MARQUAND'S MESSAGE AIMED AT WRONG PERSON

Officials at Marquand-Zion School District found a unique way last week to address the funding dilemma that is afflicting education throughout Missouri. When the school district compiled a $31,237 charge for removal of asbestos from its buildings, Superintendent Gerald Deardorff forwarded the bill to Gov. John Ashcroft. Nice try. He might find sympathy in Jefferson City from a governor who knows all too well the difficulties of lining up money for education, but the superintendent shouldn't anticipate a check in the mail.

Deardorff probably doesn't expect such a thing. His letter, sent at the direction of his school board, was more a brash message than an actual solicitation for payment. The letter spells out the school district's belief that federal court-ordered school desegregation in Missouri, which drains ~almost seven percent of the state's budget, results in educational inequity. The argument is not new, only uniquely packaged.

Specifically, Deardorff and his board maintain that all Missouri taxpayers, through the desegregation mandate, paid $9 million for the removal of asbestos from schools in Kansas City. Sauce for the goose should be sauce for the gander, say the Marquand-Zion officials. If the governor can disburse funds for Kansas City asbestos removal, he should do no less for the folks in Madison County. Enough justice and good sense resides in that thought to make you want to cry.

But while the message sent was well-aimed, it was not aimed well. In sending the bill to Gov. Ashcroft, the educators are preaching to the converted. The Missouri governor has now spent almost two terms in office bearing this burden of federal intervention. There is no one in the state more acutely aware of its injurious effect on Missouri's budget than the chief executive. The state pays for asbestos removal in Kansas City schools because it has to; if Ashcroft could fund similar abatement programs in all Missouri schools, he would do so gladly. He is not fiscally able.

Copies of the Deardorff letter were sent to 15 other locations, mostly to media outlets and elected officials. Not included on the list was the man who might best profit from its logic: U.S. District Judge Russell Clark, who presides over the Kansas City desegregation order. A man who uses the judiciary to tinker with society should know all its results.

Does a good point lead to reimbursement for asbestos removal? The Marquand-Zion officials are speaking for a lot of people, particularly in rural Missouri, who would like to see this bottomless money pit called school desegregation come to an end. Unfortunately, that sentiment, along with the appropriate coinage, will get you only a cup of coffee.