A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

Masson's Blog

SB 33 – Take your gun to school. But only if there is a church in your school.

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“[H]is mother cried as he walked out, ‘don’t take your guns to town, son. Leave your guns at home. . . unless you’re going to that school church. In which case, you should lock and load.'”

Sen. Sandlin has introduced SB 33 concerning firearms. It amends IC 35-47-9 which is the part of the Criminal Code which generally makes it a felony to possess a firearm on school property. There are exceptions to application of this law in IC 35-47-9-1. For example, it’s legal for law enforcement officers or individuals specifically authorized by the school board to have a firearm on school property.

Sen. Sandlin would add to the list of people authorized to have a firearm on school property. They have to be otherwise legally entitled to possess a firearm and possesses the firearm on school property in connection with “attending a worship service or religious ceremony conducted at a house of worship located on the school property.”

I know bad things can happen anywhere, but I don’t think going to church is so inherently dangerous that it justifies its own special exemption.

SB 18 – Notice to Parents of Right to Skip Student Immunizations for Religious Reasons

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Indiana General Assembly needle exchange program

Needles are scary.

Sen. Jim Tomes has introduced SB 18 which requires schools to send every student’s parent, every year, a notice of the student’s right to not to receive immunizations or related testing if the parent objects on religious grounds or if a physician certifies that such immunizations might be detrimental to the student’s health.

This one is a twofer: an additional burden on schools and a sop to the antivaxxers. The administrative burden is unnecessary. If skipping vaccinations is such a core tenet of your religious belief that you’re willing to put the rest of the community at additional risk to honor those beliefs, you won’t need reminding of your options by the public school system.

At the heart of my complaint is my skepticism about whether we should allow exemptions to vaccinations based on religious objections. There is some risk to the individual from any vaccination. But that risk is outweighed by the benefit to the community and the individual him or herself. However, the calculation potentially changes if everyone else in the community gets vaccinated. If everyone else in the community is vaccinated, the individual can skip the risk to him or herself by not getting vaccinated without a lot of risk of getting sick because everyone else has been vaccinated and won’t be a vector for that particular illness. The individual is protected by the herd immunity of the community. That’s a free-rider problem. It’s not a big deal if there are only a few free riders.

There are cases where a person’s particular medical condition makes their personal risk from vaccination unacceptably high and letting them ride for free on the rest of the community’s immunity is the sensible approach. If there are only a few outliers who are claiming a religious exemption, you can skip them too in order to avoid the emotional turmoil of offending their religious sensibilities. But that only works if their numbers are small. Sen. Tomes is choosing a policy that will inevitably increase those numbers. In addition to hurting the community, this policy will ultimately harm those with the most deeply held religious beliefs on the issue. Because, as more people get sick, the less tenable a religious exemption will be. Once you hit an inflection point, you just say public health concerns don’t permit a religious exemption of any kind. You’d do away with the people using religious concerns as a pretext to enjoy the benefits of a free rider, but you’d also sweep up the very devout few who we’re able to accommodate under the present system.

 

 

SB 24: Wear Sunscreen

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SB 24, introduced by Senator Liz Brown, takes to heart the “Wear Sunscreen” speech. It requires students to do one thing every day that scares them, to be kind to their knees, to live in New York City once but leave before it makes them hard, and to live in California once but to leave before it makes them soft.

Well, not really. But, with respect to the sunscreen, it says that students may possess sunscreen at school and that schools may assist students with application of sunscreen provided they have the parents’ permission. It also gives schools civil immunity for actions they take complying with this legislation.

Personal note: If I ever win a case with a sunscreen immunity defense, I’ll consider it my best day as a lawyer.

SB 25: Termination of Local Government Defined Benefit Plans

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SB 25, introduced by Senator Boots, would require that a political subdivision’s defined benefit plan (pension plan) be terminated if the political subdivision fails to make the full, actuarial determined contribution to the plan for three consecutive years. The fiscal impact statement makes this seem like maybe not such a great idea.  The note indicates that plans are subject to IRS rules for termination, is skeptical that plans would have sufficient funding to provide the required member benefits and annuities, and suggests that litigation would follow. On the upside, the 2016 Local Pension Report indicates only two political subdivisions that have not made the required payments in the last three years. (Unfortunately the fiscal note does not indicate which two political subdivisions.)

