Hackney Lets It Slip | Eastern North Carolina Now

   Publisher's note: The article below appeared in John Hood's daily column in his publication, the Carolina Journal, which, because of Author / Publisher Hood, is inextricably linked to the John Locke Foundation.

    RALEIGH     I don't often agree with Joe Hackney, the minority leader of the North Carolina House. A longtime Orange County representative who is retiring this year, Hackney previously served as majority leader and speaker. His political philosophy lies to the left not just of the overall House but also of the Democratic caucus.

    Still, I've always respected Joe Hackney. Now I have reason to thank him.

    In a recent media interview, Hackney responded to the passage of the Republican budget plan for 2012-13 with this revealing riff:

    I think any alternative to public schools, they are supportive of. They're supportive of home schools, they're supportive of religious schools, they're supportive of online education charters, they're supportive of traditional charters. They're supportive of any program that does not involve funding adequately our traditional public schools for everyone.

    Other than the knock on the adequacy of education funding in the new spending plan, I suspect that most North Carolina Republicans and conservatives would agree with Hackney's description of their approach to education reform. They do indeed favor more parental choice and broader competition among a variety of educational options. They do not favor district-run "public schools for everyone," nor should they.

    To say that the state of North Carolina has an obligation to fund a sound, basic education for every child is not to say that the state of North Carolina ought to provide all elementary and secondary education through a system of local district monopolies. In no other public service would state policymakers even consider such a policy, as it would be both unpopular and unsuccessful.

    For example, neither Hackney nor any other Democratic lawmaker I know argues that North Carolina should deliver health care services to poor, disabled, and elderly residents solely through a system of state-owned hospitals, physician practices, pharmacies, and nursing homes. They fully accept that Medicaid patients should have the ability to take their dollars to a variety of competing providers - to public or private hospitals, to private doctors and allied health professionals, to neighborhood clinics and retail pharmacies. They even accept that some Medicaid patients might best be served through home-based care, and that some of their medications and devices might best be purchased online.

    The same is true in the rest of the education sector. Neither Hackney nor any other Democratic lawmaker I know argues that North Carolina should deliver preschool services solely through a system of state-owned schools or facilities. Instead, they fully support the current use of Smart Start and Pre-K dollars to finance services delivered by public, private, and religious establishments.

    In higher education, Hackney and most other Democratic lawmakers have consistently voted for budgets offering Legislative Tuition Grants for students who choose to attend private colleges and universities rather than the University of North Carolina system or a state community college. As far as I know, none has criticized the federal government's policy of allowing its grants and loans to be used to attend private universities or even seminaries.

    The largest system of post-secondary education in North Carolina is actually the market for job training. If you include both formal programs and informal on-the-job training, annual spending on job training in North Carolina is estimated at between $10 billion and $15 billion. Only about $1.4 billion of that comes from federal, state, and local programs. Much of that tax money then flows to private contractors, or finances community college training tailored for specific private employers. Have Hackney and other Democratic lawmakers ever proposed a state monopoly to take over job training?

    Of course not.

    If it is widely understood that state involvement in health care, preschool, higher education, and job training need not - and indeed should not - lead to state monopolies delivering these services to "everyone," why should K-12 education be treated differently?

    Republican lawmakers have concluded that it shouldn't be. So have the leaders of many of the world's highest-performing education systems. Why haven't most Democratic lawmakers drawn a similar conclusion?

    Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation and author of Our Best Foot Forward: An Investment Plan for North Carolina's Economic Recovery.