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Ellen Belcher is the Dayton Daily News opinion pages editor. She writes about state government, education, the environment, higher education and all things Dayton.
Martin Gottlieb is an editorial writer and columnist for the Dayton Daily News opinion pages. He focuses on the political process itself and does such national issues as war, the economy, taxes and Social Security, as well as a hodge-podge of local and state issues.Home > Blogs > A Matter of Opinion > Archives > 2010 > March
March 2010
Editorial: State wasting time in next budget battle
When the Ohio legislature was agonizing last year about how to balance the budget in a worsening economic crisis, the search for more new places to cut was rushed. Republicans brought up various ideas for cuts, and Democrats responded that these proposals had never been vetted.
At the same time, lawmakers knew they would be facing a much bigger problem in their next state budget, which has to be adopted in a little over a year. By then, the state will have blown through its federal stimulus money — which closed a huge gap in the current budget — with no future federal help guaranteed. It’s possible there will be an $8 billion shortfall — in a $50 billion budget.
Wisely enough, the legislature decided to get an early start.
Out of that decision came the Budget Planning and Management Commission, made up of equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats, and equal numbers of senators and representatives. This group is supposed to find ways to confront the crisis that nobody disagrees is around the corner.
But the commission was appointed eight months ago, and has yet to meet. Charged with having a plan by November, the group has frittered away too much time.
The task of coming up with a consensus on anything dramatically useful was always daunting. By now, success is more unlikely.
After all, as Sen. Shannon Jones, R-Springboro, a commission member, notes, “The easy stuff has been done.”
Also on the commission is Sen. Chris Widener, R-Springfield.
The fact that the commission has never met is getting some attention around the state. So that particular embarrassment presumably will get addressed.
What happens next? Sen. Jones rules out supporting any tax increase. She says Ohio’s economy is too fragile, and the downsides are too high. (Worth noting is that she faces a tough primary in her conservative district.)
Taxes are certainly not the answer. The problem is too big. And yet, why rule out, say, anything so harmless as an increase in tobacco taxes?
Ohio’s rates are above some neighboring states and below some. And the state is doing too little in the fight against smoking, having notoriously routed the money won from tobacco companies in lawsuits to other purposes.
On the spending side, the task is hard. The state has three basic areas of spending: education, prisons and health care, the latter meaning mainly Medicaid. Much of what the state spends simply has to be spent, for one reason or another. The state has already cut spending repeatedly in recent years, even as social needs have increased, because of the economy.
Still, there are people with ideas on how to save money. The bipartisan commission can give those ideas a hearing, in some cases a better hearing than they’ve ever received. That would be a good exercise, even in the absence of a budget crisis.
The commission has the time to offer a major service. But that’s much less true than it was last summer.
Permalink | Comments (6) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Martin Gottlieb, Miami Valley Politics, Ohio government
TweetEditorial: Radical change might not help poor schools
A big goal in President Barack Obama’s plan for overhauling the federal No Child Left Behind education law this year is a heavy focus on dramatically improving the bottom 5 percent of the nation’s schools.
A big improvement for those schools would help millions of kids who need it most. But Dayton’s experience suggests the administration’s approach could box schools into making changes that might not be right for them.
Earlier this month, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan spelled out a “blueprint” for overhauling No Child Left Behind. Overall, it is light on details. But for the lowest-scoring schools, Mr. Duncan was specific. He called for those schools to be required to do one of four things:
• Close. The building would be shut down and the kids redistributed to other schools.
• Turn around. The principal and at least half the staff would be replaced, and there would be a new curriculum.
• Restart. The school would become a charter school.
• Transform. Like the turn around, the principal would be fired, but the school would be reshaped following a plan focused on leadership training for staff and instructional changes, such as longer school days.
Much of Secretary Duncan’s plan is borrowed directly from No Child Left Behind, which says persistently low-scoring schools should be closed, converted to a charter school or “reconstituted.” (The latter requires replacing the principal and much of the staff.)
Generally, those options did not effectively help poor-scoring schools in the Bush era. In some cases, districts didn’t push for radical change and states didn’t strictly enforce the federal rules.
Dayton was one of the few that tried true “reconstitution,” starting with Fairview and Orville Wright elementary schools in 2005. In both cases, the principal and much of the staff were moved out and a new instructional plan was put in place. The approach didn’t work.
In both cases, the schools’ test scores had been improving in the three years prior to reconstitution. Those numbers dropped badly afterward.
In 2005, Orville Wright’s state “performance index score,” a measure of total test scores, had jumped 10 points in three years to 78.3. Today, it has fallen back below where it was six years ago, at 67.5. Fairview’s score had improved even faster in 2005 — up 15.5 points in three years to 68.2. It crashed to 57.2 the year after reconstitution and has only slightly recovered to 61.3.
Why did the scores get worse, not better? Possibly because reconstitution — transformation or turnaround in the Obama lingo — is hugely disruptive.
Disruption is a constant in the lives of many poor kids. (All of the kids at both Orville Wright and Fairview are poor enough to qualify for free or reduced lunch.) At school they need as much stability as they can get.
Schools can’t be allowed to fail forever. For some, a radical upheaval might be the only way to make things better. But tying schools down to only these four approaches, given their track records, isn’t the best plan.
Shawna Welch is the fourth principal at Orville Wright since it was reconstituted five years ago. The school also moved from Wright View to Belmont, with a return trip planned when a new building opens in 2011. That’s a lot of upheaval Ms. Welch believes the lack of consistent leadership has been the biggest problem at Orville Wright.
“It takes a while to dig your way out of a hole,” she said. “It takes at least three to five years to turn a building around. You need consistency in administration, belief in your staff and buy-in.”
It might make sense at some schools to offer support and to guarantee that they will be allowed to stick with one approach for a predetermined rebuilding period. Any change to No Child Left Behind should have enough flexibility to allow schools to do that.
Permalink | Comments (13) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Education, Scott Elliott
TweetEditorial: Ward will need help to keep ‘no excuses’ pledge
Dayton will have a new school superintendent this summer, current Deputy Superintendent Lori Ward.
Ms. Ward’s reputation as a problem-solver will be tested, because Dayton can’t wait any longer for the school district to start making real progress academically. Ms. Ward must deliver on her promise Wednesday, as she took the job, that she would accept “no excuses.”
Dayton must move past a decade-long overhaul of the district that has seen a big turnover in leadership at all levels and a massive project to construct new buildings. Lots of effort went into reshaping the school district in that time. But when it comes to test scores, little changed.
The district has spent most of the last decade at or near the bottom among more than 600 Ohio school districts for test performance. Last year it was second-worst behind Youngstown.
Dayton has significant poverty and other tough problems. But it still shouldn’t compare that badly to its peers. The district ranks 14th-lowest in Ohio for median income. It’s not as poor as cities like Cleveland, Canton, Mansfield or even Springfield. But its academic performance has consistently trailed them.
The last two superintendents — Kurt Stanic and Percy Mack — spent much time reworking the district’s unwieldy operations outside the classroom, with some success. The management of Dayton schools still needs improvement, but it is considerably more professional and reliable than it was a decade ago.
Acheiving that wasn’t easy, especially with the added pressures of charter school competition and financial woes. The task meant that, too often, the district’s focus was not on the classroom.
Even Dayton’s $627 million school construction program — though it can be a crucial element of the district’s future success in the long run — has, at times, been distracting and disruptive, forcing kids to relocate often.
But the dust has begun to settle. A decade of construction comes to a close in just two years.
The necessary pieces for better academic performance — new schools, better management, stronger community support, great teaching, focused instruction — must be brought together. Consistent and effective leadership is a must for that to happen.
Ms. Ward, 52, comes with a unique background, having worked as an IBM systems engineer before becoming a teacher at mid-career and then a school administrator for the past 11 years. She has a solid track record for working well with others and getting tough tasks done.
Introducing herself to the community, Ms. Ward asked for buy-in, support and hard work from parents, teachers, students, staff and union leaders to make the strong push on academics the district needs.
It can be done. There is no excuse for Dayton to remain at the bottom.
Permalink | Comments (8) | Post your comment | Categories: City of Dayton, Editorials, Education, Scott Elliott
TweetEditorial: Ugly rhetoric has predictable impact now
Elie Wiesel, the writer, speaker and professor who is a Nobel Prize winner and a survivor of Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp, was in Dayton on Thursday, March 25. He spoke to a sell-out audience at the Schuster Center, among other events.
At the Schuster, he touched on some current news: That some members of Congress are being physically threatened and harassed because of their vote on health care. He expressed shock that such a thing can happen in America. What have we come to, he asked, when we can’t disagree with each other over politics without the specter of violence showing up?
When a Holocaust survivor is shocked at the political atmosphere in this country, that’s a good reason to pause and ask what has gone wrong.
You might have heard about a fellow at an anti-health care demonstration in Columbus last week. He insultingly threw money at a man with a sign saying he had Parkinson’s disease. (You can find the confrontation online at YouTube. Search for Parkinson’s and health care.)
It’s a story about ugliness in political combat. But it turned out to be a more interesting story than that. The man who did the insulting is now mortally embarrassed. A father of two, he told The Columbus Dispatch, “What I did was shameful.”
He said he hadn’t slept in the week since the event. He said he made a donation to a local Parkinson’s group, in an effort to start making amends.
He also said he hadn’t seen the man’s sign, and he thought the man was a begger and an “agitator.” But he didn’t offer that as an excuse.
Most interesting, he said, “That was my first time at any political rally, and I’m never going to another one. I will never, ever, ever go to another one.”
When participation in politics — which is supposed to be an exercise in bettering our society — is bringing out the worst in us, that, too, is a reason to pause and ask what has gone wrong.
Ohio Rep. John Boccieri, a Democrat who voted for the health care package after opposing a slightly different version, reports getting threats. Rep. Steve Driehaus, D-Cincinnati, has had directions to his house posted online by people drumming up a protest there.
Republican Rep. Jean Schmidt also reported getting a phone message wishing her physical harm.
By now the discussion of the threats and harrassment is on the edge of deteriorating into yet another partisan spitting match about who is responsible, who is overstating the problem, and, of course, which political movement is really the victim here.
Neither Republican nor Democratic politicians are out to foment violence. But the rhetoric that flies around these days — at rallies, in Congress, on the radio, you name it — really is extreme. The health care bill is not extreme. The rhetoric is.
The rhetoric comes from both sides. And yet, who doesn’t know where — on the political spectrum — the real anger is concentrated these days?
If enough people believe that their political opponents are totalitarian baby killers and grandparent killers, and that they don’t care what the American people think, and that they are lying about everything and doing everything behind closed doors, well, some screws are likely to come loose.
The wonder is that there’s been so little political violence until now.
The rhetoric needs to be toned down.
Permalink | Comments (61) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Health Care, Martin Gottlieb, National Politics, Ohio politics
TweetEditorial: Growth along I-75 requires new focus on energy
More local people might be separating their garbage with recycling in mind. More might be driving gas-efficient cars. Nevertheless, in the big picture, what’s happening now is not exactly the greening of the Miami Valley. Quite the contrary.
This newspaper reported last Sunday, March 21, that so much development is happening along the Interstate 75 corridor between Dayton and Cincinnati that the population of Warren and Butler counties combined now exceeds that of Montgomery County, where population has been falling.
As recently as 1990, those two counties were only about two-thirds the size of Montgomery. And, of course, the fraction was much smaller before that, when those counties were basically rural.
Some of the many new businesses locating along the interstate — a phenomenon unmistakably visible to all drivers — are following the people. Some are choosing to be near an interstate that’s near other interstates, as well as cities.
Whatever the motives of the residents and businesses, we’re talking about counties that are all about the car.
Of course, the American middle-class lifestyle is built around the car almost everyplace. But even more so in some places than others.
Said a Liberty Twp. (Butler County) trustee, “We have households here where couples commute to both cities,” meaning, of course, Cincinnati and Dayton.
Thomas Friedman, among others, would not approve. Well, that national columnist might not judge the families. But he presumably wouldn’t be happy about the fact that the only substantial growth in southwest Ohio is in communities whose growth is so extraordinarily dependent on energy, meaning, at this stage, at least, carbon-based foreign energy.
But there it is.
“If you build it, they will come,” might be a dubious notion about baseball stadiums, but it is true enough about interstates in high-population states. Interstate 75 wasn’t built to suck businesses and residents out of metropolitan counties. But people like their space — and their interstates.
Even the economic problems of the last couple of years don’t seem to have changed the trend. From mid-2008 to mid-2009, Warren and Butler counties grew in population by 3,300 and 2,400 respectively, according to government estimates. They were the only counties out of the seven that border Montgomery to grow noticeably.
For the region as a whole, having an area that is growing is certainly better than not having one. Even if some of that growth is at the expense of the central county, the region certainly benefits from being on a major transportation corridor that attracts people and businesses, as opposed to being isolated.
That said, there is this matter of energy consumption.
Some metropolitan areas have sprawled so far as to make commutes hellish. As a result, people have become interested in living close to downtown or taking trains to work. So a lot of people are using less gasoline.
But Dayton isn’t that kind of metro area. Commutes aren’t so bad, and downtown struggles to be a draw.
So the car-centered lifestyle still looks relatively attractive, notwithstanding all the warnings we as a country have received about the unreliability of oil supplies and the unreliability of oil prices.
As a community — a region — that continues to play the car card, we should be among the leaders in pushing for ways to make it a better card: for cars that are more energy-efficient, for cars that run on alternative fuels, and for new supplemental forms of transportation — like trains and better transit systems.
It’s just a matter of hedging a big bet.
Permalink | Comments (8) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Martin Gottlieb, Suburban Communities, Transportation
TweetKevin Riley: Concerned big brother has front-row view of history
Last week one of our journalists had a front-row seat — literally — at President Barack Obama’s signing of the health-care reform bill.
It wasn’t one of our reporters who routinely cover big stories and controversies. Rather, it was an editor whose family became part of the story — presenting him with a difficult set of personal and professional decisions and a rare glimpse at history.
The long and acrimonious debate about the health-care bill has been a major story for us, one that demanded careful attention to the views of all sides. Experts seem to agree that the president ultimately got the bill passed after shrewd political maneuvers and some events that resonated with the public.
One of those events was a letter from a single northeast Ohio woman who wrote that, as a 16-year cancer survivor, she had been forced to struggle between paying her health-insurance premiums and keeping her family home.
Obama chose to highlight the woman’s predicament as a concrete example of the need for health-insurance reform. Her name is Natoma Canfield, and her brother, Ken Canfield, works as an editor at the Dayton Daily News.
Actually, he more than just works here. Ken’s been with us for nearly 33 years. He’s worked in just about every department, and he’s mentored many of our editors. He is one of the people who will always challenge us to present a big story fairly — a pro whose advice is sought and trusted.
As the health-care controversy was reaching its political climax, the 58-year-old resident of Washington Twp. and his family were absorbing devastating news. Between the time his younger sister wrote her letter and the White House contacted her about participating in an event in Strongsville near her home, Natoma was diagnosed with leukemia. Ken was focused on helping her.
“You’ve got a doctor with you in the hospital room,” Ken said. “And the White House calls.”
The president decided to come to Ohio as part of his final push for the bill. Because Natoma was receiving chemotherapy and unable to meet with Obama, she asked Ken to introduce the president on her behalf. He declined, believing that would be inappropriate for a journalist.
He did attend the event in support of his sister, sitting in the crowd near big-name politicians. Ken didn’t buttonhole them, but did manage to get introduced to new Browns President Mike Holmgren. A lifelong Cleveland Browns fan, Ken asked him to do something fast about his floundering team.
Because Natoma could not attend, Ken and another of his three sisters, Connie Anderson, were later invited to attend the bill-signing ceremony at the White House. Connie had introduced Obama at his Ohio rally.
Again, Ken struggled as he tried to determine the right thing to do. He pointed out that throughout all of this: “I never spoke in favor or against anything.”
In the end, he decided to go — to represent his sister.
When he describes the scene in the East Room of the White House, you can see the journalist come out as he identified story angles and specific scenes.
And you could see him as an average American who was witnessing history up close, a privilege no matter your political views.
