Category Archives: Legislature

Common Core test survives battle

Education, Legislature, Politics, State government

By Steve Brawner
© 2015 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

The latest battle over the Common Core was fought Wednesday in the Senate Education Committee, where Rep. Mark Lowery, R-Maumelle, presented a bill that would remove Arkansas not from the Common Core, but from the new PARCC assessment that students take as part of the Common Core. The result is that Arkansas is still part of PARCC.

The Common Core is a set of standards in math and English language arts/literacy, while the PARCC assessment measures progress and compares students in different states. PARCC originally involved 24 states, including Arkansas, which has had a leading role in its development. Other states were part of a different consortium.

Common Core’s supporters, including educators and business leaders, say it provides more consistency and clarity to America’s schools, and that it teaches students more relevant stuff. Before Common Core, we in Arkansas were patting ourselves on the back because scores had improved on state exams while not knowing how those scores compared to students in other states. Maybe Arkansas schools were getting better, or maybe not.

But many others say Common Core represents a federal intrusion. It’s become one of the biggest issues in Republican Party politics, and states have been dropping out of PARCC. Now only nine states are involved, plus the District of Columbia, and for a while this session, Arkansas looked like it might be leaving as well. The House passed Lowery’s bill, 86-1.

In the Senate Education Committee, Lowery argued that the online assessment is full of technical glitches and that it will not protect students’ personal data from prying eyes. The bill’s opponents and the state Department of Education countered that the test is going mostly smoothly, especially considering this is the first year, and that students’ privacy would be maintained.

In the end, the motion to pass the bill died for lack of a second, though senators later passed it with an amendment that weakens the bill nearly to the point of irrelevance. The committee amended the bill, slightly, again on Friday. Arkansas is still part of PARCC. Senators decided it didn’t make sense to end Arkansas’ association with the exam without something to replace it. They’ll hear about this from Common Core opponents.

I asked Lowery if he had any doubts. Not about the PARCC exam, he replied, but he does go back and forth when it comes to Common Core itself.

That’s understandable, because it’s a tough issue. The people who know best, teachers, have varying opinions. I think I’m for it, but I understand why people have reservations.

I’m on firmer ground with these observations.

– The standards themselves are not really the problem. Early in the Common Core debate, opponents argued that the standards are inadequate. They still argue that, but that part of the debate seems to have died down. Too many teachers seem to like them, or at least aren’t raising that much of a ruckus.

– The debate isn’t really about education. This is really the same argument we have all the time about the federal government’s role, with the volume turned up extra high. Much of this is political, and part of it is about President Obama, unfortunately. No Child Left Behind, signed into law in 2002 by President Bush, represents a far greater federal intrusion into education than Common Core does. It says the government can punish entire schools if a single student doesn’t do well enough on a test, and yet there was no public outcry when it was passed. It was a different time, but part of the reason we have Common Core is that everyone had to figure out what to do with No Child Left Behind.

– The federal government never should have gotten involved (which, of course, it inevitably would). Part of the Common Core’s appeal was that it was pushed originally by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers. When the U.S. Department of Education started handing out Common Core-related grants, it became an Obama thing.

– The Common Core came into existence in Arkansas the wrong way, by a vote by the Arkansas State Board of Education during a meeting in 2010. Hardly anyone knew what was happening, and then parents were trying to check their kids’ weird math problems. This big of a change required more of a statewide discussion, if such a thing is possible.

– People who are maddest at the Common Care are maddest at the wrong thing. See the part about No Child Left Behind.

New law saves good small schools

Education, Legislature, Politics, State government, Uncategorized

By Steve Brawner
© 2015 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Bruce Cozart sponsored Act 377.
Bruce Cozart sponsored Act 377.
Sometimes the Legislature gets it wrong, sometimes it gets it right, and sometimes it gets it right after getting it wrong for a while.

The last was the case with Act 377, signed last week by Gov. Asa Hutchinson, which lets the Arkansas State Board of Education grant waivers from consolidation to school districts that fall below the usual 350-student threshold. As a result of that bill by Rep. Bruce Cozart, R-Hot Springs, a school district can remain open if it is not in fiscal, academic or facilities distress, and if keeping it open is in the best interest of students because of long bus rides.

The 350-student minimum was created in 2003 in response to court rulings in the Lake View case that put the state and its taxpayers firmly in charge of ensuring all students’ education opportunities are “adequate” and “equitable.” (The Arkansas Constitution uses the words “general, suitable and efficient.”)

The thinking was that districts must have at least that many students to provide the necessary economies of scale to accomplish those objectives, which is usually true. Generally, districts with less than 350 students cannot cost-effectively provide high-level math and science courses and other opportunities students need. Those districts typically are in declining communities that the rest of the state’s taxpayers are not responsible for propping up. Above all, policymakers feared that messing with the funding formula would land the state back in court. Every major education decision is made with that firmly in mind.