I suppose the intent is to add some pressure to political subdivisions to make sure they don’t get too far behind on their pension obligations. But, this seems like a Procrustean solution that would ultimately do more harm than good if it was ever triggered.

SB 7: School Calendar

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No school before August 24th

Put away the book, nerd. It’s only August 20th.

Sen. Leising seems to have a thing for schools and “the good old days.” Her perennial windmill is, of course, attempting to have the State government mandate school curriculum relative to cursive writing for what I regard as a combination of nostalgia and specious reasoning. (This year, she submitted her cursive bill as SB 8.)

With her SB 7, which would prohibit schools from starting earlier than the last Monday in August, I also detect a strong whiff of nostalgia. I’ve also heard it characterized as a response to lobbying efforts from the amusement park industry. Whatever the lobbying background of this proposal might be, my sense is that more generalized support for this initiative is going to be from people with a sense that back in the good old days, we had longer summers. When I was a kid, and my birthday rolled around in early August, I still had a few weeks of vacation left. I seem to recall my parents talking about school not starting until after Labor Day.

Aside from the general idea that school corporations are perfectly capable of organizing their calendars without dictation from Indianapolis, West Lafayette’s superintendent, Rocky Killion, had a column in the Journal & Courier a few weeks ago discussing some of the problems with this proposal.

?  Indiana code requires 180 days of instruction for all public schools.

? If public schools cannot begin school until the fourth week of August, then students will be attending school through mid-June.

? Students and staff members involved with advance placement tests would not be able to participate in the national testing schedules.

? It is better for high school students to finish their first semester finals before winter break rather than having to take several weeks off and then come back and finish first semester at the end of January.

?  Seniors who plan to graduate early will now have to return in January to finish their first semester and may possibly be prevented from enrolling into college until the fall semester.

?  All three public school districts in Tippecanoe County serve students whose parents are associated with Purdue University.  When Purdue University ends classes in early May, many parents will be forced to choose between staying in the area through mid-June or taking their children out of school before the end of second semester.

?  High school athletics would begin nearly a month before school starts.

Even though I’m not immune from grumbling about “back in my day” when my kids go back to school in the heart of August, the fact is that the scheduling works out o.k. And I trust that our local officials have decent reasons for implementing the schedule the way they do. They have lives and families outside the schools, just like we do, and I doubt they are any more eager to cut summer short than anyone else. But, there are competing considerations involved. And the General Assembly may not know how to appropriately weigh those considerations for each community.

SB 1: Sunday Alcohol Sales

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Indiana's liquor laws will drive you to drink

All we need is a ten and fiver; a car and key and a sober driver. B double-E double-R U-N: Beer Run!

Senator Alting has introduced SB 1 which would permit package liquor stores, grocery stores, convenience stores, or drug stores to sell alcohol from noon until 8 p.m. on Sundays. This bill was recommended by the Alcohol Code Revision Commission and is obviously an improvement over the current law. However, the hours permitted on Sunday contrasts noticeably with the 7 a.m. to 3 a.m. permitted the rest of the week.

As it happens, my preferred time of the week to do my grocery shopping happens to be Sunday morning. I don’t have to be at work, and the crowds are usually pretty low. But, it also happens that I don’t really mind all that much making a separate trip for a beer run. Ultimately, treating Sunday differently from the rest of the week for alcohol sales just seems like an anachronism without a lot in the way of legitimate public policy reasons to recommend the distinction. Still, half a loaf is better than none.

On Taxation, Social Spending, and Happiness

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Idea: Conversing with people of diverse opinions can lead to thought.
(Note: This is not the same as putting up with disagreeable people who like flinging their feces over the Internet.)

