Recent editorials from Alabama newspapers:
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Dec. 29
The Fort Payne Times Journal on high school graduation rates in the state:
The recent announcement that Alabama’s high school graduation rates were artificially inflated over the past several years, soaring from 72 percent in 2011 to 89 percent in 2015, is another blow for the state’s beleaguered education system.
As the Montgomery Advertiser’s Brian Lyman reported, Alabama State Schools Superintendent Michael Sentance said the incorrect numbers discovered through a federal audit and internal review were the result of two factors.
The Alabama State Department of Education continued to use alternative Alabama Occupational Diplomas, not just diplomas earned in alignment with academic studies, in calculating graduation rates, despite two warnings for the U.S. Department of Education that was forbidden.
That makes ALSDE leaders appear to have been asleep at the wheel. But, according to Sentance, the alternative diploma errors account for only a very small percentage of the inflated rate and the OUD is no longer awarded.
Second, the investigation found that ALSDE did not provide proper oversight of how local school systems reported credits, leading to some students earning diplomas without meeting required standards.
This despite the reams of evidence - including dismal standardized test scores that have shown little significant improvement in recent years - that should have made it evident the sudden rise in the graduation rate to the highest in the nation had to be hogwash.
It has been clear at least since the 2012 scandal over some Montgomery Public Schools teachers and administrators improperly changing high school students’ grades in a credit recovery program that incompetent oversight of districts’ grading policies was a serious problem at ALSDE. And probably not just in Montgomery.
Investigations into the MPS grading issues, which led to the suspension of seven educators, found that the culture at ALSDE actually encouraged improper grade changes.
Why weren’t comprehensive internal quality controls of all grading and diploma-granting mechanisms established then to ensure the department was receiving correct data?
It’s failure to do so abetted the incorrect reporting of the graduation rates, which no doubt benefited the Alabama State Board of Education, then-Superintendent Tommy Bice, and other education officials in the state, whose leadership appeared to be making a difference to struggling schools.
But the losers were Alabama’s students. Not only the students in classrooms from 2008 to 2015, but future students who would have benefited from badly needed changes to the education system that could improve graduation rates. That’s inexcusable.
Online: https://times-journal.com/
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Jan. 1
The Montgomery Advertiser on why Alabama politicians need courage in 2017:
After a year roiled by financial crises and state government scandals, Alabama legislators in 2017 again face tough challenges that call for much more than standard operating - and governing - procedures.
Solutions are needed for the state’s overcrowded and violent prisons. Lawmakers in 2016 stopped short of approving a scaled-back $550 million version of Gov. Robert Bentley’s initiative to close most existing prisons and replace them with three new super-prisons and a smaller women’s prison, to be funded through a bond issue.
Questions were raised in 2016 about the wisdom of requiring the new prisons be designed and built by one company with a one-time exemption to state bid laws. Those concerns still need scrutiny, and more details about the prison-building plan must be made public.
But approval of a large-scale prison construction bill must remain a priority this year.
Escalating violence, including riots, stabbings of officers and inmate deaths, have put the corrections system at risk of a federal takeover, sure to cost the state more than the $550 million price tag for an overhaul. Beyond that, the inhumane conditions inmates and officers endure in Alabama prisons are a moral failure that can no longer be tolerated.
Alabama’s deteriorating transportation system poses another severe problem for the Legislature, and one that can only be solved by finding new revenue. Some 15 percent of the state’s major urban roads and highways are in poor condition and 35 percent more are rated as mediocre or fair, according to recent studies.
The state’s bridges are also crumbling, with 25 percent deemed structurally deficient or obsolete. Proposed increases in Alabama’s gas tax - stuck since 1990 at 18 cents per gallon - are an obvious way to boost infrastructure funding. But tax-averse lawmakers have been sitting on their hands while road conditions worsen and the safety of the driving public is put at risk.
This year the Association of County Commissioners of Alabama is calling for the Legislature to approve a 3-cent gas tax increase as one way to fund road improvements, with counties and cities to reap the new revenue. More aggressive measures will be required to fully address the state’s transportation woes, but a 3-cent hike at the pump is a small step forward that should be approved.
Yet another crisis that’s not going away is the perennial dearth of money in the General Fund to pay for critical state services such as Medicaid. In a special session last summer, lawmakers agreed to use BP money from the 2010 Gulf oil spill to plug an $85 million budget gap for the federal/state health program that serves poor children, the elderly, pregnant women and persons with disabilities.
That emergency measure averted deep cuts to state hospitals and doctors’ offices, but Medicaid coverage in Alabama is still a bare-bones operation. More than 500,000 state residents also still lack health insurance, partly because lawmakers refused to expand Medicaid coverage for the working poor under the Affordable Care Act.
All bets are off as to what will happen to the ACA under the Trump administration, but if the massive program is repealed or gutted some 200,000 more state residents could lose access to affordable health care. If Republicans in Congress follow through on proposals to turn Medicaid into a block-grant program, Alabama stands to lose significant federal dollars and any chance of implementing the regional care organization plan lawmakers hoped would limit costs and improve care.
There’s no denying the situation going forward in 2017 is ominous. Lawmakers, however, should focus on finding ways to help provide medical coverage to more Alabamians, not fewer. That will take political courage, but it’s the right thing to do, particularly in a state that ranks poorly on health measures, from low birth-weight infants to obesity and diabetes.
Other major issues, including education funding and the state’s lopsided tax structures, also demand legislators’ earnest attention this year. There’s hard work ahead and no time to waste.
Online: https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/
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Jan. 4
The Dothan Eagle on former politicians who are able to “bypass bureaucratic obstacles:”
If you’re rankled by former state Rep. Terry Spicer’s “good opportunity” to slip easily into a state job after his release from prison after serving roughly five years on a corruption conviction, you’re not alone. It’s difficult to believe that someone can plead guilty to corruption in public office, spend a stretch in prison, and then find their way back onto the taxpayer’s payroll.
In Alabama, it’s possible. And it’s difficult to fault Spicer for that. The former lawmaker paid his debt to society and, at 52, was interested in work after his release - preferably work with the state, so that he could complete 16 months of state employment to attain 25 years of service, a benchmark that would allow him to draw a $50,000 annual pension without otherwise waiting until age 60.
That makes sense; Spicer had 23 years and eight months in the Retirement System of Alabama before losing his job as a school superintendent in Elba upon his guilty plea in federal court in 2011. He now works as a sales associate in an Alabama Beverage Control Board liquor store in Dothan.
What rankles is how his employment came to fruition. State jobs are highly sought and competitive, with most positions requiring job seekers to join a register and wait until it’s their turn to be considered whenever something materializes.
In Spicer’s case, someone contacted ABC administrator Mac Gipson saying Spicer needed help finding a job. Gipson, a former lawmaker who served with Spicer in the Alabama House of Representatives, put him to work.
Politicking to bypass the bureaucratic obstacles that unconnected folks must navigate is the sort of workaround that perpetuates Alabama’s reputation as a hotbed of corruption. It may be perfectly legal, but it certainly isn’t right.
Online: https://www.dothaneagle.com/
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