The result of all this is that, according to the Arkansas Rural Community Alliance, 53 high schools and 48 elementary schools have been closed. For the sake of both students and taxpayers, many of them probably should have been.

The problem with that arbitrary 350-student minimum is it confuses “impossible” with merely “difficult.” Against the odds, the Weiner School District was doing well. Its academics were among the best in the state. Its facilities were good. Its finances not only were sound, but its citizens recently had voted to raise their own taxes.

It didn’t matter. Because it fell below that magic number, it was forced to consolidate in 2010 with its larger neighbor, Harrisburg, whose students were not achieving at the same levels as students in Weiner. There’s still a Weiner Elementary School, but older students travel to Harrisburg now. To this day, taxpayers who live in Weiner pay higher millage rates than those who live in Harrisburg. So far, the district’s patrons have voted not to change that situation.

Michelle Cadle stood behind Hutchinson as he signed the bill into law and was handed one of the pens he used. Her family lives in what once was the Weiner School District. Her youngest child attends Weiner Elementary, but she drives her oldest to the Valley View School District 20 miles away.

The loss still stings, but she has chosen to channel her emotion into becoming an advocate for small schools. “We always said it was never about Weiner,” she said. “It was about doing what was right for all schools across Arkansas, so this was a victory day for us.”

Hutchinson made it clear that the law is “forward looking.” In other words, it can’t be used to reopen the Weiner district. Still, Cadle said the community is looking for alternatives.

There wasn’t strong opposition to this bill. It doesn’t do away with the 350-student minimum. It merely gives the State Board of Education a tool to use when there’s an exception to the rule, like Weiner. Districts in decline still will be consolidated.

More generally, education policymakers are concerned about the lack of institutional memory in the Capitol. Because of term limits, very few legislators were in office when the Lake View case was decided. The more the case shrinks in the rearview mirror, the more it will be forgotten – until somebody sues again.

That’s a valid concern. However, the fear of that happening shouldn’t lead the state to repeat a past mistake – or put more and more kids on long bus rides unnecessarily. Regardless of its size, if a district’s students are performing well, if its finances are sound, and if its facilities are in good shape, it shouldn’t be consolidated. It should be duplicated.

Tough task for health care task force

Health care, Legislature, State government
Jim Hendren is one of the chairmen of the health care task force.
Jim Hendren is one of the chairmen of the health care task force.

By Steve Brawner
© 2015 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Sixteen legislators will spend the next 22 months trying to figure out how to do what no one has been able to figure out so far – cost-effectively provide health care to lower-income people without growing government and making more people dependent upon it.

Also, they must try to produce a proposal that would be supported by 75 percent of the Legislature and the governor. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court this year will issue a ruling on Obamacare that could throw the entire health care system into disarray.

The group is called the Arkansas Health Care Reform Legislative Task Force. Tough task, huh?

The task force was created earlier this legislative session as Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s way of resolving the impasse over the private option. He doesn’t want it simply to go away without a replacement.

The private option was Arkansas’ response to the Affordable Care Act’s requirement that states expand their Medicaid populations, and the Supreme Court’s subsequent ruling that it had to be only optional. Many Republican-leaning states turned down federal money rather than grow Medicaid. Arkansas used that money to buy private insurance for 200,000 people, and counting.

Now Arkansas is leading the nation in the reduction of its uninsured population. According to a recent Gallup poll, the percentage of Arkansans without insurance dropped in one year from 22.5 to 11.4 percent. The private option will bring $1.3 billion in federal funds to the state in 2015. Without it, rural hospitals would probably close, as they have in states that turned down the money.

But the private option is rightfully controversial. It has roots in Obamacare. While the federal government is paying for almost all of it now, the state’s share grows over time – supposedly to 10 percent, but who knows with the federal government these days? Legislative opponents say this is how the $18 trillion national debt keeps growing. Everyone always has a hand out.

Because the private option involves spending money, it must pass with 75 percent majorities each year, and it’s barely done that twice. This year did not look promising, so Hutchinson asked legislators to form the task force to consider not only how to change (and surely rename) the private option, but also to consider broader Medicaid reforms.

The 16-member task force by design is split between legislators who have consistently voted for and against it. If this were Washington, it would accomplish nothing, but Little Rock is not Washington. The sponsor of the legislation creating the task force, Sen. Jim Hendren, R-Sulphur Springs, expects it to make progress “because we’re going to act like grown-ups.”

Hendren has been a private option opponent because he believes it’s unsustainable at both the state and federal levels. However, he recognizes that the old system – lots of uninsured people getting charity care in emergency rooms – wasn’t working. Plus, you can’t just yank insurance away from 200,000 people. Plus, he’s Hutchinson’s nephew. So what now? Ideally, he said, the task force will create something that will “meet the needs of those people that need it and encourage them to improve their station in life, and we also do it in a financially sustainable way.”

