When state lawmakers return to Jackson Tuesday for the start of the Legislature’s 2013 session, their agendas will be topped by education reform and deciding whether to expand Medicaid.
Sen. David Jordan, D-Greenwood, said that of those two issues, education is the most pressing.
“I think we’re heading in the wrong direction,” he said.
The wrong direction, according to Jordan, is a push for charter schools that is gaining bipartisan support, Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves recently told the Associated Press.
Republican lawmakers have pushed hard for charter school legislation, most notably in The Mississippi Charter Schools Act of 2012, which would have authorized a mirror agency to take control of public charter schools, rather than the Department of Education.
Jordan said that he doesn’t understand why some lawmakers are looking to put money into a new system, when the state already has a system that works.
“We are not fully funding the Mississippi Adequate Education Program. It has worked so far. We are looking at a new model when we have not fully funded the one that’s working,” he said.
The Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP) was passed by the Legislature in 1997. Jordan said that with more funding, the program would be successful.
But advocates of charter schools argue that education reform should include school choice. Andrew Campanella, president of National School Choice Week, a pro-charter organization, told Mississippi Public Broadcasting Friday that charter schools give Mississippi families options for where to send their children to school.
“Not all children have access to a good school, and some of these kids are trapped in failing schools. And when you trap a child in a failing school, they're more likely to drop out, or graduate without the skills necessary to get a good job,” said Campanella.
Mississippi established its current charter school law in 2010. It allows underperforming schools that have received a letter grade “F” for three straight years to convert to public charter schools.
But Jordan, who pointed out that he spent 33 years teaching in a public school, said that giving families a choice won’t solve the problem.
“Schools are poor for a reason. Poor schools are in counties that cannot contribute enough funding. For example, why would Rankin County have better schools than any other county in the state? They have more resources. They don’t have better students or teachers,” said Jordan.
“Instead of doing what needs to be done, we’re looking in a different direction,” he added.
Rep. Willie Perkins, D-Greenwood, agrees: “A big issue is charter schools, one that I am not in support of.”
Perkins also indicated that this session, one in which Republicans again hold the majority in both the House and Senate, will be as politically divided as last year’s.
“I put my trust in Willie Perkins,” Perkins said. “I can’t put my trust in Republicans, never have, never will.”
Lawmakers say that the future of Medicaid is also sure to stir up debate in both the house and the senate.
Mississippi stands to gain $8 billion, according to one estimate, from the Affordable Care Act, aka “Obamacare,” if it decides to expand Medicaid, but Gov. Phil Bryant and fellow Republicans say they oppose expansion because they believe the state can’t afford to put millions more dollars into the federal-state health insurance program for the needy.
Although the Affordable Care Act promises to fund the program for at least three years, it also mandates that 54 percent of Mississippians receive healthcare coverage.
Jordan argued that “we cannot, as a poor state, play around and not accept it. we can’t lose $8 billion.”
Mississippi Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney, a Republican, told the Mississippi Business Journal that Bryant should not rush into a decision when it comes to such a weighty issue, but Senate Public Health Committee Chairman Dean Kirby, R-Pearl, told the Associated Press earlier this week that he doesn’t think expansion will be approved this year.
Even if a bill were to pass the House and Senate, said Kirby, the governor has made it clear he’d veto it.
Rep. Bobby Howell, R-Kilmichal, chairman of the Medicaid committee, could not be reached for comment.
Jordan said that 30,000 people need Medicaid, and for that reason alone the state should vote to expand the program.
Perkins said that when “reality sets in,” he believes that the state will vote to expand medicaid.
Alongside the biggest issues facing the state, lawmakers have their own personal goals.
Perkins said that he would like to see more funds allocated to Mississippi Valley State University in the upcoming session.
Jordan said that he would like to put a greater effort into pre-K education.
“We need to be more enlightened about it. We’ve got children coming from homes where no one reads. Pre-K is where the greatest amount of learning happens,” he said.
That might be one issue on which Jordan and Bryant agree. The governor has proposed $15 million for greater reading instruction for children in early grades.
• Contact Jeanie Riess at 581-7235 or jriess@gwcommonwealth.com.