But mostly, he was a big brother, with a sick kid sister on his mind.
“I loved watching history, but I was sad,” he said. “I wish she could have been there.” He called her, but she was too ill to talk.
Natoma is a lifelong Republican, and Ken said he believes her illness and her story have served a “greater good.”
He knows that our nation is divided over health-care reform, and the emotions will remain high. But his worry is for Natoma.
“If I can believe what I heard, we have half of Washington praying for my sister,” he said.
Permalink | Comments (4) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Health Care, Kevin Riley, Locals in national affairs
TweetEditorial: Embarrassing report begins county’s repair work
Montgomery County had to investigate how it was possible that the local Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance were getting paid for providing social services and weren’t being held to account.
As it turns out, the problem was deeper than just these particular groups not being checked on.
This week county Administrator Deborah Feldman told commissioners that on-site visits weren’t done in 66 percent of the instances where it is required as a condition of getting county social service money.
The finding is embarrassing.
This is not one of those times where anyone can say the rules were made to be broken — not when the county has touted its monitoring and delivery of care for the needy as a national model.
It’s not just the Montgomery County government that’s been damaged by a weak system of checks and balances. The do-good organizations that the county turns to — indeed relies on — to work with poor children, help people get jobs, assist the elderly to stay in their homes and more have taken a hit. They fear that the voters — the taxpayers who have consistently supported the essential county Human Services Levy — now have doubts about their integrity and their quality of work.
Many of the organizations are doing better work than they will ever get credit for. Often, unsung people on the front line in helping others are the difference between success and failure for an individual, and sometimes even the difference between life and death.
Montgomery County is in the vanguard among communities that try to protect the vulnerable. Many places all across the country don’t have the array of services or agencies that we have. Many don’t tax themselves as much. Some have not set out to create a local safety net that is much bigger than, say, just ensuring the distribution of federal food stamps.
The local tradition didn’t generate spontaneously and doesn’t sustain itself automatically.
It’s fostered by elected officials who consciously choose not to rail against the poor and who instead recognize that the disadvantaged are among us and that local government is best positioned to help move people away from dependency to self-sufficiency.
It’s fostered by volunteers who simply believe in doing their share to help the less fortunate.
It’s fostered by the people who are paid modestly to help those who, through bad luck or mistakes, are struggling.
Montgomery County itself has made mistakes. Ms. Feldman did the right thing by quickly acknowledging a problem, investigating it and reporting publicly on the depth of the mistake.
The trick now is to recover and get people rededicated to making sure that those who would take advantage of a good system can’t ever drag it down.
Permalink | Comments (34) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Ellen Belcher, Montgomery County, Social Services
TweetEditorial: Let’s see business plan for the Arcade
The new owners of the Arcade say they’re looking for $5 million worth of help from the Dayton community.
Totally not shocking, but they have the cart before their horse.
Gunther Berg, one of the two owners, dropped that expectation recently, even before he has shopped around his business plan.
Officials at the City of Dayton, CityWide Development Corp., Montgomery County and the Downtown Dayton Partnership
haven’t seen his financial calculations and projections. Without that information, they can’t possibly entertain putting up public money, offering other forms of help or even vouching for the project’s viability.
Making matters worse — from a public-relations perspective — Mr. Berg and his partner, Wendell Strutz, haven’t paid their property tax bills on the complex since they bought it at a sheriff’s sale a year ago. They now insist that debt will be paid.
Mr. Berg is unquestionably dedicated to creating a workable development plan. Passionate and sincere, he deserves to be taken at his word that he’s making progress lining up investors.
That said, Mr. Berg and Mr. Strutz have to be sensitive to the fact that the architectural showpiece is in their hands today because the last owner didn’t pay his taxes. The wider public doesn’t have a clue if Mr. Berg and Mr. Strutz are in as far over their heads as the last owner, or if they’re the right people showing up at the right time.
The two men have bitten off a risky, immensely complicated project. If bringing the Arcade out of mothballs were a simple proposition, it would already have happened. Others before these developers have been as impressed about the complex’s craftsmanship and the place it holds in Dayton’s history.
Assume for a minute that Mr. Berg and Mr. Strutz have arrived at the right formula for success, but they’re $5 million short. Everyone who’s ever looked at the Arcade has said that making the numbers work would require a public subsidy, and $5 million matches some previous estimates.
More important, if they’re successful in lining up out-of-town or out-of-country investors, those people, of course, will want to know that the Dayton community is also committed to the project. If individuals outside of Dayton are going to assume financial risk for making over downtown’s so-called living room, this community should be springing for something.
The skepticism that Mr. Berg and Mr. Strutz are encountering is not personal; ironically enough, it’s historical. The best of intentions and bold plans have gone badly multiple times before.
The men also happen to be coming along at possibly the worst time for risky economic development projects, even as this also is a time when there’s a resurgence of interest, especially among the younger generations, about working and living in downtowns.
Denying that resurgence or assuming it’s not relevant in Dayton because we’re not Washington, D.C., New York or Chicago is a mistake.
Dayton is, indeed, lucky to have the interest of Mr. Berg and Mr. Strutz. They could take their investor contacts and their time and engage elsewhere. Though they obviously have an eye — and heart — for remarkable historic architecture, there is no shortage of places that need the attention of people who believe in the power and worth of such buildings.
Still, with all due respect, Mr. Berg and Mr. Strutz have more work and more disclosure to do before they can insist on community partners ponying up.
Permalink | Comments (19) | Post your comment | Categories: City of Dayton, Editorials, Ellen Belcher
TweetEditorial: Health care holy war has a sick side
The nonsense quotient was — and remains — pretty high on the health care debate. It’s coming from both sides, but a Republican who, in Sunday’s debate on the House floor, denounced health care reform as communism and totalitarianism made an excellent shot at taking the cake.
All weekend, emotions had been running high in Washington, as protesters confronted congressional supporters of the bill, sometimes with racial and homophobic epithets.
From Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank, about a certain stage in the proceedings: “The legislators were making such a ruckus on the floor that they couldn’t hear the ruckus just outside their walls. The tea-party demonstrators chanted ‘Nancy! Nancy!’ and held signs saying such things as ‘Red Queen Nancy — Joseph Stalin Was Not a Saint’.
“That would have been the end of it, had Republican lawmakers not stirred things up. First Reps. Buck McKeon (Calif.), Rob Bishop (Utah) and Mike Turner (Ohio) came out waving signs saying ‘KILL THE BILL.’ The crowd went wild.”
To television viewers, the congressional debate didn’t come off as a matter of honest, bridgeable differences among people with much in common (like a country, a civilization). It came off like doomed peace talks between foreign countries before war breaks out. It came off as holy war.
A Republican legislator shouted a phrase that included “baby killer” as a Democratic opponent of abortion explained his support for the bill. This is street stuff.
Days before the vote, U.S. Senate candidate Rob Portman said he “prays” the bill would be defeated. U.S. Rep. John Boehner says each of the Democrats should be ashamed, that the bill will “ruin the country.”
And yet the Democrats think the bill is literally the greatest thing they have ever done, the vote to be proudest of.
Nor could the atmosphere be written off as a one-weekend thing, or the result of exhaustion. The atmosphere has been pretty much the same for a year.
And now Sen. John McCain is evoking Winston Churchill, of all people: “We will challenge this in the courts. We will challenge this in the towns. We will challenge this in the cities. We will challenge this in the farms. We challenge this all over America.”
So much for the custom of healing words after a fight.
What to make of all this?
It may be no coincidence that this atmosphere prevails as the nation has moved into a new era in the distribution of political information. Cable television stations, Internet outlets and other media pick the political factions they want to appeal to. Many members of those factions believe everything they hear from those partisan sources and nothing they might hear from nonpartisans, much less partisans on the other side.
The complexity of the health-care legislation feeds the purposes of those who distort. It allows the opponents to raise more alarms than can be rebutted. And they do so with no scruples. This is war. And it’s business. Gotta keep the people riled up and scared, or they might not tune in.
But a major piece of legislation about who pays for health care and about regulations on insurance companies is not a revolution. If the nation cannot do — or decline to do — something like this without this level of animosity, it has a problem to worry about beyond the likes of health care, the economy, global warming, immigration and the deficit.
Permalink | Comments (83) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Health Care, National Politics
TweetMartin Gottlieb: Why were Democrats still pushing Turner by Friday
What follows is, admittedly, not one of the big issues raised by the health care war. But it is some sort of comment on how the democracy is operated these days.
Those who are on the White House’s e-mail list — supporters and the media, mainly — got an e-mail Friday, March 19, in connection with the pending Sunday vote. It was addressed to supporters by their first names, as the White House often does.
(Sometimes the “from” line reads “Barack Obama,” and the message begins something like, “Thank you, Alice.” That is a good bet to get Alice’s attention.)
This one wasn’t from Obama directly, but from David Plouffe, an Obama adviser working with the Democratic National Committee. It read:
“This is it: After months of hard work, the final vote on health reform in the House of Representatives is expected Sunday. … (B)ut it’s shaping up to be incredibly close, and every member of Congress will play a critical role.” Nothing surprising so far.
Then:
“So we’re aiming for 469 calls to Rep. (Mike) Turner from Dayton before offices close this evening. Whether you’ve called your representative before or haven’t yet spoken out on health reform, it’s now time to raise your voice.”
The e-mail then made a brief case for the health care bill and gave phone numbers for Turner’s offices in Washington and Dayton.
It ended, “Let’s win this thing.”
A lot of recipients who have been watching the health care fight closely must have responded this way:
“What?”
Turner? What in the world would be the point of calling a House Republican?
The e-mails were localized according to congressional districts, of course. But that doesn’t explain anything. Why ask people to do something that’s pointless?
All Republican House members save one have always been adamantly opposed to the bill, and everybody knew it. If Turner voted for this bill, he’d be undertaking a whole new identity as a pariah in his party. Wasn’t going to happen.
And nobody had to tell this to Plouffe. That’s what was so puzzling (aside from the question, “Where in the world does the number 469 come from?”).
One stumped hyper-veteran observer at this newspaper speculated that maybe the White House saw itself as engaged in some sort of contest with Republicans in this matter of call-generation.
Given that House Democrats had been hassled for months by calls from opponents of the bill, maybe the Democrats wanted to demonstrate that they, too, could generate hassling calls.
But it seemed awfully late in the game for such game-playing. And, anyway, the e-mail insisted that respondents would actually be helping to pass the bill.
By Friday, the bill’s supporters had already focused a lot of calls on House Democrats who were still seen as undecided. Supporters of the bill had come to life.
This came after months of lethargy on the left, months of hair-splitting about precisely what the bill should say about abortion or about whether it should have the famous “public option.”
Through the first three-fourths of the health care fight, much of the fighting left had taken overall victory for granted. Finally, people were getting over that.
Indeed, so many calls were placed by the end of last week that worries arose about a possible backlash. Some House members said they were dodging even the president’s calls. They were complaining about all the pressure.
And by Friday the White House was starting to suspect that it had the votes.
At that point, did Plouffe and company decide that having people call Republicans might do less harm than having them call Democrats? With the troops fired up and ready to go, did the Democrats have to find something to do with all that energy?
A call to the Democratic National Committee elicited a denial.
OK, but it is misleading and mistreating your own people to tell them you need their help with a particular vote and, therefore, you want them to call somebody who is already hopelessly committed.
The people in both parties who send out e-mails that are designed to rile up the troops are used to playing around with the truth. When the habit extends even to messing with the time of their own friends, you can see how far it’s gone.
Permalink | Comments (9) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Health Care, Martin Gottlieb, Miami Valley Politics, National Politics
TweetEditorial: ODOT answers on 3C worth hearing
After Ohio won $400 million in stimulus money to build a passenger train system from Cincinnati to Cleveland via Dayton and Springfield, state Senate President Bill Harris, a Republican, said he still wasn’t convinced Ohio should proceed.
He noted that the state will, near as anybody can tell, be responsible for operational expenses, which are projected at $17 million a year more than the system will bring in, which can’t actually be known for sure. And, of course, the state budget is already in terrible shape.
His view matters, because the federal decision didn’t end the debate.
Ohio’s participation still has to be approved — in stages — by bipartisan votes of the state Controlling Board. The Controlling Board includes Harris appointees.
Sen. Harris submitted a list of questions to the Ohio Department of Transportation about 3C (as the rail issue is called, referring to Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati). ODOT is headed by Jolene Molitoris, former director of the Federal Railroad Administration. She is a big proponent of passenger trains. She has responded.
Many questions are wonky. “What additional studies will be required before the state knows the true costs and can furnish ‘contract-ready’ financial analyses, detailed operating parameters…?” That sort of thing.
But some questions got down to the real controversy: Will enough people actually ride this thing, given that it won’t run very often or very fast?
Ms. Molitoris went out of her way to address these kinds of questions in a cover letter.
Skeptics have complained that the 3C trains will only average 39 mph. She writes that the trains “will operate at the same conventional speeds as most of the nation’s growing passenger rail corridors — with speeds up to 79 mph. (T)he average speed will be well within the average speed of the service in other Midwestern states,” where lines have been very successful.
“More importantly,” she continues, “train-travel time will be competitive with car-travel time for trips between Cincinnati and Dayton, Dayton and Columbus, and Columbus and Cleveland.”
(In other words, not necessarily all that competitive for Cincinnati to Columbus or, for that matter, Cincinnati to Cleveland.)
In response to the charge that the possible 3C schedules already made public don’t allow for good day trips, she argues that the trains will be very valuable for those planning to spend more than one day away from home. She also says special arrangements might be possible for, say, athletic events.
What is left unsaid in her defense of the 3C project and in most other defenses, is that it really won’t take many users to make the project affordable.
A federal study (not done by Amtrak, Ms. Molitoris is at pains to say) says that about a half-million riders will use the system in a year; that will be enough to keep the operating subsidy at $17 million a year.
A half-million per year is only about 1,300 per day. In a state of 11 million people. As the trains become faster and more numerous, there will be more users, if the pattern of other states prevails.
Ms. Molitoris also attempts to reasure Sen. Harris on a lot of other issues: the project will have more government oversight than, say, highway projects usually have, she says.
And the freight train operators are onboard, so to speak, for the state using their pathways, because this could mean upgraded freight lines. (Sen. Harris has said that he wants to see upgrading of the rail infrastructure.)
Meanwhile, the nation simply cannot have a fully developed passenger rail system without Ohio. Ohio is behind other populous states and other Northeast-Midwest states. Does it really want to be the problem?
The ODOT response to Sen. Harris is at the ODOT Web site, in the train section. It doesn’t answer all possible questions, but it deals with the reasonable ones that are raised most often. It deserves a hearing.
Permalink | Comments (15) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Martin Gottlieb, Ohio government, Transportation
TweetEditorial: Historic vote right course for country
The U.S. House of Representatives’ passage of President Barack Obama’s health care reform bill — for the second and decisive time — marks what might be considered the completion of the Democratic social agenda as to big-ticket items. With Social Security, Medicare, civil rights and other government protections in place against destitution and discrimination, what mainly remained to be done was the extension of decent health insurance to all, or nearly all.
The House vote assures that sweeping health care reform will be enacted.
The other parts of that agenda were accomplished with some Republican support. This was not. (Part of the explanation is the disappearance of the liberal wing of that party.)
Nevertheless, this measure is no radical departure from the style of other historic legislative turning points.
It is not socialism. In socialized medicine, everybody in the system works for the government. It is not the single-payer system of Canada, where the government pays all the bills.
It is not a government takeover of the system. It leaves in place the employment-based system of private insurance that has evolved in this country.
But it can reasonably be called “big government.” Besides imposing a lot of new regulations on the insurance industry, it requires most individuals to get insurance if their employers don’t offer it. (It also tries to help and to spur employers to offer coverage, and it helps low-income families pay the cost, and it creates a new insurance pool for people to shop in).
But if there is a non-big-government way to move dramatically toward universal health coverage — which has been achieved in all the other advanced, affluent democracies in the world — it’s hard to see.