For many reasons, the culture in Little Rock is much more collaborative than in Washington, D.C. Unlike in our nation’s capital, state legislators tend to meet somewhere in the middle. Moreover, the lines between private option supporters and opponents can be somewhat blurred, Hendren said. “Obviously we’re not going to have a society in Arkansas where people can’t get health care at all. It’s just a question of how we deliver that in an affordable way,” he said.

The task force’s other Senate members are Sens. David Sanders, R-Little Rock; Jason Rapert, R-Conway; Linda Chesterfield, D-Little Rock; Keith Ingram, D-West Memphis; Terry Rice, R-Waldron; John Cooper, R-Jonesboro; and Cecile Bledsoe, R-Rogers. House members are Reps. David Meeks, R-Conway; Joe Farrer, R-Austin; Justin Boyd, R-Fort Smith; Michelle Gray, R-Melbourne; Charlie Collins, R-Fayetteville; David Murdock, D-Marianna; Deborah Ferguson, D-West Memphis; and Kim Hammer, R-Benton.

They must produce their first report by the end of the year. They won’t “solve” health care, but they will produce something useful. No one will get everything they want, and they’ll accept that, like grown-ups.

Can states save the federal government?

Debt and deficits, Legislature, Politics, State government

By Steve Brawner
© 2015 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Common Core cover cutoutThe thing about human nature is that we resist the big change until there’s a crisis, even though we know a crisis is inevitable if we stick with the status quo.

It often takes a diagnosis for us to quit smoking or change our diets. Some alcoholics must lose everything before they’ll finally seek help.

On the other hand, some people do make lifestyle changes before they absolutely must. Can a society do the same?

On March 2, the national debt stood at $18,149,954,531,765.07, according to the U.S. Treasury Department’s website. That’s $57,000 per American.

The government has been in debt since 1835, but the numbers have been soaring lately. It took two centuries to reach $1 trillion in 1980 and then 35 years to add $17 trillion to that.

There have been a few years when the government did not add to the debt, but not many. Debt has been an ever-present part of America’s past – and unfortunately, its foreseeable future. The federal government’s own Congressional Budget Office predicts the debt will increase $7.7 trillion over the next 10 years. The debt then will continue to rise because of the government’s many unfunded promises.

Someday there will be a reckoning. You can’t keep adding debt forever. And yet Washington seems incapable of stopping this train wreck from happening. So can the states do it?

In the State Capitol on Wednesday, the House of Representatives voted to advance the Compact for a Balanced Budget, a national effort to amend the U.S. Constitution. It now goes to the Senate.

The Constitution has been amended 27 times, the first 10 amendments being the Bill of Rights. With each amendment, Congress has initiated the process.

However, under the Constitution’s Article V, the process can be initiated by states instead of Congress. Thirty-four states must agree to a call, Congress must make the call, the delegates must meet to propose amendments, and then 38 states must approve those amendments. It’s never been done before.

The Compact for a Balanced Budget spells out exactly what the convention would do and how it would do it. Delegates would vote for a single amendment saying the government cannot spend more than it collects unless it borrows under a debt limit that can be increased only with approval by state legislatures. It also requires a two-thirds vote by Congress for most tax increases.

The previous day, the House voted against a resolution advancing the Convention of the States, another national effort to amend the Constitution through the Article V process. That effort would let delegates consider a balanced budget amendment but also others that would limit the government’s power and scope. Supporters tried again on Friday and narrowly passed it through the House. It now goes to the Senate as well.

I like the Compact’s approach much better, but I understand why people are opposed to both. A balanced budget amendment could rob Congress of the flexibility it needs in a crisis. It could be ignored. Or it could give the Supreme Court an outsized say in taxing and spending matters. Clearly, the Convention of the States is a conservative movement meant to reduce the size of the federal government, which many Americans don’t really want to do.

Other arguments against the Article V approach are not as persuasive. Some fear a “runaway convention” where delegates make scary changes to the Constitution. That’s hard to imagine. Remember, whatever the convention proposes must then be ratified by 38 states, one at a time. It’s far more likely the process either would produce nothing, or something so watered down as to be meaningless.

Some are opposed to amending the Constitution because they say it is just fine like it is. Thank goodness that argument didn’t carry the day before passage of the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery, or the 19th, which ensured women have the right to vote.

The framers of the Constitution gave us a wonderful document, but it has become increasingly obvious since 1835 that it contains a flaw: The government has many incentives to create debt without a mechanism to discourage it. Thomas Jefferson recognized that flaw in 1798.

The framers also understood their own imperfections, and humanity’s, as well as the fact that times change. That’s why they made it possible to amend the Constitution, with great difficulty.

They wisely included the Article V provision. Congress can’t always be trusted, so a democratic process was needed to bypass it – before a crisis occurs, preferably.