Grading Texas

“Best” legislators were education supporters

You may or may not agree with all the choices on Texas Monthly’s just-released list of Ten Best and Ten Worst Legislators, but I think Paul Burka and his crew were dead-on accurate in drawing a huge distinction between the lead lawmakers on public education.

House Public Education Chairman Jimmie Don Aycock made the “best” list, and Senate Education Chairman Dan Patrick was rated among the “worst.” Amen.

Although the magazine hasn’t published the reasons for its evaluations yet, the major differences between the two during the recent regular legislative session are easy to document.

Aycock, a Republican from Killeen, was the primary sponsor of House Bill 5, the new law overhauling high school graduation requirements and reducing the insanity of high-stakes standardized testing. It reduces end-of-course exams for high school students from 15 to five.

Aycock also voted for the new state budget bills restoring almost $4 billion of the $5.4 billion cut from public school budgets two years ago, and he attempted to slow the greedy drive toward school privatization. He let it be known early on that there was little stomach in the House for private school vouchers, and he tried – although with limited success – to slow down the expansion of privately operated charter schools.

Aycock listened to the concerns of educators — the real education experts — not just to ambitious school profiteers disguised as self-styled “reformers.”

On the other side of the Capitol, though, Senate Education Chairman Patrick operated in a different world. The Republican from Houston called himself an “educational evangelist.” In truth, he was a privatization huckster.

His top priority was siphoning tax dollars from public schools – where most students get their educations — for vouchers, which would have benefited a handful of kids while enriching private school owners at taxpayer expense.

Unable to get any traction for that bad idea, Patrick focused his attention – with some success — on expanding charter schools. Charters, on average, don’t perform as well as traditional neighborhood schools in state ratings, but Patrick’s success in winning enactment of his Senate Bill 2 will allow more private operators of charters to dip into the state treasury.

And, adding insult to injury for public school students and employees, Patrick voted against the state budget that restored much of the education funding he voted to cut two years ago.

I find it interesting that other members of the “Ten Best” list include Speaker Joe Straus, who made education funding a priority at the beginning of the session, and Rep. Jim Pitts of Waxahachie and Sen. Tommy Williams of The Woodlands, the two budget-writing chairmen.

Receiving a special “Bull of the Brazos” award was Rep. Sylvester of Houston, a champion of public schools and education funding.

Eight on the “Ten Best” list were supported by TSTA during last year’s elections. They were Aycock, Pitts, Sen. Wendy Davis of Fort Worth, Sen. Leticia Van de Putte of San Antonio, Sen. Robert Duncan of Lubbock, Sen. Juan Hinojosa of McAllen, Rep. Charlie Geren of Fort Worth and Rep. Trey Martinez Fischer of San Antonio.

To see both lists, click on this link:

http://www.texasmonthly.com/burka-blog/best-and-worst-legislators-2013

School funding still comes up short

No doubt about it, $3.9 billion is a lot of money. But anyone who may think that it is going to take the state off the hook in the school finance lawsuit is engaging in wishful thinking. Either that, or they are betting the Texas Supreme Court eventually will undercut public schools with an ideological decision perpetrating the myth that money doesn’t make a difference in educational quality.

TSTA and other public school advocates are pleased that the Legislature restored $3.9 billion of the $5.4 billion cut from public education in 2011. And, we are grateful to the parents and school employees who contacted their legislators and helped ensure the partial recovery. But the appropriation is still $1.5 billion less than schools were receiving two years ago, while enrollment has grown by about 170,000 statewide since that time – and is still growing. And, the Legislature left $8 billion of taxpayer money unspent in the Rainy Day Fund.

Assuming Gov. Rick Perry doesn’t figure out a way to veto any of the $3.9 billion – and that may be a rash assumption – the next decision-maker to be heard from in the school funding drama will be state District Judge John Dietz of Austin, the presiding judge in the school finance lawsuit brought against the state by more than 600 districts.

Dietz ruled in February that the state wasn’t spending enough money for schools to do their jobs successfully and wasn’t appropriating money among districts in a fair and equitable way. But he delayed issuing a formal, written decision until after the Legislature had another chance to address funding and other educational issues.

During the regular session, which ended on Memorial Day, lawmakers also reduced the end-of-course (EOC) exams for high school students under the STAAR regime from 15 to five, partly in response to school district complaints in the lawsuit but also to parental outrage over too much testing.

Senate Education Chairman Dan Patrick predicted the extra money and testing reductions could affect Dietz’s final ruling. “I believe the judge needs to revisit the issue,” Patrick was quoted in The Dallas Morning News over the weekend.

But I doubt that the judge will be overly impressed by the Legislature’s work product. Remember, he estimated in February that it may take an extra $2,000 per child – or another $10 billion or $11 billion a year in state funding – to meet all state standards. And, the Legislature didn’t come close to meeting that figure. Moreover, more than 60 percent of public school students are low-income, with many requiring more funding for remedial programs.

As Dietz remarked back then,” There is no free lunch.”

Once Dietz issues his final ruling, the state will appeal to the Texas Supreme Court, many of whose members view the world – and state government’s responsibility – quite differently from the trial judge.

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A couple of weeks ago, I posted an item about SB346, which had been approved by both the House and the Senate, to require certain nonprofit groups that actively engage in political advocacy to publicly report their donors to the Texas Ethics Commission. It would have helped teachers, parents and others who value public schools to learn more about who is paying for political efforts to undermine public education.