During the weekend, abortion opponents had to settle for Senate language they didn’t like. They got a presidential order interpreting the bill in a way they like. But the language of the law is what matters most. In settling, the abortion opponents — including Ohioans Marcy Kaptur, of Toledo, and Steve Driehaus, of Cincinnati — did the right thing. Abortion is just a tiny corner of the bill, after all.
Over the weekend, too, Republicans complained that the new finding of the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office — that the bill will cut the deficit a little in the next 10 years and by a trillion dollars in the following decade — is misleading. But what’s most remarkable is that any effort is being made at deficit neutrality. Republicans certainly didn’t do that with their prescription drug law, which costs hundred of billions a year.
Reasonable people can disagree about the bill. It does not do as much to control costs as it should. It does impose new regulations and taxes.
Moreover, the partisan nature of the vote is not a good model. And the special deals — especially in the Senate version — that were used to win votes do not comport with the campaign promises of President Obama to change the way Washington works.
But any complaints about the process must include both sides. There’s been so much nonsense. House Republican leader John Boehner, of West Chester, said this weekend: The bill will “ruin the country.” Good grief.
The Republicans promise they’ll fight to thwart the enactment of this law. That’s a shame. There will be plenty of national divisions about new fights to occupy those who reject compromise and moderation. That said, the Republicans certainly do have every right to make health care an issue in the November election.
For now, a determined and talented president (with much help from a determined House speaker, Nancy Pelosi) has stuck to his guns to make good on perhaps his most important campaign promise. After frustrating some Democrats with a low-key approach for months, he hit his stride in Ohio last week with a fiery speech that seems to have paid off; and he continued his full-court press effectively.
The nation has turned a corner it should have turned decades ago.
Permalink | Comments (61) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Health Care, Martin Gottlieb, National government
TweetEditorial: Free bus rides not the city’s best strategy
Give Gary Leitzell, Dayton’s new mayor, credit for suggesting a big, bold idea when he proposed that the Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority consider dropping fares and making bus rides free or very cheap.
Dayton certainly needs creative ideas, even if they’re long shots. The suggestion was part of Mayor Leitzell’s push for the city to take concrete steps to become a more inviting and accessible place.
But because nobody wants to discourage Mayor Leitzell, or squelch his brainstorming, he’s not getting the feedback he needs.
The mayor has the right goal, but there are better ideas out there — ideas that already have been vetted and are connected to a wider, coordinated strategy.
His busing suggestion is not crazy. Mayor Leitzell is right to focus on transportation, which is a key issue for downtown. RTA Executive Director Mark Donaghy is taking the suggestion seriously, promising to research costs and complications and report back.
RTA gets more than 80 percent of its revenue from a local sales tax. It’s supplemented with state and federal aid. About 17 percent of its operating money, or $9.5 million, comes from fares, which is a big sum that would have to be replaced to avoid drastic service cuts if that money went away.
The ideas Mayor Leitzell has suggested to replace fare revenue are unrealistic. He says $2 million more could be raised annually by making more advertising space available on buses. Currently, RTA counts on about $200,000 from advertisers each year. Even an aggressive effort to sell more space isn’t likely to exceed $500,000.
Other ideas include getting local universities to charge all their students a bus fee or even asking the county to institute a small annual tax — say $10 — on everyone who works here to support RTA.
Those charges won’t go over big, and it’s hard to see how those ideas could cover RTA’s losses.
But the biggest issue isn’t even whether free busing could be done. It’s whether free rides would help the city achieve its goal of attracting more people to downtown, especially suburbanites and young adults in their 20s and 30s. Those groups aren’t now riding local buses very often, partly because it’s so easy and quick to drive in the region.
Making it easier for people to navigate the city must be part of any downtown plan. In fact, how to do that has been under study through the Greater Downtown Dayton plan, led by the Downtown Dayton Partnership. Read its draft recommendations at www.downtowndayton.org. Final recommendations are expected in May.
The Greater Downtown Dayton plan does not recommend free busing countywide, but proposes a smart mix of strategies that include improving parking, easing pedestrian and bicycle travel and building connections among destination spots like the Brown Street Marketplace, the Oregon District, Fifth Third Field, the central business district, Sinclair Community College and the planned passenger train station.
Among the intriguing ideas in the Greater Downtown Dayton plan are establishing small stations around the city where bicycles can be borrowed and returned for free and building a small urban streetcar system.
The streetcar, modeled after systems in other cities that are attracting strong ridership, would connect those destination spots in a five-mile rail loop. Start-up costs are high, an estimated $55 million. Operating the system would cost about $2 million annually, though fares would be low. That’s still significantly cheaper than the cost of “free” busing.
The bike system would run about $2 million in start-up costs and it, too, would require ongoing operating money. In short, the money required to allow for free or cheap bus fares could be better spent in other ways.
At a meeting with his leadership advisory panel Wednesday, Mayor Leitzell stressed that Dayton should choose a handful of priority projects and push hard to complete them within two years — to show that change for the better is coming to downtown.
That’s a good instinct. But his energy would be better spent by pushing hard on the most achievable proposals from the Greater Downtown Dayton plan.
Permalink | Comments (37) | Post your comment | Categories: City of Dayton, Editorials, Scott Elliott
TweetEllen Belcher: In disaster lore, Dayton wasn’t where all went wrong
(A postcard of a suspected looter being stopped by the National Guard patrol in the aftermath of the 1913 flood. )
Today we argue with The New York Times.
In a recent story about looting in Chile, there was this:
“By midweek, with thousands of troops deployed, the pictures began shifting: young men spread-eagled on the ground with gun muzzles pressed behind their ears.
“All in all, it sounded a lot like Haiti. Or like New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. Or like Dayton, Ohio, after the 1913 flood. Or like Rome in 410.”
Say what? Dayton compared with Haiti, New Orleans and Rome after one of its many sackings?
Of all the flood stories I had heard, looting wasn’t high on the list of problems. And the suggestion that mayhem reigned contrasts with the narrative that Daytonians were models of efficiency and decency in how they reacted to the historic disaster.
Those who know Dayton’s history are mystified, too.
“From what I’ve read, I don’t think it (looting) was a severe problem,” said Mary Oliver, director of collections at Dayton History. “My understanding is that the community very quickly picked themselves up, started cleaning up and getting back to business.”
Nancy Horlacher, the local history specialist at Dayton Metro Library, said that there was looting, and she supplied the post card at the top of this post as evidence.
But she adds: “I’ve never read anything where they center on looting as a big, huge problem. Gov. (James M.) Cox’s declaration of martial law was very strong … If such things happened, they were very brief.”
Gareth Davies, a lecturer at the University of Oxford, came to Dayton last year to research the flood. Asked about his findings, he wrote in an e-mail:
“It would be remarkable had there not been some looting in 1913, especially given the complete collapse of the city government. … That said, I do not recall having encountered even one specific reference to such activities in the newspaper coverage, or in subsequent historical writing. That suggests to me that any looting must have been on a comparatively small scale.”
Curt Dalton, in his self-published book “Through Flood, Through Fire,” includes excerpts from a report given by the National Guard to the governor, detailing what happened after Cox declared martial law:
“By nightfall, Thursday (March 27, 1913), the water had receded to the southern line of Third Street, but every inch of fall meant additional guard duty as every store and bank door had been forced open by the elements and their contents lay open to any marauder….
“The amount of valuable property of all kind covered by our guards that night was very great. At the jewelry store of A. Newsalt, I should estimate that from $10,000 to $15,000 worth of jewelry and valuable merchandise was scattered on the sidewalk and in the gutter.
“I take great pride in saying for the National Guard of Ohio that not a single case of looting was reported as the result of this night’s work, although the opportunities were limitless.”
Regarding the strict 6 p.m. to 5:30 a.m. curfew, the report said:
“It is to be said, to the credit of the citizens of Dayton, that this stringent regulation was received in the spirit in which it was ordered and from the very first evening but little trouble was encountered in enforcing it.”
Dalton, who works part-time at Dayton History, said that newspapers around the state and outside Ohio pronounced at the time that Dayton was awash in looting and dead bodies. Morticians hoping to pick up quick business flocked to town.
They left disappointed, he said. No bodies were allowed to be removed from the area, and there were far fewer who died than had initially been reported.
Dalton said he has read about a rumor that a looter had been shot by police and found to be carrying in his pocket a hand that had apparently been cut off for the rings still on its fingers. But Dalton said he never has been able to verify that story.
Donald G. McNeil Jr., the author of The Times story, pointed to several newspaper articles from his newspaper, one with the headline “Militia are shooting Dayton looters.”
A Times story published a few days later, written in the language of the era, said, “If apparently well-authenticated reports are to be believed, nine negroes and one white man were added yesterday to the seven suspected looters shot and killed since martial law was proclaimed three days ago.”
That story was decidedly less breathless than the first report.
Well, so there you have it — the story of how Daytonians of old got lumped in to demonstrably far more chaotic disasters. And now this take on history will be out there forever on the Web.
Ahem. At least tell your children that the real drama of this piece of Dayton’s history wasn’t about the looters.
Permalink | Comments (2) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Ellen Belcher, Local History
TweetEditorial: Brown wrong about stopping wind grants
Last month an operation called the Investigative Reporting Workshop at American University in Washington complained that “Money from the 2009 stimulus bill to help support the renewable energy industry continues to flow overseas.” Almost $2 billion.
This prompted several Democratic senators, including Ohio’s Sherrod Brown, to call for a fix in the law “so that funds only flow to projects that will create jobs in the United States,” as opposed, most specifically, to China.
The senators called upon the Obama administration to suspend the energy-grant program until the change can be made.
Sen. Brown’s involvement is consistent with his view that Washington is a pushover in trade relations with other countries and that it needs to be more aggressive about protecting American jobs.
His critics say — correctly — that Sen. Brown’s general posture invites foreign countries to discriminate against American companies, thus undermining the jobs of Americans involved in exporting, one of the few bright spots in the Ohio economy.
Of course, even Sen. Brown’s critics must acknowledge that, when taxpayer dollars are involved, that’s a special situation, especially when the money is supposed to create American jobs.
However, the Obama administration rejects the findings of the report that prompted the Brown proposal. Officials say that the bulk of the jobs being created are in the United States, no matter where the companies are owned.
They also say that Americans who want to develop wind energy (which is involved in most of the deals in dispute) sometimes have no choice but to deal with foreign companies, because they are the ones with certain abilities.
And it would be a shame to shut down or delay American green energy projects that can provide jobs now.
Also rejecting the Brown proposal is Gov. Ted Strickland, who, when he was in Congress, had the same protectionist-tinged concerns as Sen. Brown.
Gov. Strickland doesn’t want to jeopardize the hundreds of Ohio jobs that foreign companies can help Ohio develop through the creation of wind farms.
The Brown side responds, in part, that the American jobs that have been created have been temporary.
The charges and counter-charges don’t shed much light. The argument has been conducted largely through press releases, press conferences and blogs. (On the Web, investigativereportingworkshop.org has the initial report and a link to a response from the American wind industry.)
The initial report deserves attention. But the Obama administration could not possibly justify suspending the program on the basis of it alone. The Energy Department says suspending the program could cost thousands of American jobs.
If the senators want to submit legislation and hold hearings on it, fine. Being in the majority party, they can do that. Let the debate be complete.
The Brown side says that other countries have rules favoring their own companies. It also says this country has such a rule where government money is involved, though the rule doesn’t happen to apply to the wind program.
The Brown side also insists that, under the rule, if a foreign company is the only good option in a specific case, the government could allow a waiver. But some businesses say that would make the process slow and bureaucratic.
If, indeed, there are ways to undertake the most advanced, desirable wind projects while keeping more jobs in this county, Congress has a right to ask why taxpayer money isn’t fostering that.
In the end, however, the benefit of any doubt should go to those who want to minimize the barriers between countries. If American contractors need to work with foreign companies to quickly get what the country needs, government regulations shouldn’t interfere.
Permalink | Comments (2) | Post your comment | Categories: Economy, Editorials, Locals in national affairs, Martin Gottlieb, National government
TweetMartin Gottlieb: State auditor primary offers relief from aging D vs. R show
Here’s a refreshing change of pace: politicians in the same party saying nasty things about each other publicly.
Not only the same party, but the same wing of the party.
In service of all those who have grown tired of interparty sniping, some conservative Republicans have decided to go intra.
It’s not unheard of, of course, especially during primary election campaigns. But there haven’t been many juicy primaries lately. (Partly leaders discourage them.) And party unity has been such an obsession of the politicians lately that you had to start to wonder.
So here we have state Sen. Gary Cates, who represents most of Butler County, writing a letter to state Rep. Seth Morgan, of Huber Heights. Morgan is running for state auditor in the primary. He’s challenging Delaware County Prosecutor Dave Yost, the choice of state party headquarters . Says Cates (a Yost supporter) to Morgan, “After recently reading an error-filled smear you promulgated against a private citizen, I was ashamed of your tactics…. I would be hard-pressed to name another fellow GOP candidate who has run as poorly executed and questionable campaign as you.”
Cates was referring partly to Morgan’s complaint that a Yost aide “admitted to public corruption charges,” which, in fact, news outlets have reported. Yost responded that the case was ‘thrown out by a judge and even the record that it was filed was sealed.”
And Yost said the case in question was part of a politically motivated pursuit of former Republican state Treasurer Joe Deters, for whom the Yost aide then worked. In other words, shame on a Republican for bringing it up.
But the immediate prompt of the Cates letter was another squabble. It was over Morgan’s claim that he has the endorsement of Montgomery County Republican Chairman Greg Gantt.
After Morgan made that claim, Gantt asked him not to say it anymore. After that was revealed, Morgan put out a transcript of what Gantt said on the occasion of Morgan’s announcement of his candidacy:
“I certainly know you would make an excellent candidate and encourage you to pursue that option and go for it…. Myself and others are going to stand behind you and support you and encourage you to go for the auditor’s position…. I’m very excited, and very honored to be a part of this.”
Gantt also said he was happy to see Morgan “now moving up to the state level … I’m behind you 100 percent.”
Morgan responded with thanks to Gantt for “joining us…. Your support is important.”
Actually, Gantt’s statement sounds like an endorsement of Morgan’s decision to run, not an endorsement of him over Yost. Whether Morgan should run was the issue at the time: Given that the state party organization had already endorsed somebody else, should a young, first-term legislator challenge him?
Morgan still claims he had reason, based on public and private comments by Gantt, to claim the endorsement. And maybe he did. But it’s strange that the transcript he first put out doesn’t support the claim.
Eventually Gantt tried to diffuse the issue, which is the job of a party chairman. He said, “The last couple of days we’ve been twisted up in words, in silliness.”
This is what happens in certain kinds of races. With neither candidate having a record as state auditor, there isn’t much to fight about that’s relevant to the job. People look for every tiny angle, and it eventually becomes personal.
One of the funnier angles: Morgan is running as the only certified public accountant in the race. Yost is running as the only one who’s actually been an auditor, a job he held in Delaware County for a term.
Morgan took offense at Yost’s claim about being the only auditor, saying that a CPA does audits. So now Yost describes himself as the only “public auditor.”
What’s weird is that being a county auditor isn’t even about doing audits. A county auditor does a hodge-podge of other things. The state auditor actually audits.
At any rate, these guys will all make up and praise each other highly before November. For now, though, the race is a comforting reminder that our politicians haven’t become so obsessively partisan that their other combat abilities have atrophied.
Permalink | Comments (6) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Martin Gottlieb, Miami Valley Politics, Ohio politics
TweetEditorial: There are some things all kids should know
A controversial idea in education is back in a form that just might work for Ohio and the nation.
The “common core” idea promotes basic standards about what students should learn in English, math, social studies and science — the core subjects.
The notion that basic expectations should be consistent across the nation doesn’t sound especially divisive. In fact, though, there are camps passionately in favor and against the idea.
To many conservatives — including those who are critical of public education and who believe there are basics in every subject that every child should know — the idea of the federal government telling local schools what to teach is heretical.
On the other side, some liberal groups have pushed to require states to ensure every student is taught at least to a minimum level in the major subjects. Former President Bill Clinton was a huge proponent of national standards and a national test to measure how well kids are measuring up. He abandoned the effort in the face of a backlash from the states.
