One of the difficulties of participatory democracy is getting correct information. In two recent campaigns, the voters were deluged with advocacy positions, some the sprightly exchanges in the letters to the editor and unfortunately some in the ostensible news columns. What didn’t appear was authoritative and objectively reliable information. Realizing the difficulty of achieving objectivity in today’s highly subjectivist world, there should nonetheless be available such obvious things as the State budget which demonstrates increases or decreases in expenditures. Having the Superintendent of Schools say he needs more money or the sky will fall is not an objective standard.
There have been three letters in the last three weeks which have dramatized this issue. One by Lester Tobias in which he reasonably asks has anyone checked the web site which gives information on the California budget, part of which is the amount applied to the public schools. The other two representing an advocacy position supporting Measure S and the idea that scrutiny of anything pertaining to public education is ipso facto a betrayal of our children – or at least children attending public school.
There is, of course, nothing wrong with “feeling” one way or the other on an issue. It just isn’t a very productive or accurate problem solving technique. Most people feel strongly about wanting the best education possible for all children just as they felt they wanted Malibu to be undeveloped yet have all the conventional amenities imaginable for the “ideal” city. As with the confusing data on Measure M, the feeling of wanting the best for the children may not result in discovering the most efficient and effective way to achieve that worthy goal. In the Education Business, as in any bureaucracy, enormous inefficiency develops as incredible effort is expended to protect vested interests.
A sincere and dedicated advocate of Measure S might feel that the common denominator of every citizen paying taxes amounting to $44 billion a year for public schools is not enough. It is certainly their right to advocate for that position. But is there not a distortion when the so-called objective information presented is that so many teaching positions were going to be lost that the educational well-being of the children was in jeopardy, when after Measure S passed, we read the Superintendent of Schools talking about now being able to fill his wish list and later learn that such nice things as paying for a librarian (as opposed to a volunteer), and having a school nurse to put band aids on scraped knees are the benefits of Measure S. Now is that a nurse for each elementary school or a roving one? in the Santa Monica/Malibu district? If Malibu contributes to this nurse with property tax dollars, why would such a person not be available to all the children of Malibu? Or is there not much left after sending the majority of the money to Santa Monica? To suggest that K-12 budget cuts might have been exaggerated (or more charitably, misinterpreted) is not to say California does not have a budget crisis. Most households have had the experience of hitting a rough patch and having to cut back 5,10, 15 percent or more and finding the will and the way to do it.
One letter suggests that “in this time of Thanksgiving” those who pay their fair share into that tax base, such as Mr. Tobias (and I would add myself to this list) are guilty of undermining generosity toward children. Objective argument or cheap shot?
Clearly there are some disputed budget figures which could use explanation. The intention of Mr. Tobias seems to be to get to the bottom of it all. Those with children not in public schools gladly pay to maintain the principle and fact of good public education. It is quite another thing to have an advocate demand that whatever blank check he or she determines to be necessary should be mindlessly and unquestioningly signed by the rest of us, never questioning whether the bloated bureaucracy and politically correct assumptions of California public education should be reformed.
Donald Wry