday, February 14 from 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm at the Lionel D. Alford Library located at 3447 S. Meridian in Wichita. The library is just north of the I-235 exit on Meridian. For more information on this event contact John Todd at john@johntodd.net or 316-312-7335, or Susan Estes, AFP Field Director at sestes@afphq.org or 316-681-4415.

  • Kansas school teacher cuts

    As Kansas struggles with its budget and decides what to do with public schools, advocates of public school spending exaggerate claims of pending job cuts and fail to take advantage of an opportunity to improve our state’s base of teachers.

    Misinformation about school employment is plentiful. An article from the Hutchinson News (Budget cuts a way of life for Kansas school districts, December 26, 2010) is typical: “More than 1,000 teachers and 900 classified school employees have been cut out of the system.”

    The Kansas State Department of Education surveyed school districts asking how many positions were reduced or eliminated due to lack of funding for the 2009-2010 school year. The answer was 1,160 teachers.

    Actual employment figures from the KSDE indicate that for the 2008-2009 school year, Kansas schools employed 35,438 teachers. For 2009-2010 34,985 teachers were employed. That’s a drop of 453 teachers, or quite a bit less than half of the 1,160 teachers schools said they would have to cut.

    Looking at total employment, schools claimed they would have to cut 3,704 jobs. The actual number of jobs lost was 562.

    We see that the public schools, like many government agencies, exaggerate the effects of spending cuts — or even a slowdown in the rate of growth of spending. Whether this exaggeration is purposeful and dishonest is for others to decide. But this tendency is something to keep in mind as school districts across the state tell taxpayers and legislators what the effect of reduced school funding will be.

    Cuts could be beneficial

    While schools don’t like to see employment cuts, especially for teachers, cuts could be used to beneficial effect if not for the rules that most school districts have adopted. These union work rules require that teachers be laid off in order of seniority. Therefore, the teachers with the longest service will be the last to be let go.

    It might seem like retaining the most experienced teachers is a beneficial policy. But research tells us that longevity in the classroom is not related to teacher effectiveness. One study found results that are typical: “There appear to be important gains in teaching quality in the first year of experience and smaller gains over the next few career years. However, there is little evidence that improvements continue after the first three years.”

    Another result: “Thus we conclude that novice teachers in the sample are less effective than teachers in the sample with some experience, but beyond the first couple of years, more experienced teachers are no more effective than those with a couple of years of experience.”

    So when school districts retain their most experienced teachers, they are making a decision to keep their most highly-paid teachers, using reasoning that has found not to hold up in the real world. This causes stress on school budgets for something that doesn’t improve student learning.

    If Kansas schools would lay off their most ineffective teachers first, that would improve the overall quality of teachers in Kansas schools. But Kansas has weak policies in place to determine which teachers are effective.

    Instead, Kansas schools will inform parents that class sizes will get larger. That might be true. But we now know it’s much better for a child to be in a large class with an effective teacher than to be in a small class with an ineffective teacher. But the policies of Kansas schools will not let this improvement in teacher quality take place.

    Is it all about the kids?

    Kansans ought to ask who the public schools serve. The schools, of course, say it’s all about the kids. But when the schools have work rules that protect the most expensive teachers when these teachers are not the most effective based solely on longevity, we see that the public schools are like most government programs: they exist to protect themselves, not their customers (students) and funders (taxpayers).