To get around the political minefield, this time the call for standards, cleverly, has been led by the states. Through the National Governors Association, 48 states have joined an effort to jointly write common standards. Ohio and Gov. Ted Strickland have been strong supporters of the idea, with a handful of Ohioans playing key roles crafting the draft standards that were just released for math and English.
The goal is to finalize those standards this summer in anticipation of the participating states adopting them soon after.
A decade ago, Ohio’s own standards were not well regarded. The Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, in a national review of state standards, rated Ohio a D+ in 2002. But things have changed. Last year, in its annual report on standards, Education Week gave Ohio an A. Others are not as high on Ohio’s approach, but there is agreement that the state has come a long way in the past decade.
The “common core” draft standards are getting some good reviews. Adopting them, which Ohio is likely to do, would help ensure Ohio is keeping up with what’s happening nationally. At that level, it’s hard to dilute standards and have the effort go unnoticed.
The “common core” could have a dramatic impact on the states — and the kids — in need of the most help. If everyone gets on board with bringing their systems to the same high standard, millions of students could really benefit.
Of course, if all this comes together, then the natural next question is which states are doing the best job of getting kids to learn at the level expected in the new standards? Answering that question probably would require some sort of national test.
Better leave that battle for another day.
Permalink | Comments (11) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Education, Scott Elliott
TweetEditorial: Cameras can catch speeders, increase safety
Cameras mounted on street corners might not be the ideal way to enforce traffic laws, but it’s hard to argue with Dayton’s statistics.
The cameras are working.
They capture images of cars that ignore red lights and record their license plate numbers. The word has gotten out. That has made some dangerous streets safer. Problems with the system need to be addressed, the most pressing of which is that many drivers nabbed by the cameras ignore the citations they receive; consequences have been rare.
Even so, the city has a strong case to expand its use of cameras to issue citations also for speeding.
An outside company, contracting with the city, installed the cameras at its own cost between 2003 and 2005 at 10 intersections notorious for accidents.
While traffic accidents were trending down citywide before the cameras were put up, the decline at the camera sites are significantly deeper. In the past 18 months, accidents at the camera intersections were down 40 percent.
In addition, red-light violations recorded by the cameras have dropped by 72 percent. Even rear-end accidents are down 16 percent. In other cities, those crashes spiked at camera locations as drivers slammed on their brakes to avoid being caught by the camera.
Collections haven’t gone so well, primarily because the fines do not have the power of the courts behind them. Because there is no law officer or eyewitness involved, a city ordinance makes the fine a civil rather than criminal matter.
The Ohio Supreme Court in 2008 upheld a city’s right to treat camera-enforced offenses more like parking tickets than moving violations, which typically result in higher fines and points against the driver’s license. The debt owed by the driver to the city is legally binding and collected by the camera company, but criminal courts can’t enforce payment. If individuals think they’ve been cited erroneously — that someone else was driving their car, for instance — there is a formal appeal process.
Thousands of fines have gone unpaid. If drivers know they won’t be forced to pay, what incentive is there to pay attention to the cameras?
The company is now moving delinquent drivers more quickly to a collection agency, and the city is exploring changing its ordinances to allow for license and registration renewals to be blocked for unpaid camera fines.
Police Chief Richard Biehl wants to add more cameras on streets with the most speeders. The numbers support his case. Consider one example — the intersection of Third Street and Edwin C. Moses Boulevard.
For the 18-month study period, data from the cameras there showed 1,578 red-light violators were also driving at least 11 mph over the speed limit. A third of those cars were traveling at least 15 mph above the limit.
If the threat of a fine works to deter speeders the way it has for red-light violators, the added public safety alone makes trying it worthwhile.
Chief Biehl says he has no plans to completely replace traffic enforcement with cameras, but the reality is that there will be fewer police assigned to traffic duty as the police force shrinks due to budget cuts.
Using cameras to supplement officers’ eyes is making the most of technology.
Permalink | Comments (19) | Post your comment | Categories: City of Dayton, Editorials, Law Enforcement and Public Safety, Scott Elliott
TweetMartin Gottlieb: Are ‘the American people’ really against health care plan?
It is by now official — whether true or not — that “the American people” oppose the pending health care plan.
Republican House leader John Boehner, of West Chester, says it all the time. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, of Kentucky, says it all the time. Likewise for conservative voices in the media. Everybody says it.
Not only do they say it: they start there. It seems to be the most important point to them. Ask almost any public opponent of the plan for a brief statement and you get references to polls.
These warriors see polls as a great weapon for scaring moderate Democrats in Congress whose votes are up for grabs.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce sent out a poll this week that focused on particular congressional districts in Ohio. The version that came to this newspaper said “51 percent … in the 1st District oppose the … plan … while only 35 percent support it.” The 1st — in the Cincinnati area — is represented by freshman Democrat Steve Driehaus, who beat a Republican incumbent in 2008 and is in for a tough race this year. He’s uncommitted.
One striking thing about the polls is how often that 51-percent figure comes up, or something even lower. A Web site called RealClearPolitics gathers many polls on the subject, from the likes of USA Today/Gallup, Newsweek and Associated Press. It reports that an average of polls by eight organizations between mid-February and the first week in March showed 48.9 percent opposing and 41.3 percent supporting health care reform.
The biggest gap between support and opposition was 12 percent; the lowest, 2 percent. The biggest majority for opposition was 53 percent. If political warriors want to try to scare the politicians by pointing out that more people oppose than support the proposal, fine.
But “the American people”?
President Barack Obama’s pollster, Joel Benenson, referred to another collection of polls (at Pollster.com) in a Washington Post column Saturday, March 13. He said eight out of 12 showed a gap in the range of three points.
He also noted that follow-up questions in two polls show a lot of opponents upset because the plan doesn’t go far enough, which is clearly not what Boehner and Co. mean when they talk about opposition.
Benenson refers to a CNN poll in which 10 percent of respondents opposed the bill saying it was “not liberal enough.” And he noted an Ipsos poll in which a third of opponents say it doesn’t go “far enough.”
He and others note that polls show majority support for the major parts of the plan.
Clearly, though, the Democrats have failed to sell their overall plan. Theories abound as to why: it’s big government and big spending; the White House has been inept and/or lax in making the case; people are skeptical of 2,500 pages of change in a system that already works for many.
The correct theory: Republican and independent voters are both very influenced by the fact that Republican politicians are opposed in lockstep. Many independents distrust anything that doesn’t have more bipartisanship.
In a lifetime of watching, pondering, using and dismissing polls, I’ve come to the general conclusion that polls on issues aren’t useful where the issue is complicated; people just simply do not focus on complications.
Health care might be an exception. Many people report feeling strongly. That has to be respected. The issue has been around long enough that a great many people do have a good feel for it, even if they can’t give you a recitation on the complications.
Those who support the plan are less likely to say they feel strongly than those who support it. One suspects that has something to do with a certain leeriness about everything these days, a reluctance to let one’s hopes get too high.
So what should the impact of the polls be?
If, indeed, the problem in the polls is the lack of Republican congressional buy-in, a good discussion can be had about whose fault that is.
But if the Democrats let Republicans stop them now, (A) they’re giving veto power to the party they defeated for control of Congress and the presidency, and (B) they’re probably not doing themselves any good in the coming election. But that’s another column.
Permalink | Comments (83) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Health Care, Martin Gottlieb, National Politics, Ohio politics
TweetEditorial: Health care reform partly in Ohio’s hands
“Ohio gets full court press,” was one headline on Politico.com for much of the day Tuesday, March 16.
It was in reference to the fact that President Barack Obama is pushing wavering Ohio Democratic members of Congress hard to vote for health care reform.
There’s no hope of any Republicans voting for the bill, so it all comes down to the Democrats. Specifically, 216 “yes” votes are needed for a majority (after vacancies are accounted for).
A dozen or so members have been on the fence, with possibly as many as four of those reps from Ohio.
President Obama, when he was in Strongsville on Tuesday, was unabashedly courting Cleveland’s Rep. Dennis Kucinich, who voted “no” on health care reform last year because it didn’t go far enough. (He’s a supporter of the single-payer plan, effectively extending Medicare to everyone.)
Rep. Marcy Kaptur, from the Toledo area, has had concerns that there aren’t enough restrictions on public money going for abortion. Rep. John Boccieri, from near Cleveland, has been noncommittal, and he didn’t show for the president’s appearance.
Finally, Rep. Steve Driehaus, from the Cincinnati area, has gotten the attention of the administration, with the vice president flying in to host a fundraiser for him.
That Ohio would be in the thick of things isn’t shocking. The state has a large number of uninsured. Many families have gone from having profoundly good health insurance — because someone in the household worked in manufacturing, especially auto manufacturing — to having no coverage.
Meanwhile, the state is also not reflexively Democratic or Republican, Depending on how you see it, Ohio voters can be fickle, independent or suspicious of both parties’ big ideas.
If health care reform is defeated, absolutely that will be embarrassing for the president and Democrats. But political victory or defeat is not what this decision is about.
The country is at a juncture:
Are we or aren’t we going to extend affordable health care to nearly all Americans? And are we going to insist that Americans who can afford to buy insurance do so, while also requiring those who can’t pay the full cost still pay something toward coverage?
There is much that’s wrong with the pending bill, but there is much that’s wrong with every massively complicated piece of legislation.
Morevoer, does anyone believe that there isn’t a lot wrong with the current system — 50 million people without coverage; an insurance system that protects you when you’re well, but kicks you to the curb when you get sick; cost structures that result in huge sums being spent on marketing and processing claims instead of services to patients?
Will a lot of effort have to be put into fixing things that are not right if the bill passes? Absolutely. That is the nature of doing something complex. But it happens all the time, too, when Congress makes far less historic, sweeping change.
Republicans would have you believe that this legislation is so awful that the only solution is to start over. That is not a plan; it is a stalling strategy. But stalling for what?
The current system is unsustainable for everyone. Insurance rates keep going up both for businesses and individuals. Young people continue to choose not to buy insurance, sticking hospitals and those who do buy insurance with their bills. Medicaid rolls are soaring, forcing states to limit eligibility, cut spending elsewhere and reduce how much they reimburse doctors. People who want to buy insurance can’t get it if they’ve ever had a serious illness.
The canard that the plan is socialized medicine is ridiculous. Private insurers would have all the business they have today and more because of the requirement to purchase coverage.
Win or lose this vote, the president and Democrats are in for tough political times. At least if they win, some 30 million people will get health insurance and some immoral elements of a broken system will be no more.
Permalink | Comments (13) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Ellen Belcher, Health Care, National Politics, National government
TweetEditorial: Lehner move could help patients save
You’ve heard a lot about new approaches to medical care that are designed to save money for taxpayers and purchasers of insurance: paying doctors a flat salary, rather than for every procedure; getting more people to buy health insurance, so as to spread out the cost; getting all medical records onto computers.
Some ideas along these lines are in the health reform measure pending in Congress. It’s big on pilot projects. (That’s one reason the bill has more than 2,000 pages.)
One idea in the bill is the patient-centered medical home (PCMH). Don’t picture a home, though. And don’t picture a doctor making home calls.
The idea is to reorganize the family practitioner’s office to put greater emphasis on prevention and communication with patients, making access to help more immediate and using technology to follow patients more carefully. A doctor heads a team that might include the likes not only of nurses and a physician’s assistant, but a dietitian, social worker and pharmacist. Patients get plenty of consultation time aimed at prevention.
The Ohio House of Representatives has now unanimously passed a bill fostering PCMH’s in Ohio, which is behind a lot of states in developing them. Rep. Peggy Lehner, R-Kettering was one of the two early sponsors.
No law is necessary to permit patient-centered homes. And this bill has no money in it, which is a disappointment to Rep. Lehner, who wanted maybe $5 million for training people in this new approach, among other costs.
But the state legislature isn’t exactly looking around for new ways to spend money. Instead, the legislation blesses the idea, identifies universities as early participants (including Wright State University), sets up a governing board, proposes state scholarships for medical students going in this direction and lays out some rules.
One controversy was whether to allow patient-center medical homes to be headed by an advanced-practice nurse. Rep. Lehner wasn’t enthusiastic about that; she felt a doctor’s extra years of training and education are necessary at the top.
(For the record, Rep. Lehner is married to a doctor. He’s a specialist, though, not the kind of family doctor who would be involved in this effort. She points out that, theoretically, the approach would mean fewer referrals to specialists, as the prevention ethic pays off.)
The bill entails one nurse-led operation in each of four zones in the state, in cooperation with a nursing school. That pilot-project approach is a reasonable compromise.
The overarching patient-centered medical home idea has won support from organizations of family doctors, pediatricians, osteopaths and others. It has bipartisan support in Congress and has been tried by both Medicaid and Medicare. It’s an idea whose time is coming. Ohio should be involved.
When a bill passes a legislative body unanimously, outsiders might assume there was no challenge. But Rep. Lehner has done constructive work in bringing the issue to the fore, in working out conflicts and in finding something an overly polarized legislature can agree upon.
Even in the absence of a state appropriation, it’s a good accomplishment for a new lawmaker.
Permalink | Comments (4) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Health Care, Martin Gottlieb, Ohio government
TweetEditorial: Crowds are not the enemy at the Fraze
The people who own the businesses that surround the Fraze Pavilion want to prevent blankets or folding chairs from popping up on their lawns for a few hours on summer nights.
Commonly, people who don’t have tickets to concerts or who don’t want to pay gather outside the Fraze to listen to the music rolling out from the amphitheater. The crowds are there to soak up the fun with their neighbors and enjoy the park.
That atmosphere is about to change.
Property owners are perfectly within their rights to draw lines at the sidewalk and call those who step across trespassers. But going down that road is a big mistake, one that threatens to harm a friendly community spirit that has been a big player in the Fraze’s success.
It’s hard to accept that there’s really a problem. The anecdotes property owners cite — public urination, property damage and increasing disorderliness — simply don’t match the general experience most people have when they stroll the sidewalk along Lincoln Park Boulevard during a summer show. There just isn’t any hard evidence of major problems or that misbehavior should be a growing concern.
Of course, there certainly are isolated cases of bad behavior whenever large groups of people gather. To some extent, that’s the nature of being next to an outdoor attraction, whether it’s an amphitheater, a movie theater or even a park or walking trail.
Those problems can be addressed in other ways, including law enforcement. Often, rule-breaking can be discouraged simply by asking the good people who use public venues to help. An army of people willing to report misbehavior and to reinforce the rules through their own actions and expectations can be a powerful force for good.
Asking for help from concert-goers and a stepped-up police presence would have been a better way for the city, the Fraze and property owners to start this conversation. What about blocking off a piece of Lincoln Park Boulevard for a few hours?
From its opening 19 years ago, the Fraze Pavilion was hailed for giving Kettering an identity as something more than just another suburban bedroom community. Lincoln Park Commons, as it was known before the Fraze, was an ideal setting for a de-facto public square. As a “central park,” it was already a popular setting for community events and activities.
The Fraze took that a step further. The Dayton Daily News described the new scene at the time as “a well-planned assortment of housing, green areas, water spots, restaurants and offices” that created “an environment that is serene even as it adds a cosmopolitan flavor to Kettering life.”
If, with the city’s and the Fraze’s blessing, neighbors throw up an invisible fence, they threaten to upend the delicately balanced, interactive “commons” that the space was intended to be.
It’s not too late to reconsider. Property can be protected in other ways.
Permalink | Comments (29) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Scott Elliott, Suburban Communities
TweetEditorial: Huber court video cheats defendants
Ohio’s 2nd District Court of Appeals is sending a loud message to Judge James A. Hensley Jr.: the Constitution applies in his Huber Heights courtroom.
Safeguarding the rights of people in court is a judge’s prime responsibility. Judge Hensley’s failure to do so led the appeals court to overturn convictions in six of his cases. The appeals court said he failed to ensure that those defendants were informed enough to know what they were doing when they gave up their right to consult with an attorney.
Instead of questioning defendants about whether they wanted a lawyer, Judge Hensley had them watch a generic video tutorial about their right to one. The cases in question were minor crimes, such as driving without a valid license, possession of drug paraphernalia and theft. But the charges were still serious enough that the accused could be sent to jail. Any defendant who could end up in jail needs legal advice, or the judge needs to be personally convinced that the person understands what he’s giving up.
