Creigh Deeds went on the attack yesterday. With some back-up from Gov. Timothy M. Kaine at a Virginia Business for Higher Education Council event, the gubernatorial wannabe criticized Bob McDonnell’s transportation plan on the grounds that it would short-change funding for education.
As reported by Jim Nolan at the Times-Dispatch, “Kaine and Deeds say McDonnell’s transportation funding plan would drain education money from the general fund…. [Deeds] said: ‘Education is one area where we can’t cut.’ … He likened draining money from education to a farmer using all of his seed corn, leaving nothing to harvest later.”
I don’t defend McDonnell’s plan to tap General Fund revenues for transportation. (See “Disaster on Wheels.”) But Deeds’ education platform is almost as bad.
Deeds’ approach to education can be spelled out in seven letters: Mo’ Money. While touting incremental efficiencies to be gained through audits, a bulk purchase program and loans for efficiency-enhancing measures, Deeds provides a laundry list of initiatives that start with the verbs “establish,” “pay for,” “promote,” “expand,” “support,” “provide,” “use,” “offer,” institute,” “make” and “pursue.” (See the plan here.) He has lots of ideas for improving the educational system, and almost all of them require mo’ money.
And none of them require fundamental reform. The U.S. may spend more than any other country in the world for worse outcomes, and Virginia may not perform a whole lot better than the national average, but all we have to do is expand a pre-K program here or pay teachers a bit more over there, and everything will be better.
McDonnell’s education plan would not fundamentally change the system but at least it would rock the status quo. McDonnell calls for more charter schools, college-partnership laboratory schools, virtual schooling and controls on administrative overhead. Compared to the root-and-branch changes we need to make, they’re pretty tame stuff. But at least they move in the right direction.
The U.S. is veering toward fiscal armageddon. Virginia will face unprecedented fiscal challenges itself. Instead of expanding the scope and cost of government, we need to begin the hard work of radically re-thinking the way we deliver core government services more cost effectively. Fundamental change will take years to enact. That’s why we need to get started now.