I was having a pleasant back-and-forth on one of my more conservative friend’s Facebook page which led to a probably overly-long-for-Facebook comment on my part. But, it seems like a good enough basis for a blog post. Also, a periodic reminder to seek out people of good will who have different opinions. Try not to get mad at each other. The discussions will be good for you.

Anyway, the subject of taxes came up. I mused about the relationship between taxes and happiness indexes because high-tax areas often seem to be areas where people rate themselves happy. He correctly pointed out that those indexes are subjective and also observed that he and I are happy living in low-tax Indiana. Which led to this, from me:

I think a fair amount of my happiness comes from having located in the People’s Republic of West Lafayette. It’s not very high tax or liberal compared to your average college town, but compared to the rest of Indiana probably more so.

Part of what makes me happy about the community is that there isn’t a lot of (noticeable anyway) dysfunction in the people with whom I come into contact. West Lafayette is a bubble. Tippecanoe County is less so but still a bit of a bubble when compared to the rest of Indiana.

The question is whether spreading social services more broadly can, in effect, expand and strengthen that “bubble?” Or, to get out of using the mildly pejorative “bubble” characterization, can spreading social services more widely reduce the dysfunction in the general population? Can taxing the rich and spending it on the poor effectively improve education, improve health, strengthen families, make people more productive, and make communities happier places to live? How much can you tax before the good things produced by the spending is outweighed by the unhappiness created by taxing and taking peoples’ money?

Then you get to the moral question — even if you generate significantly more happiness through taxing and spending, is it morally justifiable to take from the few and spend on the many? On this point, I’m probably never going to have a meeting of the minds with the “taxation is theft” purists. But, as to the previous point, I think there is a lot to discuss and to be learned about what sorts of social spending is effective and about when you hit a point of diminishing returns with respect to taxation.

SB 65: Learning About Sex

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Sen. Kruse has introduced SB 65 regarding instruction about human sexuality in school. Schools would be required to make available to parents any instructional material on human sexuality “including sexual activity, sexual orientation, and gender identity.”

In addition:

A school may not provide a student with instruction on human sexuality, including sexual activity, sexual orientation, or gender identity, unless the parent of the student or the student, if the student is an adult or an emancipated minor, has provided the school with written consent for the instruction. A consent form provided to a parent of a student or a student under this subsection must accurately reflect the contents and nature of the instruction on human sexuality that will be provided to the student.

I predict that the kids who are most in need of instruction on these subjects are probably going to be the ones with the parents who are least likely to consent to the instruction.

Washington Post on the Political History of School Privatization in Indiana

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School Privatization Discussion (artist’s visualization).

Valerie Strauss, writing for the Washington Post, has an article with some of the political history behind school privatization in Indiana and the related defunding of public schools in the state. (Much of the article seems to come from Carol Burris.) Former Governor, Mitch Daniels, is mentioned prominently for obvious reasons. But, the article dates the movement back to a discussion at a 1996 event involving Mike Pence, Mitch Daniels, Steve Hilbert, Mickey Mauer, and Fred Klipsch.

Daniels asserted that there was no debating “the abysmal, atrocious failure of the public school monopoly.” Mauer was apparently told he was wrong when he tried to argue that the Carmel schools were doing o.k. Twenty-one years later, the result of that discussion would be described as:

[P]ublic schools were reeling from 15 years of relentless attack. I found public schools engaged in fierce competition with each other, charter schools, virtual schools and voucher schools for students and the “backpack funding” that came with them.

Entire public school systems in Indiana cities, such as Muncie and Gary, had been decimated by funding losses, even as a hodgepodge of ineffective charter and voucher schools sprang up to replace them.  Charter school closings and scandals were commonplace, with failing charters sometimes flipped into failing voucher schools. Many of the great public high schools of Indianapolis were closed from a constant churn of reform directed by a “mind trust” infatuated with portfolio management of school systems.