In fact, judges routinely refuse to accept guilty pleas from those facing jail, no matter how insistent they are, until they have spoken with an attorney.
The problem in Judge Hensley’s court came to light when one confused defendant called the Montgomery County Public Defender’s office to complain that no attorney from the office had shown up for her case. Nobody came because no lawyer was assigned.
The public defender found five other similar cases of judgments rendered by Judge Hensley and sentences set with no defense attorney present. In some cases, the appeals court noted there was no indication that a prosecutor was even present.
Judges face many temptations to move cases along quickly. Dockets in a court for misdemeanors like Judge Hensley’s are long. Quick guilty pleas can hasten the pace. But defendants often are unfamiliar with court procedures and what can happen to them. Sometimes they unwisely just want their case to be over with. It is a judge’s job not to let them make uninformed decisions.
Lawyers make sure their clients understand their rights and options. They can level the playing field, sometimes negotiating plea bargains that are good for both sides. The deals can ensure the defendant accepts some punishment, while reducing sometimes steep penalties to more appropriate levels.
Lawyers can accomplish all these things because the court has to take them seriously. If a prosecutor or judge is unreasonable, a lawyer can always insist on a trial. Most minor offenses don’t result in jail time. But defendants may not understand that. They might not realize that even a short stint could cost them their jobs, or prevent them from getting a job in the future.
Judge Hensley knows the rules that all defendants are entitled to a lawyer. His shortcut was convenient for him, but not for people who had much to lose. Part of getting your day in court is having an advocate looking out for you. Before a defendant can give up that right, a judge needs to have a conversation with the individual and it needs to be more than, “Here, hit play while I deal with these other people.”
Permalink | Comments (4) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Law Enforcement and Public Safety, Scott Elliott, Suburban Communities
TweetScott Elliott: State’s school report cards should list poverty rates
Researchers have told us for decades that wealth and school performance are strongly connected, but it’s still pretty amazing when you look at the numbers.
For all the pressure on teachers and schools to raise test scores, the fact is the impact of formal education is strongly overshadowed by factors outside of school.
For this reason, Ohio ought to acknowledge poverty rates on state report cards, which are intended to represent how well schools did educating kids. As reported now, test scores alone do not give a complete picture.
Poverty is one of the easiest outside factors to measure and a useful stand-in for a variety of other non-school impacts on learning. Among the many disadvantages for kids from low-income families are problems like weaker health care and less enriching interactions from parents who are, themselves, not well-educated. Many poor kids grow up in broken homes headed by one overburdened parent, adding to the challenge of making time for learning at home.
The statistics, in this case, are based on averages. Certainly not all poor families are unhealthy or uneducated. Not all fail to provide enriching home lives for their kids. But across a large population, like a school district, the impact of the many disadvantages of living in poverty will push average test scores down.
The most commonly discussed poverty measure for schools is the percentage of kids in the district who are eligible for free or reduced-price lunches. To be eligible, a family of four can earn no more than $41,000 a year.
The Ohio Department of Education also tracks the percentage of students in each district who come from families receiving public assistance, which also would seem to be a fair indicator of how much poverty there is in the schools. Another good measure is the median income of tax returns filed for residents who live in each district, which is tracked by the state treasurer’s office.
Last month the Education Writers Association’s held a statistics training seminar where journalists are paired with experts in data analysis to study a problem. I took a look at these poverty measures and how strongly they correlated to test performance.
All were strong predictors of test scores. But the percentage of kids eligible for free and reduced-price lunch was the strongest. The connection was so strong, that the percent of kids receiving lunch assistance could fairly be said to explain about two-thirds of the variation in test scores.
Studies have repeatedly shown between 60 and 70 percent of a school’s or school district’s standardized test score is connected to its poverty rate.
Good teaching and good schools do move the needle in the right direction. But consider the instructional challenge where there is more poverty — it’s just tougher. When comparing test results of districts, the poverty level must be taken into account to get the full picture.
Consider two high-performing local school districts that this year achieved the state’s highest report card rating of “excellent with distinction.” Centerville earned that rating with an impressive “performance index score” of 105.4. (With a top possible score of 120, this index is a measure of test performance across all tests taken.) Right next door, Miamisburg’s index score was 99.
But Miamisburg achieved its high rating even though about 30 percent of its kids are poor enough to qualify for free and reduced-price lunch. For Centerville, that figure is just 5 percent. Shouldn’t Miamisburg be recognized in some way for the greater “degree of difficulty” its teachers face?
Adding a poverty measure to the state report card wouldn’t be making an excuse for low performance. High expectations for all kids to score well shouldn’t be diminished. But right now, tremendous performance by high-poverty schools that get kids to score is obscured.
Showing the percentage of students receiving free or reduced-price lunch would make the data more meaningful.
Permalink | Comments (6) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Education, Scott Elliott
TweetGuest column:Ohioans could pay more for worse phone service
This commentary was written by Ellis Jacobs, a senior attorney at Advocates for Basic Legal Equality in Dayton who often represents clients in telecommunications matters.
As if households in Ohio aren’t under enough financial stress, now the Ohio House and Senate are considering legislation that could make it harder to pay monthly home telephone bills.
If passed, the legislation would deregulate Ohio’s land-line telephone companies, allow residential rates to increase and weaken consumer protections and service quality.
Even with the spread of wireless telephones, many Ohioans still rely on traditional land-line home telephone service as their main or sole source of telecommunications. They rely on it because it provides unlimited minutes of use at a low, fixed, monthly rate.
They don’t just use it to call friends, family and neighbors, but for emergency services such as 911, medical alert buttons and alarm services. They need their land-line phone service to be reliable and affordable.
Here are some concerns about how telephone service in Ohio would be affected by this proposed law:
• Telephone companies would be able to raise their monthly rates for basic telephone service by $1.25 every year, even for those on the low-income Lifeline discount program. This could mean rate increases of up to 20-40 percent over the next few years.
• Telephone companies would be allowed to take up to three days to restore service outages, up from a current one-day rule. Companies have been able to meet the one-day requirement for many years. For those who rely on their home telephone, being without service for three days is unacceptable.
• The proposed legislation scales back educational efforts for the Lifeline program, which could prevent customers who need the help that this program offers, from knowing about it.
• Customers who have a package or bundle of telecommunication services — the majority of land-line telephone consumers in Ohio — will receive even fewer protections than those with just basic service. They would have only limited protections from “unfair or deceptive” practices. They would not be guaranteed access to 911 emergency services if disconnected for nonpayment, as they presently are. This could put vulnerable customers’ health and safety at risk.
The big phone companies argue that the legislature should allow them to raise rates and reduce service because they face competition. The irony of this should not be missed. Competition, after all, is supposed to lower rates and improve service.
The other argument I’ve heard for this legislation is that the phone companies are hurting financially and that if they get this deregulation, they will increase investment in Ohio. Neither part of this claim stands up to the facts.
AT&T Ohio averaged 11.4 percent return on equity during the past five years. Verizon averaged 15.8 percent over the same period. We should all be hurting like that.
Moreover, the history of telecommunication deregulation in Ohio shows that when a service or product is deregulated, not only does the price of it go up, but investment and jobs in Ohio go down.
From 2001 to 2008, during a period of deregulation, AT&T Ohio reduced its employee count by 40 percent. Verizon reduced its by 26 percent.
Ask yourself, if a company can take three days instead of one to repair a line, will it employ more or fewer people in those types of jobs?
Contact your state legislators. Tell them to defeat House Bill 276 and Senate Bill 162. This legislation is a bad deal for Ohio. It gives telephone companies all the benefits while leaving consumers empty-handed.
Permalink | Comments (4) | Post your comment | Categories: Guest Columns, Ohio government, Rural Communities
TweetKevin Riley: When it comes to floods, at least we’re not Fargo
That March’s thaw came early and, with it, more than nine inches of rain in just five days.
People knew a flood threatened. After all, their city had flooded often, and during its centennial celebration, a historian predicted a flood that would put the city “out of existence.”
And very nearly, the flood of 1913 almost destroyed Dayton.
The descriptions of what happened during that defining event read like excerpts from a biblical tale of devastation. How our community reacted sounds like an even more far-fetched story.
Its first settlers set up the city for its day of reckoning because they placed it at the mercy of the rivers, which snake around it in what a Dayton Daily News writer once called a “sickle-like clutch of death.”
In 1913, the spring water rushed down the Miami Valley and, on March 25, the weak levee at Monument Avenue gave way.
By the end of the day, the intersection at Third and Main was under 11 feet of water. People were drowning, and buildings were collapsing. Then came the fires, as natural gas lines broke and high winds ignited nearby buildings.
People climbed onto trees, into attics and atop roofs. All they could do was pray and wait to be rescued; 123 died in Dayton and Harrison Twp.
View photos of 1913 Dayton flood.
The tragedy was overwhelming, but, once the water receded, determined citizens and leaders vowed that this would never happen again.
A public campaign was launched, and in just 10 days businesses and citizens raised a stunning $2 million. The community used the money to plan a flood-control system.
Local leaders and politicians pushed a bill through the legislature to create the Miami Conservancy District, covering nine counties. It oversaw the construction of an expansive $31 million system of dams and levees, which local citizens and governments paid for. That system has protected this region from floods since its completion in 1922.
We’re about to enter the season of floods, and it looks like it’s going to be a bad one for some places.
Fargo, N.D., on the banks of the Red River, is readying for its annual disaster. According to Mayor Dennis Walaker, the community is planning to assemble 1 million sandbags.
It’s “time to prepare, not time to panic,” he told me last week, seemingly resigned to another tough spring. Last year, the Fargo area was hit with devastating flooding, and, as a result, there seemed to be agreement on finding a permanent solution. But it’s not happening.
“It takes a long time to get all the stars aligned,” Walaker said.
He pointed out that Fargo is on the North Dakota-Minnesota border. That means two states, two counties and various parts of the federal government all have a say in any flood-control plan. He guesses any project would cost at least $1 billion and take at least six years to construct, provided everyone can agree.
Given Fargo’s problem and other responses to natural disasters today, our story remains remarkable.
First, the Miami Valley didn’t turn to Washington or Columbus. We paid for and figured out our own solution. Today, it’s unimaginable — and perhaps impossible — that a community would not ask for help from the federal government.
And what about the cost?
The community raised $2 million to create its plan. Adjusted for inflation, that would be about $44 million today. Again, they raised it in 10 days.
The cost of the overall system of dams and levees was $31 million. That would translate to at least $336 million today, not counting legal costs, regulatory expenses and changes in property values (the conservancy district bought land for the project). It’s probably safe to say that it would cost us a billion dollars today to build the system we have.
Today we see our levees and dams as part of the landscape, but they are monuments to incredible political and social will for change. Some time this spring, when it’s been raining for days, go to one of the dams or stand atop a levee.
A good spot is at the Taylorsville Dam on the Great Miami River near Vandalia, where U.S. 40 goes across the top of the dam and there’s a small parking lot.
As you watch the roiling water the dam controls, consider our community’s finest hour, and whether we could muster the will to do something like that again.
Permalink | Comments (9) | Post your comment |
TweetEditorial: Air Force under gun as Northrop exits tanker fight
A new generation of flying gas stations has been described for years as the biggest pending Air Force acquisition.
Incredibly, airplanes — known as tankers — that refuel other planes in flight have existed for many decades. More incredibly, the tankers that the U.S. military now use are from the 1950s and 1960s.
The process of getting them replaced has been, shall we say, a bit troubled.
Not for many years has there been any controversy about whether the tankers should be replaced.
When the Air Force moved to update the fleet in 2001, Boeing was the sole bidder. But the company was eventually stripped of the deal after a scandal that resulted in people going to jail. Sen. John McCain was instrumental in bringing the scandal to light.
Later in the decade, Boeing bid against Northrop Grumman, which was in a partnership with a European firm. The bids were handled at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, where the later stages of the acquisition process will also be managed.
Northrop won the bid, but Boeing appealed, and an independent government investigation found that the Air Force didn’t follow its own rules in awarding the bid, changed the rules in midgame and gave more information to one side than the other. (Definitely not a shining moment for Wright-Patterson.)
Perhaps the Air Force was bending over backward not to be accused of favoring Boeing.
So the bidding process was restarted. This time, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has taken responsibility for running it.
But now Northrop has pulled out. It says the Pentagon’s specifications favor the smaller Boeing plane.
This is not good, because it eliminates competition, which tends to drive costs down.
Some people are enraged over the government’s posture. European officials see protectionism at play. The president of France has promised to take up the issue with President Barack Obama. And Alabama, where much of the work on the Northrop plane was to be done, is ready for a Franco-Bama alliance, not withstanding any lingering hard feelings about France’s view on the Iraq war.
But Northrop says it won’t push the fight anymore, given how long American troops have had to wait for a modern tanker. That’s good.
In truth, the Pentagon’s position looks pretty solid. Secretary Gates has long emphasized that the Pentagon shouldn’t always buy the most expensive systems available. The Northrop plane could carry more fuel than the Air Force requested. More is nice, but there were reasons behind the Air Force request. And the Boeing plane is smaller, so it can land in more places.
At any rate, the upshot of Northrop’s decision was not only to make Boeing’s day. (A contract for $40 billion, with the possibility for more later, up to $100 billion, can do that.) The upshot was to put the Pentagon and the Air Force under more public scrutiny than ever.
And Boeing. If Boeing gets arrogant — feeling it can’t lose — that could still derail the process again.
Secretary Gates is out to save money. He can’t allow his decisions about the bid specifications to backfire by virtrue of eliminating competition. He will need help from the Air Force in keeping Boeing under control — not only in awarding the enormously complex, long-term contract, but in carrying it out.
Permalink | Comments (4) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Martin Gottlieb, Wright Patterson Air Force Base
TweetMartin Gottlieb: Linking Portman to birthers gets Democrats noplace
When Rob Portman was in the Miami Valley to campaign for the U.S. Senate recently, he was preceded on the program by two — count them — local Republican politicians who, in the process, cracked birther jokes.
Not jokes about birthers — the people who somehow manage to believe that President Barack Obama wasn’t born in this country and isn’t a citizen; but jokes proceeding on the premise that Obama was, in fact, not born in this country.
This campaign event really did happen. There’s audio and video.
Ever since, Ohio Democrats have been having a blast. They’re e-mailing links to the audio and video. They’re calling on Portman to denounce the birthers. They’re counting the days during which he has not done so to their satisfaction. They’re reporting about how many blogs have picked up the story. (See talkingpointsmemo.com, for example, and search for Rob Portman to hear the audios.)
They’re milking the thing for all it’s worth.
But, really, it’s not worth much.
Portman was in Darke County for a Lincoln Day Dinner, a fundraising event. Introducing him was state Rep. James Zehringer. He said that Wikipedia, an online source, offers a biography of Portman that starts with he’s “an American lawyer.”
Said Zehringer, “That’s something our president can’t say.”
You probably had to be there. (Actually, though, the audio raises questions about whether even those who were present were amused.)
Before Zehringer, Jim Buchy (pronounced Beeky) spoke. He was a state legislator for many years. An assistant House Republican leader, he was known as among the most conservative people in Columbus.
He delivered a recitation that was apparently already going around in right-wing circles. It entails a comparison of Abraham Lincoln and Obama, both, after all, being lawyers and legislators from Illinois who reached the White House without great prior experience in office. It ends, as Buchy offered it:
“Lincoln was a skinny lawyer. Obama is a skinny lawyer. Lincoln was a Republican. Obama is a skinny lawyer. Lincoln was born in the United States. Obama is a skinny lawyer.”
Defenders of Buchy and Zehringer say they were just joking around, however badly. Still, one might expect experienced politicians to know it’s not a great idea to tie your guy to the birthers. Maybe what they didn’t count on was the Internet.
Portman didn’t say anything about the birther jokes at the event. But he has, upon being pressed, called the remarks “inappropriate,” before changing the subject to how the Democrats can’t do anything but take cheap shots.
The whole thing looks to reasonable people like one of those political flaps that warriors and journalists love but have no real meaning, being only diversions from serious talk about complex issues. (And you know how much people love serious talk about complex issues.)
