Anti-bullying bill ready to overcome political posturing

The issue of school bullying deserves better than to be used as a political prop by one state legislator, but, fortunately, another appears ready to tackle the substance of it.

State Rep. Pat Smith had sponsored HB 407, which would define measures that constituted bullying and marginally increased notification and reporting requirements. Unfortunately, in its original form, the bill carried consequences that could have conflicted with free speech advocacy; for example, the bill’s language could have caused prosecution of a student arguing against the concept of same-sex marriage to another who favored it. Additionally, by assuming to come up with a complete list, it risked creating classes of individuals the bullying of whom under current law would not be covered. Finally, other than specify protected classes of individuals by both characteristics and behaviors, it did little else to beef up notification and reporting.

To deal with free speech issues, an amendment was offered that pared away the list of specified protected classes, which succeeded. Smith then voluntarily deferred it rather than proceed – even though the bill didn’t do much else to address the issue it did more clearly define behavior that constituted bullying and more amendments could have improved it further. Given that action, it’s hard not to conclude that she seemed more interested in trying to make a political statement than actually support a law that would increase the chances of preventing and prosecuting bullying.

Debased rhetoric again appears to try derailing reform

As the debate over changes to the Louisiana State Employees Retirement System, one particular red herring has come up in an attempt to stymie this legislation and avoid argument over the merits of an increased contribution of three percent employees would have to make. Unfortunately, it gained credence because of political reasons, and now must be batted away as a distraction from the real issues.

Some opponents to the increase claim that it is a “tax” and point to a ruling made last year by then-Speaker Jim Tucker concerning a bill that asked for the same increase that it was a “fee” or “tax,” in order to rule whether it needed just a majority or two-thirds vote to advance. No doubt a similar choice looms on the horizon for current Speaker Chuck Kleckley, with two other considerations also thus in the balance: this being an even-numbered-year sessions, tax increases are prohibited, and in any year they cannot originate in the Senate, as the current bill is.

It was a politically-motivated decision for the term-limited Tucker then had his eye on higher office, so seeming to cut off any increase might win him favors among state employees who voted (apparently not enough, as he subsequently lost a bid for secretary of state). As it was, the legal reasoning behind his opinion was exceptionally shoddy.

Different Senate outcomes in NW LA provide same lesson

Louisiana's Legislature has reconvened for a new term, with few incumbents of any kind running for office not winning. State Senate contests in northwest Louisiana proved exceptional and instructive in this regard, and deserve review as to why incumbents and psuedo-incumbents do lose -- and this already has made a difference in policy.

After the general election in October, Caddo and Bossier Parishes had the singular distinction of having the only legislative district in the entire state where a current incumbent was defeated by a non-incumbent, when Sen. Barrow Peacock took just more than half as many tries for elective state government office as had state Rep. Barbara Norton to notch a win. On his fourth try, the Republican became the senator-elect for District 37 by defeating former state Rep. Jane Smith in a contest many observers had thought was hers to lose.

Smith of the GOP carried the backing of many state Republicans all the way to the top, having been one of Gov. Bobby Jindal’s floor leaders.

Compromise hopefully will not moot LA education reform

Perhaps although necessary for bill success, a potential poison pill provision in the recently-passed incipient law that permits Louisiana’s scholarship voucher program to expand carries the future risk of abrogating the very intent behind the legislation.

HB 976, among other things, might dramatically expand the number of students who receive an amount of state money, one considerably less than the state spends per student in public schools that could pay for schooling at a non-public school. Children from families whose income is 250 percent of the poverty limit or below and who attend a D or F ranked public school are guaranteed placement in one of these schools – if there’s room for them.

Those schools entirely voluntarily will supply the space, which over the next few years may amount only to several thousand slots, perhaps two percent of the total now eligible, where their willingness to do so in large part comes from how heavy of a hand the state will cast in regulating regarding these students. Understand that the reason these private schools exist, most of them having some religious affiliation, is because they wished to teach certain subjects and in certain ways that public schools for various reasons would not or could not do. Too much regulation that makes them unable to operate in the manner they see fit will discourage them from accepting these students.

Paranoid, misinformed column validates reform need

Gov. Bobby Jindal hasn’t yet signed the two bills that serve as the centerpiece of his latest round of education reforms, and already some affected see the sky as falling – with such responses demonstrating why this batch of changes combined with others made previously are so necessary to improve the state’s elementary and secondary education systems.

One current teacher named Madeline Cole gave us a trip through her fears about the changes. She sees the new law’s permission to make it easier to discharge underperforming teachers combined with 2010’s Act 54 that created the value-added assessment regime – where teacher performance is graded half on student academic growth and half on a few hours of administrator observation – as unfairly threatening sinecures. She called the achievement of tenure now hostage to “unrealistic” expectations, bemoans that no longer can automatic pay raises be forthcoming every year, whines that it’s hard to achieve a “perfect score” under the new system, places faith in rumors that teachers subject to corrective actions will be paid less if at all, argues that there’s too much whimsy in evaluation because “evaluation is based on how this year's kids did in comparison to last year's kids,” and chafes that under the new way of doing things no “one cares or notices that every one of my kids improved their personal best, went up in reading level, increased their GPA, and became overall more successful as individuals.”