The article talks about much of the PAC funding of the political movement that resulted in a political environment where public schools could be attacked coming from Betsy DeVos starting in 2010. I think their dates are off a little. Back in 2006, I posted about Dick DeVos and his Amway fortune funding an organization called “All Children Matter” that was donating liberally to Indiana campaigns. Of “All Children Matter,” I wrote, “All Children Matter is devoted to privatizing our educational system through use of vouchers and similar schemes or, to use their characterization, offering “school choice.””

In the 12 key house races that Mary Beth Schneider called Hot races:

District 17, Steve Heim $1,000.00 from All Children Matter
District 20 Tom Dermody $53,000.00
District 21 Jackie Walorski $1,000.00
District 30 John Smith $4,500.00 on 10-13-2006
District 31 Tim Harris $1,000.00 on 10-03-2006
District 33 Bill Davis $1,000.00 on 10-10-2006
District 46 Vern Tincher report not online
District 52 Martin Stutzman report not online
District 64 Troy Woodruff $1,750.00 in three payments
District 69 Billy Bright $20,000.00 on 10-25-06……yes 20 grand!
District 70 Christopher Byrd $500.00 on 10-12-2006
District 86 Kathy Densborn $2,000.00 on 10-12-2006

In any case, the Washington Post’s telling of the tale of Indiana’s assault on traditional public schools is well worth reading. In the years since, we’ve discovered that private schools don’t yield better results and charter schools very often suffer from sketchy oversight. We need to re-commit ourselves to giving public schools the resources they need to thrive. In addition to educating our kids, our public schools provide an important focal point for our communities generally. They are part of what transform our cities and counties from a collection of individuals into a community — something that charter schools and private schools don’t do nearly as well.

 

Bonaventura Resigns from DCS in Protest

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Marisa Kwiatkowski, writing for the Indy Star, has an article on the resignation by Mary Beth Bonaventura from her post as director of the State’s Department of Child Services. She was a Pence appointee to DCS and, prior to that, had been a Bayh appointee as judge of the Lake County Juvenile Court. So, she’s been in the child welfare business for a long time, and it sounds like she’s either bipartisan or non-partisan.

Her letter of resignation outlines four reasons for her departure.  First, is the Governor’s choice of DCS chief of staff. (I had initially posted, incorrectly, that it was a very partisan Eric Miller, known for his campaigns in favor of socially conservative views. Turns out it was a different Eric Miller):

She said the governor’s office placed Eric Miller as her DCS chief of staff — someone with no child welfare experience — because he “was an asset during the campaign.”

Using the position and authority given by Holcomb’s office, Bonaventura argued, Miller has engineered his own hires, bullied subordinates, created a hostile work environment, exposed the agency to lawsuits, overridden her decisions, been ‘brazenly insubordinate” and made cost-cutting decisions without her knowledge. She said her attempts to “rein him in” haven’t been supported.

Second she says the works DCS has done to build a better relationship with child welfare providers and the work DCS been trying to do to update its rates and licensing is being undermined. A collaborative relationship is being returned to an adversarial one.

Third she says antiquated technology is threatening to wreck the Child Support Bureau and that the governor’s office has cancelled the plan for a new system despite years of work to secure federal approval and matching funds.

Finally, she says efforts to reduce or cap staffing levels of family case managers and child welfare attorneys “will lead to disastrous results.” She contends that DCS was permitted “to request only a fraction of the funding and staffing needed to protect kids.”

A lot of the complaints sound more or less like you could chalk it up to budgetary concerns. A good director is going to believe in the mission of his or her agency and will frequently chafe at budgetary constraints imposed from higher up where they are trying to balance a lot of different priorities. But, I doubt that can be the whole story. She managed under the Pence administration which, I don’t suppose was overly free with money when it comes to social welfare. So, it sounds like this might go beyond the usual penny pinching.

Social welfare spending can often seem like you’re pouring money into a black hole. The need is infinite, and it’s tough to see good results from the spending. At best, it seems like you are merely making bad situations less bad. But, at the end of the day, Ms. Bonaventura is correct that kids lives hang in the balance.