In fact, though, there’s a legitimate, relevant issue. Portman has somehow developed a reputation for level-headedness and a kind of gentility, even while keeping the fire-breathing conservatives happy. This bugs the Democrats. They want to paint him as afraid to take on the party’s fringes. They want to undercut his reputation among independents.
They point, among other things, to a John McCain campaign event in 2008 when radio flamer Bill Cunningham carried on in a way that led McCain to explicitly “repudiate” Cunningham. Portman, another speaker at the event, kind of laughed it off, in the name of party unity.
“Willie, you’re out of control again,” he said on stage. “So, what else is new? But we love him. … I’ve got to tell you, Bill Cunningham lending his voice to this campaign is extremely important.”
Some might reasonably be put off.
Thing is, though, politically speaking, Portman probably doesn’t need to establish credentials as a moderate. If swing voters are inclined to think that the president they elected in 2008 needs to be balanced off with Republicans in Congress — as such voters often seem to think in midterm elections — they’re likely to be little concerned about varying degrees of conservatism among Republicans. They’re not electing a president, after all, just balancing the parties.
Speaking of presidents, though, look at how the Republicans did in 2008, when they pointed to Barack Obama’s embarrassing affiliations: his minister, an associate with an extremist background, ACORN.
The voters who were up for grabs just didn’t care. They judged the individual and the circumstances of the election.
For some reason, up-for-grabs voters seem to assume that everybody in politics has embarrassing friends.
Permalink | Comments (8) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Martin Gottlieb, Miami Valley Politics, Ohio politics
TweetEditorial: Construction fight a study in dysfunction
The latest obstacle to Beavercreek school district’s long-running quest to build two new schools couldn’t be more bizarre.
What should have been a breezy meeting last month with the Beavercreek Twp. Zoning Commission to approve a zoning change for the new schools got unexpectedly testy as commission members questioned school officials’ construction plan.
After the board put off a decision, questions by a Dayton Daily News reporter revealed an even bigger problem: half of the zoning commission’s members were serving though their terms had expired.
The district now must wait for the mess to get cleared up, further delaying its plan for new schools next to the Stonehill Village housing development.
The whole affair calls into question the ability of key leaders — at the township, the city and the school district — to solve problems. These processes must become more cooperative.
The school construction saga has been a study in dysfunction. Stonehill’s developer, Robert Nutter, initially offered to sell some and donate other land to the district if it placed schools there. But Mr. Nutter asked for oversight over the building design, which nearly scuttled the deal. The school board was so close to giving up on the Stonehill plan that it turned its attention to a different property it already owned and began planning a school there.
However, that dispute is now over. Mr. Nutter and the school board came to the zoning commission on the same page, wanting to remove the land from Stonehill’s planned development to allow for both schools to be built there.
Zoning commission members not only balked, they demanded that the school board explain its choice in a discussion that went well beyond their purview.
At one point, commission member Charles Brackenhoff told school board member Peg Arnold, who was there just to observe, she “really needs to sway the zoning commission” that the board’s site for the schools made sense.
Choosing school sites is not the commission’s job; it’s the school board’s. The only legitimate question for the commission was whether the school board’s zoning request makes sense under township law, which it does.
The commission’s behavior seems even more out of line now, given that half of its members continued to make zoning decisions for the township up to 18 months after their terms expired.
The township trustees are clinging to a passage in the rules that says a commission member can continue to serve after a term expires until a successor is named. Obviously, though, that was intended to serve as an occasional short-term fix, not a license for members to serve indefinitely.
On Monday, the township trustees formally reappointed the necessary members, hoping to resolve any uncertainty.
Growth in Beavercreek and the township has reached the point at which a high degree of coordination is needed for effective governance. The question of whether a merger of the two would better serve the larger community simmers in the background.
Regardless of how that is resolved, Beaverceek exists as one community. The city, township and schools — and zoning commission — all must be working in partnership, and each must have a grip on its own responsibilities. In this case, the township didn’t have its act together.
Permalink | Comments (2) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Education, Suburban Communities
TweetEditorial: Annual festivals aren’t MetroParks’ essential work
Five Rivers MetroParks is taking a drubbing from at least a few of the estimated 20,000 to 30,000 people who come out for the Garlic Festival. More than a few RiverBlast and Butterfly Festival fans are disappointed, too.
MetroParks is canceling those events, arguing that mega-event planning isn’t the park district’s mission. Reasonable as the view is, it probably isn’t the best way to explain a decision that is bound to upset people who’ve come to associate these big, fun, free annual events with the organization.
Meanwhile, MetroParks also is discontinuing the laser light show that’s held on weekends during the summer and after Dragons games at RiverScape.
Especially coming on the heels of last fall’s vote to renew the park district’s 10-year 1.8-mill levy, of course, some people are going to complain about these things going away. Getting out of the business of delivering something people enjoy is dicey without a well-honed, concrete message of what they’ll be getting instead.
MetroParks is fundamentally about conservation, making nature accessible and education. Putting on the Garlic and Butterfly festivals — each of which takes 1,000 direct hours of staff time, not counting the prep time — was increasingly becoming a drain.
Meanwhile, the events were a flash in the pan. They didn’t protect the parks; the crowds were so big that people weren’t really experiencing the essence of the parks; and there wasn’t a lot of evidence that visitors were coming back on other occasions as a result of having had a good time at the festivals.
Think about how many festivals there are in this community, many of them organized mostly by volunteers. Of all the things Dayton doesn’t have enough of, festivals is not one of them.
When RiverScape opened in 2001, Memorial Day weekend’s RiverBlast was the only festival being held there. Today there’s the CityFolk Festival (which moved from downtown’s main streets to RiverScape), the Celtic Festival, the Hispanic Festival, the African-American Festival and more.
The laser light shows were popular initially, but attendance has horribly fallen off. Charlie Shoemaker, MetroParks executive director, said average attendance is less than 150 on the weekend, 50 during the week after a Dragons game.
Furthermore, the lasers need to be replaced, which would cost $240,00. The computer program for each laser show runs $17,000 on top of that.
MetroParks officials are being disingenuous when they say their decision isn’t about money. Of course money is a driving factor, even if it’s not the only consideration.
MetroParks has a $20 million operating budget; the Montgomery County property tax levy represents about $17.9 million of that amount.
There is some concern that property tax proceeds won’t be as steady as they have been in the past, with large numbers of foreclosures bringing down property values and more people not paying their tax bills.
Meanwhile, starting next year, the tangible personal property tax will be phased out over six years. That will result in a loss of about $1.7 million annually.
MetroParks has 25 parks that cover almost 15,000 acres. Managing them and creating programming is an evolutionary enterprise. What once worked and produced the most payback will change over time.
There’s no shortage of next big things for MetroParks to be involved in — from building a whitewater park to creating more and better bike trails. To create those things, choices have to be made.
Permalink | Comments (15) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Ellen Belcher, Montgomery County, Sports and Recreation
TweetMartin Gottlieb: Finn loses ally to the left — or the right
If people set out to improve longstanding institutions and ways, they will most likely make things worse. That used to be a premise of American conservatism, as promoted, say, in mid-century by William F. Buckley’s National Review magazine. The mission statement of that magazine — the fountainhead of the conservative movement — said the magazine “stands athwart history, yelling Stop.”
Then the conservatives changed. Fear of change gave way to an ideology about how society and government should be structured. All change in the direction of ideological purity was suddenly good.
Take education policy. Confronting a public school tradition, the conservative changers were for everything their ideology could imagine and tolerate: school choice, merit pay for teachers, charter schools, more testing, more “accountability,” mayoral control of school systems, you name it.
The old notion that change-seekers tend to mess things up transmuted into liberals mess things up. That formulation proved emotionally satisfying to some, but it lacked the old elegance, the foundation in human nature, the insight that fallibility is general.
All of which is preface to this:
Those who have followed the modern debate over education policy — especially in Dayton — know the name Chester “Checker” Finn Jr. A local boy, he became assistant secretary of education, a leading conservative voice on school issues and a promoter of charter schools, especially in Dayton. The Washington-based Fordham Foundation, a think tank he heads, has adopted Dayton and Ohio as test cases.
Often when his name has been mentioned, the name Diane Ravitch has been not far behind. She’s been a colleague in arms, a co-author and a friend, also with a Fordham connection.
Well, educational policy circles are now abuzz — yes, these people do buzz with the best of them — over the fact that Ravitch, a greatly respected researcher and writer, has flipped on him. Not that she has turned him over to the authorities with allegations of cooked books or anything. But flipped ideologically speaking.
She’s out with a book called “The Death and Life of the Great American School System,” in which she lays out how and why she has become disillusioned with the school reforms that she and Finn have pushed so successfully.
She now believes the politicians should pretty much leave the public schools alone. She also believes public schools are the best hope, rather than alternatives.
Finn, too, has found the reform experience somewhat chastening. Some years ago he offered the memorable line, “This is hard,” about building charters that are better than public schools. That might not sound like much of an admission, but you have to understand where some conservatives started: give a principal a baseball bat and watch test scores rise.
Even now Finn and Ravitch have much in common. In response to her book, he writes (in a blog at the Fordham site):
“We … share a number of disappointments and frustrations. … ‘Accountability’ has turned to test-cramming and bean-counting, often limited to basic reading and math skills. That emphasis, in turn, has diverted what was already weak-kneed attention to history, literature, art, etc. … NCLB (No Child Left Behind, the main federal school program) has brought as many problems as solutions. … Charter schools are uneven at best. …
“A lot of innovations and reforms … have failed … — hence our essentially-flat test scores and graduation rates these past three decades — and some have had malign side effects.”
Where they disagree: He wants to get bolder and more insistent with reforms; she wants to turn back.
Finn has referred to his own prescription as “blow it up,” where the pronoun refers to the public school system.
Which brings us back to conservatism.
“Blow it up?”
So let’s see. Ravitch, a former Democrat (married to the Democratic lieutenant governor of New York) first moves to the political right, embracing free-market based solutions and siding with anti-union forces. Then, after long testing of these ideas, moves back in the other direction.
And yet, to see her latest move as that supposedly rare case of an older person (71) becoming more liberal is to miss something. Ravitch has embraced the insight of earlier conservatives about how trying to fix something that’s stable and traditional often makes it worse.
Complicating the ideological picture is this: the Finn-Ravitch educational reforms were eventually embraced to some degree by the political center including, now, the Barack Obama administration, which Ravitch criticizes it for.
So we have, from right to left, Finn, Obama and Ravitch.
Or is it left to right?
Permalink | Comments (5) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Education, Locals in national affairs, Martin Gottlieb
TweetEditorial: ‘Last Truck’ very much an ongoing story
In the time between the debut of the “The Last Truck” at the Schuster Center last year and the remarkable scene at the Academy Awards show Sunday night, March 7, the story told by the documentary only got bigger and more important.
The HBO film made by Julia Reichert and Steve Bognar was about the General Motors Moraine Assembly Plant closing at Christmas 2008. Now the four former GM workers who went with the filmmakers to Hollywood for the Oscars are still out of work. That makes it a different kind of story.
Lots of people lose jobs all the time. Indeed, thousands of other auto workers have lost jobs in recent decades. But losing jobs is one thing when there are other jobs around.
The timing of the closing of the Moraine plant could not have been worse.
It happened to coincide with the historic collapse of the banking and financial sector of the American economy, a collapse that was to send the country into its worst economic tailspin in generations.
Imagine being a laid-off auto worker trying to find a job in that climate. That’s a whole other movie.
One scene might be from the Academy Awards show itself, with the unemployed workers fittingly present, having not only starred in the movie but helped to film inside the plant when the moviemakers themselves weren’t allowed in.
So there they were. One often hears of actors who are unemployed one year, then — struck by Hollywood lightning — find themselves at the Oscars the next. But the Daytonians were at the Oscars even while unemployed.
What a remarkable moment in the history of this community it would have been if “The Last Truck” had won in its category. Not exactly happy for the community, of course, given the nature of the story; but certainly a moment to be listed on a timeline history of Dayton.
Nobody in Dayton would relish having the city known for its problems. But what is is. Best to get the truth out there, then think about sequels, if not for HBO, then for the community.
Instead of an Oscar, the movie won itself a footnote in Oscar history as one of the nominees in the category that saw a “Kanye moment,” an outburst reminiscent of when Kanye West rapper interrupted Taylor Swift’s speech at the MTV Video Music Awards last fall.
The winning short-subject documentary was “Music by Prudence,” a fact which precipitated an interruption at the microphone and a nasty exchange afterward among “Prudence” people.
Unfortunately, however, such unseemly episodes don’t result in awards being rescinded and re-awarded to somebody else.
What the concrete result of an Oscar would have been for Dayton — or Moraine — is not clear. Some attention would have been drawn to the fact that Dayton has, to this day, a lot of unemployed workers ready to work in new enterprises.
Perhaps the most useful result would have been a renewed focus on just how hard it has been for many victims of job loss to recover, certainly in Ohio, and on just how much attention is still needed to the task of creating new jobs and fostering transitions to those jobs.
“The Last Truck” is not, most important, a story about the decline of the American auto industry. It’s not about history or 2008. It’s about today.
Permalink | Comments (7) | Post your comment | Categories: Auto industry, Editorials, Locals in national affairs, Martin Gottlieb
TweetEditorial: Voinovich vote right, but jobs bill not the answer
Last month’s basically flat unemployment numbers look like good news to some people who are highly focused on the economy. After all, February’s huge snowfalls peaked in precisely the week when certain stats were being counted.
Tens of thousands of job losses were reported in construction, retail and other realms because people couldn’t get around.
Among the homebound, too, were people who might have been out seeking jobs, which are materializing in some sectors, though in small numbers.
So the flatness of the stats might be covering up some progress.
Meanwhile, some analysts are struck by the numbers about retailing. Most of the big chains have posted increasing sales gains over the past six months, with the February jump being the largest since 2007.
Dean Baker is with the Center for Economic and Policy Research, which has been skeptical of signs of recovery. But he says of the current direction, “It’s strikingly good. It’s much better than it had been looking.”
Still, nobody — but nobody — is expecting any dramatic improvement in the job situation. Profits may return for good; overall economic growth may return. Jobs? Not so much.
As for how things are going so far, flat unemployment rates aren’t the best demonstrations of the problem. They only count how many people say they are looking for jobs. Best, perhaps, to count the actual number of jobs. But, on that score, too, the overall picture is bleak.
Certain sectors are showing slightly more jobs, including manufacturing, which is good for Ohio to see. Remarkably, even the auto industry is a growth area.
But the overall loss of 36,000 jobs in February put the nation more than 136,000 short of where it needs to be just to keep up with a growing population.
So the politicians talk “jobs, jobs, jobs,” even more than usual and, certainly, across party lines.
But whether their declared interest will pay off for the unemployed is doubtful. President Barack Obama has proposed tax breaks for employers who hire unemployed workers. One might think that would win a lot of Republican support, given how often members of that party emphasizes the usefulness of tax breaks for business.
And, yes, there has been some support. Ohio Sen. George Voinovich was among five Republicans who bolted from the party leadership to kill a filibuster against the idea. When the bill itself was voted on, eight more Republicans joined in.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, an early sponsor, said “This is a conservative approach to help put our economy back on track through tax relief, not more government spending.”
But only six Republicans in the House supported that body’s version of the bill (none from southwest Ohio).
There were concerns about the bill increasing the deficit and failing to create jobs. Suddenly, it was Republicans expressing doubts about the usefulness of business tax breaks.
The main provisions of the bill allow employers not to pay payroll taxes on any unemployed workers they hire this year, and to take $1,000 off their federal taxes for any such employee who stays a year.
The cost of the bill is $15 billion, far too little to have a dramatic impact on an economy measured in the trillions. That’s all the more clearly true when you figure that some of the new hiring would presumably happen even without the new incentives.
Most of the people promoting new efforts to spur job growth have used figures of $100 billion and more.
The reluctance of employers to hire — for fear of another economic downturn, given all they went through the last time around — is likely to be very hard to break through.
