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Local
Control of Public Schools
West Virginia permits less local control of K-12 public schools
than any state save Hawaii. In fact, Hawaii's is worse. Hawaii has
one statewide school district.
This makes no sense, to me, for either state. West Virginia and
Hawaii are possibly the two most diverse states in the union of
less than three million population. West Virginia has just less
than two million people, and Hawaii just over one million.
The great diversity of these two states is not just geographic.
They are both diverse politically, economically, socially and culturally,
to be so small. I think this diversity argues for more, not less,
local control.
In West Virginia, this lack of local control transcends public education.
We also allow very little local control in other areas of public
policy.
Part of the reason for a serious lack of local control in public
policy lies with the desire of state leaders to "run the show."
I'm not talking about any one person here. This mindset can be found
in all three branches of government (legislative, executive and
judicial) and has been around at least since I've been in elementary
school.
But that's not the only reason. State leaders in other states would
like to "run the show," as well. Many state leaders, from
all over the state, express an extreme lack of confidence in the
abilities and motives of local leaders.
This is the classic logical fallacy called "argument ad hominem."
Translated from Latin, it is argument "to the man" (or
"to the person"). By the flawed logic of this argument,
any idea advanced by a person whom I believe to be flawed must be,
ipso facto, flawed. "Ipso facto" is Latin for "by
the fact." In other words, an idea coming from someone for
whom I have little regard must be, for that very reason, a bad idea.
That makes no sense. Sometimes a stupid person has an excellent
idea. And, sometimes very bright people are wrong.
Some legislators don't want any more power placed in the hands of
their county or city governments because they believe the officials
running those governments to be muleheads. This is not logical.
First of all, those who are, indeed, muleheads are the chosen muleheads
of a majority of the voters in an election. Some of the same people
who argue with great enthusiasm for the power of the voters don't
want to let the local government leaders chosen by those voters
to have the power to solve local problems. I've even had fellow
legislators tell me that they're willing to give local governments
more authority when their own county commission (or city council)
gets better (in their minds) people on it.
This becomes a self-fullfilling prophecy. One of the reasons that
unwise people get sometimes do get elected to office is that they
are either unopposed or opposed by people no wiser. I'm convinced
that many people who have the skill and interest to run local government
effectively are often discouraged from seeking local office because
they don't think they can make a difference. They correctly perceive
that the limits placed on many local offices by state government
make it difficult, if not impossible, for them to be effective.
I think that giving county and city governments more authority to
decide questions of policy will result in more folks wanting to
serve as county and city officials. And, many of the additional
candidates will be people who have the desire and skill to effect
positive change.
By no means do all legislators resist giving more authority to local
governments. Many realize that a lack of local control is one of
the reasons West Virginia is behind the nation economically. But
there are enough recalcitrants to keep many proposed changes from
being adopted. And, the legislators in each of these two categories
are scattered all over the state.
I have argued for years that our state needs to give a greater degree
of autonomy to local governments. I think the whole state would
benefit, but the Eastern Panhandle would benefit the most from such
a change.
The Eastern Panhandle would benefit the most because we get less
support from Charleston in dealing with our problems than any other
part of the state. To me, more local control should be a "no-brainer"
for all of us in the Eastern Panhandle.
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