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Opinion A9

THE DAILY HERALD

WWW.HERALDNET.COM/OPINION

Editorial Board Josh O’Connor, Publisher Peter Jackson, Editorial Page Editor Neal Pattison, Executive Editor Jon Bauer, News Editor/Content

TUESDAY, 08.26.2014

IN OUR VIEW | Letters to parents, No Child Left Behind Act

About those ‘failing’ schools Bring forth the letters, nondescript and governmentissued, like a jury summons or an IRS audit. Dear (supposedly loving) parent: A majority of Washington’s public schools are “failing,” as defined by the federal No Child Left Behind Act. Your goes-to-a-failing school child may transfer to a (technically) non-failing elementary or secondary school, presupposing such non failures exist in your district (with regrets to students in Mukilteo.) As The Herald reports, there have been 62 transfer requests for students attending one of the Everett School District’s six Title I schools not meeting what’s known as “Adequate Yearly Progress” targets.

Rule one, straight from the “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy,” is don’t panic. “There is a fair amount of confusion,” said Cynthia Jones, director of categorical programs for Everett School District who received parents’ calls about the letters. “There is confusion about what does it mean for my child’s school and what does it mean for my child.” That confusion subsides when parents get in the weeds. If 100 percent of students don’t meet state-drafted standards, the entire school flunks, triggering the failure letters and other steps. Parents caught off guard — and they are legion — tuned out the Olympia noise. Earlier this year, Washington became

the first state in the nation to have its conditional waiver of the No Child Left Behind denied. The bugaboo was that Olympia wouldn’t hitch teacher evaluations to student testing. It’s more nuanced than a teachers-union uprising against a culture of standardized testing. The required use of poorly vetted tests to measure student achievement and linking those results to teacher performance is unworkable over the short term, however much it creates the illusion of accountability. “There is widespread acknowledgment that NCLB isn’t working,” Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn said at the time.

“Congress has failed to change the law at the federal level, so states are forced to come up with workarounds.” Because of the waiver denial, $40 million the state receives from the feds will be freighted with restrictions. The Everett School District, for example, will be forced to set aside 20 percent of its Title I budget to bus students in failing schools to non failing ones and to provide private tutors for struggling students. Money falls away just as disadvantaged children get slammed the hardest. After all the shouting, there’s a simple, two-part remedy: Fully fund education as the McCleary decision requires and repeal NCLB.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR ■ UNITED STATES

All agencies are now militarized President Obama was jolted to see images of heavily armed police officers with body armor and automatic rifles clashing with protesters in Missouri. Why doesn’t the press look at the real story? Why does the United States Department of Education and FEMA both have tactical operation units (SWAT teams) equipped with the very same type of equipment that jolted the Commander in Chief in Missouri? And why did Janet Napolitano purchase 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition for Homeland Security before she left her government job? When will the press start doing their job?

honor on Snohomish WWII veteran.”)

Jim Tagart Snohomish

Jim Hills Edmonds

■ THE HERALD

■ 44TH DISTRICT

Dan Bates’ front page image of Douglas Whipple is yet another reminder of just what a great photojournalist he is, how he makes true that hackneyed phrase “a picture is worth a thousand words,” and how lucky we are to see his photographs. (Monday article, “France bestows high

Despite being a newcomer to state politics, Mike Wilson’s strong showing in the August primary election did not surprise me. Prior to my retirement, I worked with Mike for many years at Cascade High School and know him to be a dedicated professional. He fosters an awareness of civic

Bates’ photos always tell story

Wilson’s blend of skills needed

Have your say Include your name, address and daytime phone number. Send it to: E-mail: letters@heraldnet.com Mail: Letters section The The Daily Herald P.O. Box 930 Everett, WA 98206

responsibility in his government classes by inviting candidates and other experts in to talk with his students. He encourages his students to be active in the democratic process; so it is no surprise to me to see so many

of his former students engaged in his current campaign for state representative in the 44th Legislative District. During his many years of coaching experience, Mike learned how to motivate student athletes and to instill confidence in them. Most important, he knows how to work with parents in a collegial way to enlist their aid in serving students’ needs. This ability to work with diverse groups of students, parents, peers and administrators has made him a successful educator and is definitely what is needed in our Legislature. Yvonne Linnabary Everett