Permalink | Comments (11) | Post your comment | Categories: Economy, Editorials, Locals in national affairs, Martin Gottlieb, National government
TweetEditorial: Real change can get Ohio more Race to the Top cash
Ohio got lucky Thursday when it was named a finalist for $400 million in federal grant money for schools. But the state has work to do if it truly wants big bucks or, more important, if it wants to try to make President Barack Obama’s reforms work.
Meanwhile, Dayton might still get a second chance at up to $5 million, after a potentially disastrous fumble while applying for a piece of the aid. Thankfully, the teachers union has done the right thing by reversing course and removing the costly roadblock it tossed in the district’s way in January. (The union refused to endorse Dayton’s application, saying it had concerns about strings attached to the federal money.)
Ohio’s selection among 15 states and the District of Columbia as finalists to compete for a share of $4 billion in Race to the Top grant money raised a few eyebrows. The state is not among those most commonly mentioned as likely contenders to be showcased as poster children for reform.
The Thomas B. Fordham Foundation’s Dayton-based Vice President Terry Ryan called Ohio’s application a “B-minus” effort.
U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan repeatedly promised only the very best applicants would be chosen, and politics would not be a factor. But critics have already taken note that Ohio was one of five politically important “swing states” (with Florida, Pennsylvania, Colorado and North Carolina) in the 2008 election to make the list, while only five deeply conservative states (Tennessee, Kentucky, Louisiana, Georgia and South Carolina) were picked. The other six (New York, Illinois, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, the District of Columbia and Delaware) would have to be considered liberal.
That’s not to say that Ohio didn’t have a good case for federal funds. Some of Gov. Ted Strickland’s initiatives approved by the state legislature last year match well with President Obama’s priorities. But the state was much less aggressive than others which, in many cases, changed their laws to better fit the grant requirements.
In fact, state Sen. Jon Husted’s Senate Bill 180, which sought to improve the state’s chances, went nowhere.
The U.S. Department of Education isn’t saying how many states will win first-round funding next month or how much money they will get. But the signals have been strong that just a few states will be picked and that they will share a large pot of money.
It’s probably too late for Ohio to improve its case for the first round. Sen. Husted’s bill deserves a second look if the state gets a second chance to apply later this year.
Weirdly, Dayton would actually be better off if the state doesn’t get money in the first round. If Ohio is an early winner, none of it will come to Dayton because of the teachers union’s refusal initially to sign the grant application. If Ohio is picked in the second round, however, Dayton might be included because the union is now on board. Dayton certainly isn’t the only local district that blew it the first time around. Statewide, just 40 percent of school districts sought the millions available in district-level grants. Among those who took an ill-advised pass were Northmont, West Carrollton and Trotwood-Madison — all districts that are on the May ballot asking voters for new money.
Any district with financial needs shouldn’t be turning down a shot at federal aid. In this state, schools need money.
Permalink | Comments (10) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Education, Scott Elliott
TweetEllen Belcher: County’s Feldman will weather SCLC storm
If you just landed in Dayton and read about the scandal involving the Rev. Raleigh Trammell and the local Southern Christian Leadership, you might ask whose head is going to roll.
Lax monitoring of groups being paid tens of thousands of dollars to deliver services to the poor. Reimbursements for helping people who weren’t being helped.
Lesser embarrassments have cost people their jobs. But no one in high places is pointing a finger at Deborah Feldman, Montgomery County administrator. In fact, quite the opposite, they defend her fiercely and say they’re heartsick that she’s had to do most of the explaining publicly for the SCLC debacle.
The support for her stems from history, relationships and capital built up over almost 30 years.
Feldman’s entire professional career has been in Montgomery County. She was hired by former County Administrator Claude Malone, promoted by his successor, Don Vermillion, and has been at the helm since 1997.
Over the years, there have been times when elected officials have been so weak, many people have worried how things would have gone without her influence.
The fact that she’s stayed in her position and at Montgomery County counts for more than a little. Yes, her husband’s commercial laundry business is here, but she could have sought and gotten a different job locally.
Charged with managing an $851 million budget, she knows something about running a complicated enterprise.
Almost four years ago, Feldman’s name came up when Riverside City Manager James Onello was suspended for misusing his city credit card. He put in for reimbursement for taking her, among a cast of other local officials, to lunches at the The Living Room, a seedy gentleman’s club on North Dixie Drive.
Everyone denied having dined with Onello at the club, but Feldman’s quote was memorable for its emphasis.
“If you know me, you know the Living Room isn’t someplace I’d ever, ever, ever, ever, ever set foot in,” Feldman said.
Feldman, 52, is as protective of the county’s name as her own. Montgomery County, in the 1970s, had some certified crooks in elective office. But, after they were booted out or indicted, it has earned a reputation in state and national circles as progressive and clean.
(Trammell was central to one of the scandals in the 1970s; he worked at the welfare department and served time in prison for welfare fraud charges.)
The petite, deftly commanding Feldman is widely seen as the force that keeps independently elected officials from the prosecutor to the coroner to the engineer in general lock-step about the county’s priorities and how it’s going to spend its money. Her shuttle diplomacy when there’s a riff is always behind the scenes, and her discretion in mopping up after someone else’s mistake — the sheriff’s mishandling of the emergency dispatch center, for instance — has made her a trusted official with both Democrats and Republicans.
Especially close to former County Commissioner Vicki Pegg, she and Pegg are unabashed defenders of the county’s responsibility to the poor. Specifically, Feldman has gotten her hands dirty — not just chaired committees — with initiatives to help reduce homelessness and get high-school drop-outs back in school.
In this work, she’s among the people who has compellingly connected the dots, insisting that if the community doesn’t help drop-outs, it’s going to be paying for them when it has to build a bigger jail; that if homeless people are wandering the streets, eventually they’ll show up in emergency rooms or courtrooms, and their doctors or lawyers will be paid with tax dollars.
The major instrument that has allowed Montgomery County to show a sense of locally-supported compassion is its Human Services Levy.
Unlike so much other county money, it’s a tax that voters have a direct say about.
Feldman is not alone in worrying that, come renewal time within the next year and a half, voters might pause about it or even vote no if their confidence in the county has been shaken.
It’s that fear — not that she could be fired — that has Feldman angry at herself and her subordinates for not having a tighter rein on the SCLC and also the Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance, which Trammell is linked to and which also received substantial county money.
Feldman has to take her share of the blame. But, clearly, she is not the bad guy.
Permalink | Comments (38) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Ellen Belcher, Montgomery County, Social Services
TweetEditorial: Ohio’s rebound depends on cities
In light of what you know about Ohio’s cities — their population losses, their troubled schools, their skyrocketing foreclosures — you might think they’re only a drag on the state.
Now comes a report saying Ohio has to tend to those places, and the concentrations of people in and around them, because they are the state’s future.
Researchers from the respected Brookings Institution and the Greater Ohio Policy Center have spent upward of three years taking stock of Ohio, drawn, in part, to the examination because Ohio has so many metropolitan areas.
The think tanks argue that in a global, information economy, metros are where the action will occur.
The reason? Those are the places that have roads, universities, cutting-edge hospitals, waterfronts, mature parks, museums and — most of all — the people.
“Today the seven largest metropolitan areas in the state house 70 percent of the state population and produce 80 percent of the state GDP,” researchers write in Restoring Prosperity: Transforming Ohio’s communities for the Next Economy.
If metropolitan regions are indeed assets, Ohio is looking good. It has more than any state except California, Texas and Florida.
Mixed in among the three dozen recommendations about what Ohio needs to do (and stop doing), the report also highlights assets you might not know about. For instance, given all the talk about the “brain drain,” it’s interesting that Ohio is in the top 10 among the states for awarding doctorates in science or engineering.
Of course, conferring the degrees is just half of the battle; ensuring that the grads actually take jobs and start businesses in the state is the other. But certainly having people who spend years doing graduate work here is an advantage.
In pursuit of improving schools, researchers say that school districts should be required to publicize their per-pupil ratio of spending on administration to classroom instruction.
Pointing to Montgomery County, the report says that the tiny Jefferson Twp. school district spends 68 cents on the dollar for administration, whereas Centerville spends just 13 cents.
The suggestion from the report that’s gotten the most media attention is that Ohio should reduce its number of school districts by a third.
Bruce Katz, of Brookings, said he thinks that idea is actually “modest,” that even 400 districts would be too many for Ohio. Mr. Katz argues that what citizens care most about is not who runs a school district, but the quality of schools their children attend. If reducing administrative overhead means more money can be spent in classrooms, he doesn’t think voters would object.
There are precedents in other states for districts to merge administrative functions, leaving individual schools, sports teams and even school boards intact.
For those who worry about consolidation being big government, Mr. Katz says that’s getting the recommendation all wrong. Consolidation translates to “leaner,” “more entrepreneurial,” “more market-oriented” government, he said.
School districts are not the only thing Ohio has in spades. It also has some 3,800 local government units, including 250 cities, 695 villages and 1,308 townships. The result is that “total local government payroll in Ohio is 10 percent above the national average and 17.5 percent above the peer state average,” according to Brookings.
None of this government is free, which leads to another finding: Ohio residents have the ninth-highest local tax burden in the country, compared with the 34th highest for state taxes. To know that fact is to understand that concentrating all the political fights about taxes in Columbus — as if state taxes alone define our competitiveness — is missing a big cost of doing business and living in Ohio.
Local government can be good government. But it’s also possible to have too much of a good thing.
Permalink | Comments (65) | Post your comment | Categories: City of Dayton, Economy, Editorials, Education, Ellen Belcher, Ohio government, Suburban Communities
TweetMartin Gottlieb: Boehner needs Voinovich help on debt
Let’s check back in on the Dayton area’s guy in national leadership, Rep. John Boehner, chief of House Republicans. And Sen. George Voinovich.
For several years, Voinovich has pushed this enormous idea: Appoint a bipartisan commission to make recommendations on the nation’s long-term debt issues. Those issues are monumental, and neither a Republican nor Democratic Congress — or a Republican or Democratic president — has confronted them.
This commission would make recommendations about taxes and about the big entitlement programs that are the heart of the spending problem. Congress would be required to either accept or reject the recommendations as a package.
(Allowing Congress to amend the package is universally seen as going back to square one, as willing nothing to be done.)
In January, a majority of senators supported the idea. But, the Senate being that bastion of democracy, it failed. It needed support from 60 percent. (It got 62 percent of the Democrats and 40 percent of the Republicans.)
Voinovich was angry at Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell for reneging on his past support and at President Barack Obama for not pushing the idea hard enough or early enough. Obama left the impression he wasn’t that into the issue.
Then, in his State of the Union speech — after a lengthy meeting with Voinovich — Obama announced that he’d create the commission himself. Unfortunately, though, his commission can’t have the enforcement mechanism, the requirement of an up or down vote. It can only recommend.
Voinovich would still like to see the commission-with-teeth idea revived in Congress. Enter Boehner. There was some uncertainty about whether he’d even participate in the presidential commission. But he has agreed to make his share of appointments. Good. To have refused would have broken records for partisanship.
But, of course, he couldn’t go along without trashing the president. He trashed him for his budget policies. He questioned whether the commission would have a genuinely bipartisan staff. He insisted that its meetings be before cameras and be announced early.
He also called for moving up the deadline for the commission report to Oct. 1, from Dec. 1, so that its proposals can be part of the 2010 political campaign, rather than presented to a lame-duck Congress for action. (Truth is, some promoters of the commission like the idea of a lame-duck, post-election Congress; it would be politically freer to infuriate.)
One news outlet characterized Boehner as “dissing” the commission. But by the prevailing standards of Washington, he was restrained.
But if, indeed, Boehner is worried about a presidential commission, a solution beckons. How about taking up the Voinovich cause: a congressional commission?
Boehner hammers the president over the head incessantly about the national debt, portraying it as a grave, immediate threat to the nation and everybody in it. But he knows that the presidency will be in Democratic hands for three years.
So what could possibly address his concerns about the debt better than a mandated bipartisan solution? The Republicans are complaining about being ignored. Suddenly they’d be given power.
If Boehner pushed for a commission with teeth, he’d be taking up the president on his call for bipartisanship. The president could hardly oppose him.
As a political bonus, Boehner would get the fun of putting the Democrats on the spot and driving a wedge between them, given that some do and some don’t support a congressional commission.
Of course, that division exists among Republicans, too. And congressional leaders don’t love dividing their own supporters. Therein lies the crunch.
But, at some stage, both parties have to get realistic about the political realities surrounding the debt, about what’s doable and what isn’t. It’s either compromise or nothing.
Even the creation of a commission with teeth isn’t a magic answer. The commission could fail to reach agreement on dramatic changes. Indeed, congressional leaders could almost guarantee that by appointing hardline conservatives and liberals.
But if you sat down, say, George Voinovich with Joe Lieberman (another sponsor of the commission-with-teeth plan), they could likely work something out.
It might include something that would irritate Boehner’s conservative, tax-obsessed base. But, given that there’s no way he can get the government to confront the deficit his way (if, indeed, he has a way), he has to decide if he prefers the possibility of doing nothing. Maybe the debt problem isn’t that big a deal, after all, but, instead, just something that’s fun to talk about.
Permalink | Comments (12) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Locals in national affairs, Martin Gottlieb, Miami Valley Politics, National government
TweetEditorial: Five Oaks kids the losers in school fight
The children of Five Oaks are the clear losers now that Dayton Public Schools has decided to abandon its plan for a school at the site of the former Julienne High School — or anywhere near the neighborhood.
As a battle that lasted almost three years has come to an apparent close, nobody really won. Still, everybody got something except the kids.
Neighborhood activists and alumni who sought to save the Julienne building from the wrecking ball saw their wish fulfilled. But those who fought to save the school also repeatedly said they wanted the building to be active, not to just sit and rot. Prospects for reuse now are dismal, with the school district moving on.
Julienne has been for sale for two years without any offers. There is no reason in sight to believe the building’s long-term future will be anything other than sitting empty. By passing on the Julienne site, the school district failed to keep a big promise to Five Oaks. Consistently, school officials have said a school absolutely was needed in, or very near, the neighborhood because of the high concentration of children who live there and attend the city schools.
The district even crafted a back-up plan to build a school about a mile away at the former site of Colonel White High School. But now that won’t happen either. The millions the school board won’t spend in Five Oaks will instead be committed to the board’s new priority — building high school additions so grades seven and eight can be added to those buildings.
Six months ago, a clear signal from the city would have saved Five Oaks from this situation. The question went before the Dayton City Commission: should the district be allowed to build a new school or must the Julienne building be preserved? School officials and the neighborhood group eagerly awaited a final resolution.
The commissioners punted. Rather than make the tough call, they asked for more discussion, delaying a vote by 90 days. That vote never came.
Had the city commissioners given the school district a go-ahead, construction of a new school at the Julienne site might already be underway. Had the commissioners said no, the district likely would have moved ahead briskly with construction at the nearby Colonel White site.
By ducking the question, the commission, in effect, put the issue on the back burner, ultimately leading to the worst possible outcome for the neighborhood.
Five Oaks, hit hard by the foreclosure crisis and struggling with crime, desperately needed the multimillion-dollar investment that was part of the promise of a school at the Julienne site. It’s sad to see the district take that money somewhere other than where it is needed most.
Most disappointing is the way this debate became totally focused on adults — school officials, city officials and activists — and what they wanted. Hundreds of Five Oaks kids, who would have benefited most from a school within walking distance, were the one constituency that nobody spoke up for.
There is no credible argument that the kids will be better off going somewhere else. But the final resolution of the debate over Julienne will leave them out in the cold, waiting for a school bus.
Permalink | Comments (8) | Post your comment | Categories: City of Dayton, Editorials, Education, Scott Elliott
TweetEditorial: Wright brothers more Ohio than Edison, Stowe
Which dead Ohioans should be memorialized in statues at the U.S. Capitol building?
People bring all manner of agendas to the question. Some think there’s a dearth of women there. (There is.) Some want members of racial minorities. Some are looking for a boost for their own hometown.
A lot of people in Dayton want the Wright brothers.
Allow for all the local prejudices you want to allow for in the current editorial, the fact remains that the case for Orville and Wilbur is awfully powerful.
