Education cuts

By Rebecca McDowell Cook

Peter Kinder has provided more heat but no more light with his second guest column claiming Missouri schools have more, rather than less, money this year.

Kinder is right that I think the debate should center on the foundation formula, which is basic state aid to schools, because that is the part of education funding controlled by the legislature. Our legislators try to obscure their $115 million cut to the foundation formula by talking about other budget items that don't go to schools or money that doesn't come from the state. They also simply mix numbers without saying so.

In his last column, Kinder mentioned "$200 million from the lottery." This debate is about elementary and secondary education money. In fiscal year 2004, lottery appropriations for the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education is $121.1 million. You have to add in the lottery money that goes to the Department of Higher Education to bring the lottery total up to $196.6 million. Kinder added the college money in to overstate his figure by $78.9 million. Fuzzy math won't change the facts.

The schools have less money this year. The ultimate message of Kinder's column is that schools are awash in money and have more than ever. Believe or don't believe individual statistics, but ask yourself this: Do you believe the schools have more money available this year than ever before? Do you believe teaching positions are being eliminated because administrators want to increase class size?

The worst use of statistics by the current leaders of the legislature is the one used by Kinder in his last column when he points to "local" increases as proof that education funding is going up. Local property taxes have gone up to cover legislature shortfalls. This allows the legislators to claim they are keeping taxes down. All they are doing is forcing local taxes to be raised.

The costs passed on by the "local increases" praised by Kinder particularly hurt schools outside the metropolitan areas. St. Louis County, Jackson County and Springfield all have big industrial and business tax bases which soften the blow to individuals. The rest of Missouri pays disproportionately when the legislature cuts the foundation formula and passes the burden to local taxpayers.

Kinder continues to complain that the governor has had to withhold funds because of the unfunded mandate the legislature has given him. Kinder says the funds should have been withheld from other agencies. The legislature has cut $22 million from the mental health budget the past two years. This has threatened to close Cottonwood Treatment Center. Should the governor cut still more of those services to make up for the $115 million the legislature has cut from the foundation formula? The fact is there is an additional shortfall of $118 million in revenue which caused the withholding.

The larger issue is whether we should keep Missouri's infrastructure intact or whether we should starve the infrastructure for short-term political gain. Gov. Mel Carnahan did, indeed, increase education funding. That was politically costly to him. It is politically beneficial to starve the infrastructure and call it cutting taxes. If we take a short-term view, it is always smart to not fund schools or mental health. When legislators cut the foundation formula, they call it cutting "waste, fraud and abuse in government." Those are Kinder's words from his column. I call it allowing the infrastructure to wither and rot.

Kinder hints darkly that I did not cut spending when I was secretary of state. I spent millions on technology to prepare that office for the 21st century. I did it on purpose to feed the infrastructure. When I took over the office it had no modern technology in place. For the 10 years between Jim Kirkpatrick and myself, needed technology changes had not been made. When I arrived, I wanted Missourians to be able to access a million corporate documents and filings on the Internet. I wanted Missourians to have a statewide voter registration database to stop election fraud. I wanted Missourians to be able to access a huge pool of state documents and archive online. As a consequence, Missouri was a technology leader when I left office. I will be accused in the lieutenant governor's race of being a big spender. You either build the infrastructure or you let it rot. I built the systems that are in use today which have dramatically improved efficiency and cost savings for taxpayers. These systems will be in use for 20 years.

The Kinder column also speaks of the governor as my running mate when I run for lieutenant governor. Like his statements about public education, Kinder knows this isn't true. Candidates for president and vice president run as a ticket under the U.S. Constitution. Candidates for governor and lieutenant governor run as a ticket in many states, but not in Missouri.

Finally, Kinder refers to my "mentor" in politics. I did have a mentor in state government: Mel Carnahan. He taught me to take a long view of the public good. He taught me to take the heat politically for doing what the state needed over the long haul. He never believed he should look at just the next quarterly balance sheet. He believed -- and I believe -- that education is the key to the future and that we should do more than just talk about it. The Republican legislative leadership fought every improvement Carnahan made, and today they tell you education has plenty of money. I rest my case on what teachers can tell you, and I rest my case on our kids who are our future.

Rebecca McDowell Cook of Cape Girardeau is a former Missouri secretary of state and a candidate for lieutenant governor.