ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, May 2, 1996 TAG: 9605020020
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-11 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: ray l. garland
SOURCE: RAY L. GARLAND
REPS. JAMES Moran, L.F. Payne, Owen Pickett, Robert Scott and Rick Boucher, all Democrats of Virginia, have introduced legislation in Congress to allow local school boards to apply directly to the U.S. Department of Education to participate in Goals 2000, bypassing state government entirely.
Rep. Norman Sisisky of the 4th District was the only Virginia Democrat declining to sponsor the bill. Sisisky said he believes Gov. George Allen was wrong to decide against joining Goals 2000, but he doubted the federal government had the right to override the state's decision.
It's fair to say the chance of this bill becoming law before the end of the 104th Congress is very slim. Of course, this fact weighed as little in the calculations of those behind the bill as the $6.7 million the state is said to be eligible for under it would weigh in the cost of operating Virginia schools. It's the politics that matter, and Democrats may be scoring some points among dimwits.
As their media blitz unfolded, I heard a local news reader of the Ken & Barbie School of Journalism refer to the "millions" in federal money the governor was refusing to take. Technically correct, of course, but hardly informative.
Let's do it one last time. $6.7 million, even if we got all of it, represents less than one-tenth of 1 percent of what Virginia spends on public schools in a single year. In fact, it would suffice to operate them for just over an hour! Yes, if we assume the schools operate seven hours a day for the entire legal calendar of 180 days, which is dubious, it comes to 1,260 hours. Dividing that figure into the some $7.4 billion we now spend gives you $5,873,000 an hour, or $97,883 a minute. So, the $6.7 million in "free" federal money buys about 69 minutes of public education in Virginia.
We might also note the state's 1996-98 budget contains an increase of $600 million in state funds to support public schools. The increase in local funds over the same period won't be much less.
It's also worth saying one more time that Congress didn't intend Goals 2000 money to take the place of customary state spending. The law intends it to be used to implement a statewide school-improvement plan that has been approved by the U.S. Department of Education. No such plan was submitted.
While the 280-page act is verbose, its purpose is stated plainly in the preamble: "To improve learning and teaching by providing a national framework for education reform. ... '' Note well the word "national." It appears many times in the law. It creates, among other things, a National Education Goals Panel, a National Education Standards and Improvement Council, a National Skills Standards Board and the National Education Research Policy and Priorities Board.
This goes to the heart of Allen's refusal to enlist Virginia in Goals 2000. He believes the relatively small federal contribution to public-school funding does not justify any nationally directed school policy. And he has matched words with deeds by making a Virginia school-improvement plan one of his first priorities.
It is certainly a fact that the mood of the present Congress is hostile to the notion of imposing a federal education policy on the states. Had the Republican majority in the House prevailed, Goals 2000 would have been strangled in its cradle. But the readiness of Messrs. Moran, Payne, etc. to introduce Goals 2000 in Virginia - over the objections of the governor and the state Board of Education - gives a taste of what a more liberal Congress might do.
From some of their published comments, it seems the congressmen haven't read the bill for which they voted. It also seems they haven't read the Constitution of the state they represent. Or, if they have, don't give a hoot for what it says.
Section 4 of Article VIII of the Virginia Constitution says, "The general supervision of the public school system shall be vested in a Board of Education ... to be appointed by the Governor." Section 5 states, even more explicitly, "Subject to the ultimate authority of the General Assembly, the Board shall have primary responsibility for effectuating the educational policy set forth in this Article. ... "
Assembly Democrats and the Virginia Education Association dearly love these provisions when they sanction decisions of the legislature telling local school divisions what they must do. But the people of Virginia made that decision in a referendum on the new Constitution in 1970, and it deserves to be respected.
The people also elected a governor in 1993 who followed that Constitution in choosing a superintendent of public instruction and members of the Board of Education in sympathy with his ideas on school reform. These appointments were confirmed by the General Assembly. But when they exercise their constitutional function to supervise the public schools in ways displeasing to Democrats, the system is bad and must be bypassed.
When assembly Democrats attempted to bypass the plain language of the Constitution to allow local school boards to decide whether Virginia joined Goals 2000, Allen vetoed it. House Democrats tried to override that veto. They fell 10 votes shy of success. No vote was taken in the state Senate.
Unimpressed by the proper functioning of our state Constitution, these five congressmen have told us, in so many words, "We know best and will do it our way." That this action would be applauded, perhaps inspired, by some state legislators and Lt. Gov. Don Beyer - who presumably took an oath to uphold the Constitution of Virginia - is the last word (this week) in the domain of the contemptible.
Ray L. Garland is a Roanoke Times columnist.
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