All states have been told they may replace the people from their states who are now on display. Ohio is replacing a discredited 19th-century governor.
A committee of the Ohio legislature worked up a list of 93 Ohioans from which to choose. Now it has narrowed the list to 10, a useful service.
Each member was allowed to pick 10 and rank them. So a total ranking emerged. But the total ranking has no formal meaning. The public will be allowed to cast votes on the 10, before the committee makes the final selection.
The ranking of the top 10 is not as useful as their selection.
Top vote-getter was Thomas Edison. True, his accomplishments and importance cannot be reasonably denigrated, compared to anybody, even the Wrights.
But he lived in Ohio only until he was seven.
Coming in second was Harriet Beecher Stowe, another worthy figure. She was the author of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” which Abraham Lincoln may or may not have — seriously or not seriously — labeled the cause of the Civil War. She certainly brought slavery to the attention of a lot of people in the North.
For Ohioans who think the honoree should represent a clear moral cause, she has appeal.
However, like Edison, her connection to Ohio was limited. She moved to Cincinnati in her early 20s and stayed for about 20 years. She did her famous writing on the East Coast, and she lived a long life there.
Maybe one guideline in picking an honoree should be that people who might be picked by some other state, too, should be excluded.
Well, no other state could pick the Wright brothers (certainly not North Carolina). The next three finishers on the committee list were great athlete Jesse Owens and two people most Ohioans have never heard of: women’s vote activist Harriet Taylor Upton, and abolitionist James M. Ashley.
Only then come the Wright brothers.
One explanation for their surprisingly low rank might be a certain confusion as to whether they’re even eligible. State Sen. Teresa Fedor, D-Toledo, a committee member, said she was “heartbroken” to learn that the feds have a rule against including two people in one statue.
She said if it hadn’t been for that, she would put the brothers in her top three. As it was, she didn’t list them at all.
Others, however, think the two-people issue is still open. A certain ruling does specify only one person. However, Dayton-area Congressman Mike Turner — pushing the Wrights — asked the Congressional Research Office if there’s precedent for two. The CRO said one existing statue has a woman and a baby, and others have the main person and additional panels featuring other people.
A good bet is that if Ohio really wants to go with the Wright brothers, a way can be found.
In pursuing that goal, Daytonians needn’t worry about being seen as mere local boosters. When you’re right, you’re right.
Permalink | Comments (7) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Local History, Martin Gottlieb
TweetEditorial: State hasn’t learned how to judge progress
Ohio has been a pioneer in recognizing school districts whose students make progress, even if they may not pass state-mandated tests. But its system for judging how much progress is being made is being seriously questioned.
In the early years of the modern movement toward standardized tests as a way of judging schools, low-scoring school districts complained that the state did not reward them for big gains. Schools were measured only against other schools, not on student progress.
That’s changed. This will be the third year Ohio gives extra credit to districts for making this kind of progress and penalizes those that fail to make “expected” progress on state tests.
But trends in the state’s data look implausible; questions about odd patterns aren’t being answered.
That may be because the statistical model on which Ohio based its system to calculate academic growth is the secret property of the company that designed it.
The anomalies have to be explained. The data problems could mean that there are serious flaws in the testing system.
And scores that don’t add up could mislead parents about the quality of their schools, confuse educators about how well they’re doing in the classroom and lead lawmakers astray.
In an essay entitled, “Is Ohio’s value-added system broken?” Cleveland State professor Douglas Clay points to a strange “yo-yo” effect in the statewide data over the past two years.
(The essay was touted on Gadfly, a blog operated by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, and can be found at tinyurl.com/ybbmwtb.)
Mr. Clay points first to fifth-grade reading scores in 2007-08. Statewide that year, a phenomenal 83 percent of schools failed to meet “expected growth” in reading. Just 2 percent were above expectations, and the rest had average improvement.
Looking at the same group of kids the next year in sixth grade, Mr. Clay expected to see a similar pattern.
Instead, the 2008-09 sixth-grade class saw its performance completely flip: 98 percent of schools rated above expectations in reading, and not a single school statewide was below expectations.
That is such an extraordinary reversal that Mr. Clay describes it as all but statistically impossible.
Mr. Clay found similar, if not quite so pronounced, “yo-yo” patterns for other groups of kids in other grades. He also saw the pattern in math scores.
Colleen Grady, a former Ohio school board member, has similar concerns that the growth measure may not be providing accurate data. (Ms. Grady blogs here, along with Susan Haverkos, a state school board member from West Chester who represents part of the Dayton area.)
She says she had concerns about the methodology years ago, when the state board was crafting the program.
An Ohio Department of Education spokesman says a review of the improvement measure is upcoming, and that revisions may follow, but that the state has confidence in the model, noting that the U.S. Department of Education is pushing other states to try it.
Unsatisfactory. The state must address the concerns Mr. Clay has raised and explain the extent of the data problem he cites. Doing anything less erodes confidence in the rating system.
Permalink | Comments (12) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Education, Ohio government, Ohio politics, Scott Elliott
TweetMartin Gottlieb: Trammell story is about changing American times
The Rev. Raleigh Trammell’s story is about a lot more than alleged misbehavior on the money front. It’s a chapter in American history.
It’s about what happened to the American civil rights movement after its most basic goals were met and after remaining racial issues proved more resistant to political action. It’s about race in America.
Generations of Americans now alive have no memory of the glory days of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and its main founder, Martin Luther King Jr.
They don’t know firsthand of his fights, of a time when black Americans could be kept out of stores, restaurants, public bathrooms and swimming pools — not to mention polling places —because of race.
Some people try to remind them every year on the occasion of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
That is a good thing, lest young people see the civil rights movement through the fights of the 1980s and beyond.
In those years, a time when racism was a real but fading force in American society, some people saw it even where it wasn’t, at every turn, or almost.
This was inevitable. The nation was going through a transition. “How powerful is American racism?” had a different (and complex) answer every decade.
People who had grown up in a world defined by racism were destined to be skeptical about just how much change was actually taking place behind closed doors and in people’s hearts.
Enter “the race card,” the use of dubious charges of racism to get attention or apply pressure. Playing it was often just a cheap hustle associated with the likes of New York’s Rev. Al Sharpton. But more and more people also saw the old-line civil rights organizations as too likely to play it.
Trammell certainly played it at the local level, even into this century. When his old ally Ricky Boyd got rushed into retirement by the Montgomery County public health agency, Trammell hammered away at “blatant racism.”
Others who rushed to Boyd’s defense shied away from the racism charge. After all, two board members who voted against Boyd were black.
Also in the last decade, Trammell was leading an effort to “nationalize” a crusade about alleged discrimination at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. But public interest was minimal.
There came a time — 2006 — when the SCLC held a national convention in Dayton and almost nobody came. An SCLC letter to potential vendors predicted 10,000 attendees. But a discussion with Sharpton and Martin Luther King III drew 100. The largest events had settings for 500 and 600 people.
Ultimately, Trammell was just boring. Same old, same old, same old. He and the old-line civil rights organizations were struggling for followers and members. Many sophisticated, young and middle-aged blacks were looking elsewhere for political leadership. But alternatives, too, had trouble finding a role and a following.
The decline of the civil rights groups was an opportunity for some. It created a vacuum. A person could easily get access to the revered “SCLC” label, complete with a sizable soapbox.
When Trammell became chairman of the national SCLC, that didn’t seem an indication that he had been underestimated locally. It was the most striking evidence yet that the old-line civil rights groups were in a deep rut.
Now his story could serve as the final chapter in a book about Martin Luther King Jr.’s once-great organization and its role in American life. Even if that organization survives, the Trammell chapter could symbolize much about what it has come to.
Permalink | Comments (13) | Post your comment | Categories: Civil Rights, Columns, Locals in national affairs, Martin Gottlieb
TweetEllen Belcher: ‘Creative class’ guru takes a beating
Here’s a pretty brutal critique of Richard Florida, the “creative class” guru who has been to Dayton and whose thinking fostered the DaytonCREATE initiative.
The piece in The American Prospect, from back in January, points out that Florida is essentially reversing course and suggesting that the Daytons of the world are unlikely candidates for an economic comeback.
Here’s a taste:
“Florida, 52, now head of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, is a relentlessly genial fellow who tries to disarm skeptics by accepting their points in good cheer, as if to suggest there is really no difference of opinion at all.
“But in a telephone interview, he disputes that ill will could exist in cities that paid handsomely for his insights, only to find themselves declared beyond repair a few years later.
” ‘I’ve never tried to sugarcoat the message to any of them,’ he says. ‘I’ve given them the facts … about what they were up against. I never tried to give them false hope. I encouraged them to work on their assets, but I tried to be honest and objective in helping them engage their problems. I hope they don’t feel let down.’ “
Florida has a new book — The Great Reset — coming out in April. He telegraphed its thesis in The Atlantic a year ago.
“We need to be clear that ultimately,”, Florida wrote in “How the Crash Will Reshape America,” “we can’t stop the decline of some places, and that we would be foolish to try. … Different eras favor different places, along with the industries and lifestyles those places embody. … We need to let demand for the key products and lifestyles of the old order fall, and begin building a new economy, based on a new geography.”
Dayton is mentioned toward the end of Alec Macgillis’ piece in The American Prospect:
“Across the country, the battle to attract the creative class carries on. In Dayton, Ohio, billboards and T-shirts carry a new Richard Florida inspired logo: ‘Dayton patented. Originals wanted.’ The city is building bikeways, passed an anti-discrimination ordinance in 2007 to increase its score on Florida’s ‘tolerance index,’ and has given a local group called DaytonCREATE the use of a vacant bank, now called ‘c{space,’ ‘where they hang out and do a lot of their creativeness,’ Mayor Rhine McLin says.”
Does anyone want to defend Florida — or add to the criticism of his work? Any thoughts on his contributions to Dayton or his theories?
Permalink | Comments (40) | Post your comment | Categories: Blog entry only, Dayton Creative Class Initiative, Ellen Belcher
TweetEditorial: Dayton didn’t worry about SCLC race card
Maybe you have noticed that, in the list of programs connected with the Rev. Raleigh Trammell that have been funded and now defunded in the wake of scandal, you’re not hearing much about money from the City of Dayton.
Montgomery County, the feds and the state have all supplied money to operations run by the local chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, led by Rev. Trammell. Not the city.
And perhaps you have also noted that the Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance, also associated with Rev. Trammell, didn’t endorse Rhine McLin for re-election as mayor last year.
You might reasonably wonder about a connection between the two facts.
The question is worth pausing over, because some people think the absence of an IMA endorsement for Ms. McLin might have been decisive, depressing black turnout.
With turnout down, the election was decided by about 900 votes out of 29,000.
Why would an organization of black ministers, which leans toward Democrats, not support the black Democratic incumbent over an unknown white challenger?
One popular theory is that Mayor McLin supported a gay rights ordinance that the ministers opposed. But so did Commissioner Nan Whaley, whom the IMA did endorse.
And the IMA has endorsed Joe Lacey for the Dayton school board; he’s gay.
There are those on and around the city commission who believe that Rev. Trammell and the IMA were less concerned about gay rights than money.
Dayton had provided money for SCLC projects before the McLin era. Just one example: Under Mayor Mike Turner, the city put up $10,000 for the SCLC gun buyback program, wherein citizens would get cash for turning in workable guns.
That SCLC initiative was revived in the McLin years, but didn’t get city money, in part because of skepticism that buybacks were getting guns out of the hands of criminals. There were also other occasions when the possibility of the city contributing to SCLC projects came up.
Commissioner Whaley says that when she screened for the IMA’s endorsement in 2009, she was asked why the city wasn’t supporting it.
She says the city had concerns about the organization’s accounting and records. If that’s the explanation, those concerns look pretty good now.
Whatever the political impact of the city’s arm’s-length relationship with Rev. Trammell, the important point to be made now is that Dayton did the right thing.
While other agencies are being rightly criticized for not knowing how money they gave to groups associated with Rev. Trammell was being used, the city deserves some props.
Montgomery County says it was afraid of losing Rev. Trammell’s and the local civil rights organizations’ support for the Human Services Levy, which is crucial to funding local social programs. That’s was a concern that the city didn’t have.
And yet it’s hard to miss another difference between Montgomery County and the city government: race.
While Rev. Trammell was carrying a big stick with white elected county officerholders (though not an all-white staff), he was stymied in dealing with a city with a black mayor, majority-black city commission, and, at various intervals, a black city manager and top police officer.
At the heart of Rev. Trammell’s MO was the race card.
The possibility always loomed that he’d blame racism for any decision he didn’t like, and some people would believe him. But that was a tougher card to play in Dayton.
Permalink | Comments (44) | Post your comment | Categories: City of Dayton, Civil Rights, Editorials, Martin Gottlieb, Miami Valley Politics, Montgomery County
TweetEditorial: Train questions fair, but there are answers
The case for 3C passenger trains has, let’s face it, been underwhelming in impact.
One poll showed a tiny majority opposed to spending state money on passenger trains. Around the state, various commentators have been cold. Republican legislators generally are critical or unimpressed.
The federal decision to fork over the $400 million to build a line connecting Cleveland, Columbus, Dayton and Cincinnati (3Cs and the D) didn’t resolve the issue. An odd entity called the state Controlling Board must sign off. And, under a deal made when the legislature decided to apply for the stimulus money, the “yes” voters must include Republicans.
The case for the 3C
basically is that the feds are putting up nearly all of the capital, that Ohio is behind other big, urban states as to intercity passenger trains, that adding a new mode of transportation can open up travel to more people, and that there are energy implications, especially when gas shortages or gas-price hikes hit.
The basic case against the 3C line: that the trains will be relatively slow (averaging 39 miles an hour, when you figure in stops), that the system won’t be self-supporting, that much money will be spent to serve few people, that the routes will be so few and badly timed that people will not be able to make day trips, and that buses can do what trains might do.
That’s about as far as the debate has proceeded. When the legislature decided to go after the federal money, it acted quickly and essentially put off the debate on the merits.
The time has come. Given that federal money is available and will go to somebody, the skeptics should at least be willing to listen to responses to their points.
Gov. Ted Strickland and other proponents of 3C need to get busy making their case in a high-profile way. The opportunity may not exist for the governor to make a whistle-stop train tour, speaking from the back of the train at all the stations, like Harry Truman running for president in 1948. But something.
And some leaders of Dayton should be getting on board, given how much this community stands to benefit from having 3C trains going in two directions. (If history had been a little different, Dayton might have been skipped. Most trains in the past included Dayton and Springfield in their routes from Cincinnati to Columbus. So, given the existence of routes, skipping the Miami Valley now would have actually made the 3C project more expensive.)
As the debate proceeds, people will hear:
• The 79-mile-an-hour trains (possibly averaging 39) are a phase. States that have faster systems have started with slower ones. Upgrading to a faster system might not be many years off, given the existence of a federal program to fund faster trains.
• The 3C system need not attract throngs to justify the conclusion of an Amtrak-funded study that a $17 million annual operating subsidy from the state might suffice to operate the line. (That’s well under one one-thousandth of the state operating budget.)
• College students, older people and families without enough cars to go around could provide much of the needed usage at first.
• When Ohio does upgrade to a faster system, that’s when the appeal to a more general audience would set in, if the history of other states prevails.
• Government subsidies for transportation are the norm, including for cars and trucks, which use public roads; trains typically run on privately owned land, with the attendant costs.
• Ohio and Hawaii are the only two densely populated states that don’t have state-supported or regional intercity trains. (“Ohio acts like it is an island,” says a pro-train group called All Aboard Ohio, the source of the information.)
• Some people who say they would travel by train don’t want to take a bus.
• Possible schedules put out by Amtrak are not set in stone. The state should fight for more convenient ones. Even the number of trains running and the average speeds could change.
• Improvements made to tracks in connection with the 3C project will be good for freight trains, a crucial part of the Ohio economy, and likely more crucial in the future.
The questions being raised by the skeptics are a legitimate part of the democratic process. The 3C project should not be shoved down anybody’s throat. And it need not be.
Permalink | Comments (66) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Energy, Local Business, Martin Gottlieb, Ohio government, Ohio politics, Transportation
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