At last. Someone has finally come up with a sane and practical way to look at the debate on how we pay for public education.
Last week, John Sharp told Texas newspaper publishers that the problem of school funding is so complicated by interest groups who want to reform the way we educate our children along with the way we pay for it, the effort is as pointless as "watching a cock fight while a nuclear war is going on outside."
That analogy is quite apt.
The Supreme Court recently found that the way we pay for our school system is unconstitutional because it amounts to a statewide property tax. The court didn't order the Legislature to consider vouchers or to increase per student spending. It didn't really speak to how Texas educates its students or what it teaches them. It said that the way we pay for public education is unconstitutional and ordered the Legislature to fix it. By June 1. Or else.
The Legislature must stop worrying about the peripheral issues and make the school finance infrastructure constitutional. Those peripheral issues - vouchers on one hand and increased per student spending on the other - cannot be addressed until this state overhauls the tax code and reduces its dependence on property tax.
But the folks who want to use tax reform as a springboard to education reform muck up the works and make it impossible for the Legislature to accomplish anything regarding tax reform. Several failed special sessions and two regular sessions attest to this failure. We must save those battles for after we put a constitutional tax system in place.
Sharp pointed out that our tax code worked pretty well in the late 1950s and early 1960s but it is completely inadequate to the task of keeping up with our global economy and high stakes development. That's why, aside from the court mandated deadline, it's critical that the Legislature develop a tax code that is fair, makes sense, promotes our economy and doesn't balance that budget on the backs of our senior citizens, shrinking middle class and chronically poor.
Further, that deadline is important. Should the Legislature fail to come up with a constitutional plan, the court could shut off state money to the schools and do it in June. Sharp noted that, since she is locked in a bitter election campaign with Gov. Perry, Carole Strayhorn, the current Texas Comptroller, would very likely cooperate with that court order and that would create incredible havoc.
Now, the Legislature could duck the whole issue. It could put another band aide on the problem (like redistribution, the so-called "Robin Hood" plan) by throwing enough money at the problem that the court looks the other way for a couple of months.
But, that's not going to solve anything. That's not doing the job we hired them to do. Indeed, that approach guarantees continued ideological strife, taxpayer stress, expensive special Legislative sessions and legal battles.
That's not good public policy. It's not good tax policy.
The Legislature must divide the issue of how we pay for education from all the other issues, then take the deadline imposed by the Texas Supreme Court seriously.
"Don't let them do it half-way," Sharp urged. "Make them stick to this deadline."
It's past time for our leaders in Austin to quit squabbling like a bunch of spoiled 5 year olds and show some backbone and leadership.
This article was published Jan. 2, 2006 as an editorial by The Cameron Herald