Data show LA state workers must make up for mistakes

Now at the plate for Louisiana policy-makers, it’s retirement system reforms. Supporters argue they are needed to put shore up a shaky and unsustainable financial situation, while opponents claim they unfairly target the compensation of the state employees involved. The latest data show the reform case has greater validity, and points to change needed beyond the current batter.

The changes for most current employees would increase paycheck deductions for retirement pensions from eight to 11 percent in order to finance the growing unfunded accrued liability of the Louisiana State Employees Retirement System, extend out the regular retirement age to 67, and use a five-year rather than three-year average to compute pension benefits. In large part, opponents express qualms in that they assert state employees are relatively underpaid to what they should be, and that if any future deficit would arise in the ability to pay pensions, it is the responsibility of the state, i.e. taxpayers, to come up with the “promised” remuneration rather than employees contributing more to their own retirement savings. To some degree, the arguments are related; because state employees are “undercompensated,” therefore it is the duty of the public to make up any shortfall.

However, the data point to the opposite conclusion. While no comprehensive study has looked at Louisiana specifically, the most recent work from 2009 by U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics economists, Congressional Budget Office staffers, and researchers in academic settings shows that in measuring total compensation in comparing jobs of similar duties, all of federal, state, and local government employees are overcompensated compared to the private sector. In the federal instance, a retirement package judged 3.5 times higher than that of the typical private sector worker doing the same tasks led to a 16 percent premium in total compensation. Without even factoring in retirement benefits, salary and current benefits of state and local government employees nationwide are 10 and 21 percent higher, respectively, than private sector employees doing similar work. This confirms differentials observed in other studies and data of years past, and it would be highly unlikely that Louisiana’s data were skewed much lower.

Omitted date discovery shows opposition's disingenuity

We didn’t ask for it, but opponents of elementary and secondary education reform gave us a final demonstration of disingenuity with comments about one bill accomplishing changes after they lost the battle of ideas over it.

While the general contents of the bills have been known and discussed for months, by candidates and research organizations, the specifics came to light just before the beginning of the session, and 23 days after its start the finished products were sent to the governor after more discussion on them than any bills in the modern history of the Legislature. Included in them were the exact procedures for their implementation.

However, one of them, HB 976, forgot to include a tool of convenience, a date in which the law becomes effective. Constitutionally, the effective date of a law unless otherwise indicated in it is Aug. 1 of the year passed. Six different implementation dates are listed in it, four at the beginning of 2013, but one on Aug. 1 and another on Jun. 30. The former instructs the Department of Education to develop standards, so even if the law wasn’t official that work may proceed. The latter is a deadline for private schools to seek participation in the scholarship voucher program, so that known incentive dangles out there for them even if the law technically has a month to go before coming into force. In others words, in this instance, the omission of an earlier effective date (such as on the governor’s signature) has no practical impact on its implementation.

Consequences of elections amplified by reform votes

Once again, the fact that elections have consequences must be searing itself in the minds of the many formerly comfortable elites invested in the way elementary and secondary education has been – poorly – delivered in Louisiana. Because had things gone a little bit differently a few months ago, these holders of power and privilege would continue to rest easy in a world without HB 974 or HB 976.

These bills, prepared to be signed into law by their most powerful backer Gov. Bobby Jindal, induce choice and competition into the archaic government monopoly system of education and place greater emphasis on merit and demonstrated ability in personnel decisions, passed the state Senate with some margin for error, 23-16 and 24-15, respectively, and would be approved by the House (which had previously approved almost identical version) at roughly the same level of support. But, focusing on the latter, had a few Senate elections gone the other way last fall, this may never have happened.

The final margin meant a swing of five votes would have defeated the measure. And when reviewing some close contests in 2011, it’s easy to see where swapping a thousand or less votes in a district would have put into office people unlikely to vote for this bill.

Jindal back, better positioned, to remake prison system

With a bill to accomplish more of this headed for committee discussion this week, it’s time again to talk about privatization of prisons and reconfiguration of the system, so that means a rehash of the uninformed, nonsensical, and silly arguments made against this from last year. Let’s take a look at the old wine in new containers.

In 2011, Gov. Bobby Jindal proposed the privatization of two prisons to join two others, initially wanting to plow the money paid for them into the operational budget. Eventually, his Administration decided to separate that out and build a budget only counting on savings from contracting. But before anything could happen past hearings on the matter, essentially he yanked the package over what appeared to be intractable opposition.

This year, Jindal is back with a somewhat different plan. This one relies only on the sale of one prison and closing of two others through consolidation, made possible by declining numbers of prisoners in the state, this perhaps caused by policy and administrative changes to place greater emphasis on probation and parole and on the use of technology in correctional facilities. Research, on the state’s two prisons privatized two decades ago, shows this privatization brought cost reductions without reductions in quality, which Jindal’s current budget counts on.

Easter Sunday, Apr. 8, 2012

This column publishes usually every Sunday through Thursday after noon (sometimes even before; maybe even after sundown on busy days) U.S. Central Time except whenever a significant national holiday falls on the Monday through Friday associated with the otherwise-usual publication on the previous day (unless it is Independence Day or Christmas or New Year's when it is the day on which the holiday is observed by the U.S. government). In my opinion, there are seven of these: New Year's Day, Easter Sunday, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Veterans' Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Christmas.

With Sunday, Apr. 8 being Easter Sunday, I invite you to explore the link above.