COMMENTARY | State Government Workers

Oregon, Washington are least corrupt Reid Wilson The Washington Post

early 20 million Americans are employed by state and local governments across the country. With so many workers, it’s almost impossible to keep everyone honest. Waste, fraud and abuse can cost taxpayers millions. But in Oregon, strong oversight and audit rules ensure that state officials keep their hands out of the cookie jar. Data from the Justice Department, compiled by political scientists at Indiana University at Bloomington and the City University of Hong Kong, show that, over a period of 32 years, there were fewer corruption convictions in Oregon than in any other state, when controlling for the number of state workers. Oregon registered 1.28 corruption convictions per 100,000 public employees between 1976 and 2008. Washington, Minnesota, Nebraska and Iowa also had fewer than two convictions per 100,000 employees. Those states score well because of robust transparency laws, according to ethics watchdogs. Oregon’s rules for campaign finance disclosures are among the toughest in the country, and lobbyists and special interest groups

cannot give gifts worth more than $50 to state employees. Oregon also requires most public-improvement contracts to be awarded based on competitive bidding, avoiding no-bid contracts, which can be a major source of corruption. “An awful lot of corruption comes from government contracts,” said Melanie Sloan, a former federal prosecutor who runs Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. “You can’t have no-bid contracts. You have to have transparent contracting procedures.” At the bottom of the list, Mississippi, Louisiana and Tennessee all registered more than four times more convictions than the least-corrupt states. More than 7,000 state and local officials were charged with corruption between 2003 and 2012, the Justice Department said in a 2013 report to Congress. The U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia reported 336 federal convictions over that time period; New Jersey’s U.S. attorney reported 428 convictions; and the four U.S. attorneys who oversee Texas reported 775 convictions. By contrast, Oregon registered just 42 convictions during that period. The bill for all that wrongdoing adds up: Corruption forces states to spend

more on everything from construction and highways to corrections and police. But the authors of the study, John Mikesell and Cheol Liu, also found that states with higher rates of corruption tend to spend less on education, public welfare, health and hospitals. So more corruption costs taxpayers - in terms of money and the social services the government provides. Nine of the 10 most corrupt states, the authors found, could have saved $1,308 per resident if their corruption rates fell to the national average. Those states should look to Oregon, home of the most honest government workers in the country. Malfeasance by the numbers: 7,000-plus: State and local officials charged with corruption from 2003 to 2012 775 convictions in Texas 428 convictions in New Jersey 336 convictions in Washington, D.C. 82 convictions in Washington state 42 convictions in Oregon Note: Convictions from 2003 to 2012. Source: Justice Department, www. justice.gov/criminal/pin/docs/2012Annual-Report.pdf Wilson is the author of Read In, The Washington Post’s new morning tipsheet on politics.

VA hospital scandal first overblown, then ignored

he unofficial end of summer, Labor Day, may serve as a bookend to a scandal that exploded around the unofficial start, Memorial Day. We speak of the very long wait times to see primary care providers at veterans hospitals and, more seriously, the doctoring of records by some hospital administrators to hide that reality. Back in May, this writer erred in underestimating the wrongdoing at hospitals run by the Department of Veterans Affairs. She’d been swayed by friends who had nothing FROMA HARROP but praise for their VA hospital experiences — and independent studies by the likes of RAND showing higher patient satisfaction in VA hospitals than in privately run ones. Also, the blast of outrage bore all the signs of another right-wing attack against “evil” government and, with it, a call to privatize another of its services. The media, meanwhile, were facing the news desert of a quiet, long weekend. So what perfect timing — especially over a holiday honoring those who served — to flog the accusation that the government was killing veterans by the thousands. That incendiary charge has thus far proved to be unfounded. The VA inspector general’s office has been investigating the deaths of veterans waiting for primary care appointments. So far, it’s failed to find evidence of veterans dying because they were on those lists. The inspector general did uncover some worms, however: Hospital administrators were faking data about those delays. Punishment is being meted. At the bottom of this emotional story sits a very plain vanilla villain: the nationwide shortage of primary care medical professionals. This scarcity plagues the entire American health care system, government-run and private alike. In a highly market-based system such as ours, providers go where the money is. That would be the more lucrative medical specialties — and in hospital settings rather than doctors’ offices. In most other countries (though not Canada), patients have shorter waits to see primary care providers. Reliance on expensive specialists to treat conditions that a family doctor could handle helps explain why America spends so much more on health care than do other rich countries. The reason we know more about the waits at the VA than the ones in the private sector is governments require that such records be kept. The private system does not. A $16 billion fix for the VA’s primarycare problem was signed this month by President Obama. Thousands of such doctors, nurses and other health care professionals are being hired. Most of the money, however, will pay for veterans on long waiting lists — or who live more than 40 miles from a VA facility — to see private providers. Thus, conservatives got some of what they wanted and some of what they didn’t. In their plus column, the system is now somewhat more privatized. In the minus column, conservatives had to approve spending these billions — and after they had blocked a vote in February to spend large sums on some of the same things. A handful of Republicans refused to vote for the bill, insisting that the entire VA system needs a multiple bypass. “We need structural changes,” said Rep. Jack Kingston, a Georgia Republican, “a purge of those who made this mess, and more choices for our veterans.” “More choices” is code for privatization. Turns out government can’t promise good health care to the growing numbers of veterans — whether through public or private facilities — without spending a lot of money. That’s the way it goes. All is quiet now on the VA hospital front. But where are the 2-inch headlines noting that the 3-inch headlines about murdering veterans were way off? Don’t even bother answering. Froma Harrop is a Providence Journal columnist. She can be reached at fharrop@ gmail.com.