Indiana Political Review

Conservatives are not much for protesting. Indeed, I attended the first political protest of my life at the “Black Sunday” property tax protest. In all candor, it seemed to me to be a lot of idle time. I understand now why so many hippie-types are prone to protesting. However, it seems that the Black Sunday protest has had some effect, so perhaps all that idle speechifying served a purpose.

What strikes me however is the nagging feeling that for all the angst that is being poured out over the property tax issue, in the end, we will not have gained a thing. Why do I say that? If one looks at his property tax bill, there is a summary of where the money goes on the bottom. While the exact breakdowns will differ depending where you live, most of the property tax (around 50%) goes to local schools. And, herein lies the problem.

For the life of me, I cannot imagine anyone come next November voting for the guy (or gal) who promises to slash spending on the schools. For that matter, I cannot even imagine there being such a candidate. But, if the largest line item on our property tax bills is virtually guaranteed to continue to increase, how do we ever think property taxes will ever be reined in? I just don’t see it happening.

Now some people, and a lot of the speechifying at the rally, centered on instituting the Fair Tax in place of property taxes (which would be eliminated altogether). Don’t get me wrong. I am not a Fair Tax hater, but I don’t think the form of taxation addresses the real problem. Axe the property tax, replace it with the Fair Tax (or pick your favorite alternative), and the problem still remains that education spending is going to continue to go up. Putting in place some sort of consumption tax will only result in politicians increasing the rate each year.

What this city really needs is a crop of candidates who actually pledge to reduce spending - even (and maybe especially) in the schools. This should be the number one priority no matter what form of taxation we settle on. And, why not cut spending on education? It is simply amazing to me that parochial schools consistently, uniformly and convincingly outperform IPS with a fraction of the money per student. How could this even be possible? Well, the simple answer is that money has nothing to do with student performance. A variety of factors contribute to a student’s performance - family involvement; teacher competence; accountability of students, teachers, administrators, and school systems - to name a few.

The Indianapolis Star ran a story Thursday that mentioned that at Marshall Middle School on the east side of Indianapolis, only 283 of the 620 students expected to be in the classrooms were in attendance on Wednesday, the third day of school. The school’s principal has been driving to students’ houses to find out where they are. Apparently some parents cited “inconvenience” as the reason they did not send their child.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I know my mother was ticking off the days until my brother and I were due back at school. She was keenly aware of the date and perhaps even a little giddy when the day finally rolled around. If parents and children today, however, cannot be bothered to even send their children to class (or to even know when they’re due back), why should I be bothered to pay for their educations? Indeed, if only half the butts are going to be in the seats on any given day, it seems to me that we could safely slash half the budget for IPS.