I say “would have helped” because, in case you haven’t heard by now, Gov. Perry vetoed the bill. He said it would have had a “chilling effect” on the democratic political process.

In truth, it would have enhanced the democratic process. It would have forced the public disclosure of wealthy ideologues who finance bullying tactics against legislators, often to the detriment of most mainstream Texans. The veto wasn’t much of a surprise, but it was wrong, nevertheless.

Trying to shed light on education foes

Yesterday, the House passed and sent Gov. Rick Perry a bill designed to help teachers, parents and others who value public schools learn a bit more about who is paying for political efforts to undermine public education in Texas. Some political pundits around the Capitol, though, already are predicting the governor will veto the bill. And, they may be correct because the measure likely would step on the toes and inconvenience many of the governor’s own political backers.

The bill, SB346, would require certain nonprofit groups that actively engage in political advocacy to publicly report their larger financial donors to the Texas Ethics Commission. The bill was sponsored by two moderate Republicans. Its apparent targets include conservative groups such as Empower Texans and Texans for Fiscal Responsibility, which use emails, phone calls and similar tactics to bully and stir up opposition in Republican primaries against moderate legislators who dare to waver from the hard, right-wing ideological line.

They were behind the defeat two years ago of an amendment in the House that would have earmarked $2 billion from the Rainy Day Fund to restore part of the $5.4 billion in education budget cuts. The House approved the bipartisan amendment one day. But after an overnight email and phone blitz threatening retaliation in the Republican primary, a number of Republican legislators switched their votes the next day and helped defeat the amendment.

They also helped defeat several moderate Republicans in primary races last year and have tried unsuccessfully to unseat House Speaker Joe Straus because, in their eyes, he is “too moderate.”

Moreover, they are able to conduct their ideological scorched earth campaign without having to report who is backing them financially. For all we know, it may be a handful of ideological, multibillionaire businessmen who, for selfish reasons, want to destroy sound government environmental and economic regulations and replace public schools with new opportunities for online vendors, for-profit charter operators and private schools.

Whatever their motives, they have been influential in the right-wing attack on public education that continues today. And, they are hiding behind a reporting exemption that doesn’t apply to most other players in the political process. The Texas State Teachers Association, for example, supports candidates in legislative and school board races, but it does so through a political action committee whose contributions and expenditures are publicly reported.

This is not a partisan bill. It also would apply to Democratic-leaning groups that also may try to conceal their contributors. It is interesting, however, that the measure was sponsored in the House and the Senate by Republicans who obviously are tired of the intimidation tactics and their anonymous donors.

The fate of the bill, which was approved earlier in the session by the Senate, is now in Gov. Perry’s hands. It will be interesting to see what the governor does with it, since it clearly could force some of his conservative supporters to be more transparent in their activities. If you like the bill, contact his office – he has a website — and urge him to sign it.

Wrong-headed politics blocking full education funding

The reason that many legislators don’t want to spend any money from the $12 billion Rainy Day Fund on public schools is because they want to hoard your tax dollars. This would enable them to go back home and brag to a small – but loud – number of constituents that they had “saved” the fund.

These constituents refuse to believe that a growing state like Texas requires a wise investment of tax dollars in critical programs, services and infrastructure. They also claim our public schools are fat with waste, despite $5.4 billion in budget cuts two years ago, and would love to divert tax dollars to private schools. And, unfortunately, they are influential in many Republican primary races.

But the “official” reason among the legislative leadership for not spending Rainy Day dollars to help restore all the education funding is that the savings account shouldn’t be used on “recurring” expenses. This is a false argument, but so far it and the political hoarder mentality have succeeded in blocking any attempt to dip into the Rainy Day Fund for schools. It also, so far, has blocked efforts to spend Rainy Day money on future water projects because of pushback from education advocates.

With the regular legislative session nearing an end, it is time for the predictable threats of a special session from the governor, and Gov. Perry is right on schedule, threatening to call lawmakers back into a special session this summer if they don’t approve a water funding plan. Unfortunately, he has said nothing about attaching a similar priority to education.

Legislators are on track to restore part of the $5.4 billion cut from schools in 2011, but without dipping into the Rainy Day Fund they could be as much as $2 billion or more short of restoring the entire amount.

Using Rainy Day money to help fill the entire $5.4 billion hole would not be a “recurring” expense. It would be a one-time repair. But failure to fill the entire hole would give school districts a “recurring” budgetary shortfall, created when the Legislature refused to fund enrollment growth for the past two years, or about 170,000 children.

In truth, the constitutional amendment that created the Rainy Day Fund and was approved by Texas voters in 1988 includes no prohibition against spending the savings account on recurring needs. And, the Legislature – under both Republican and Democratic control – has spent Rainy Day savings over the years on a number of recurring expenses, including public education, retired teacher health care, the Children’s Health Insurance Program and Child Protective Services.

In 2003, the Republican-dominated Legislature even spent Rainy Day money to create the Texas Enterprise Fund and in 2005 to fund the Emerging Technology Fund. Gov. Perry has used both those funds to dole out millions of tax dollars to private businesses. The funds have been recurring expenses, and, in the minds of many, recurring boondoggles.

Perry claims they have been important economic development tools. But the biggest, most effective economic development tools the state has are its public schools.

The bottom line is there is more than enough money in the $12 billion Rainy Day Fund to begin paying for water projects AND restore cuts to public schools AND have money left over for future emergencies.

The math is simple. The politics are not.

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