Public Policy and Governance – Page 316

Dealing with the Embarrassment

I logged onto the Star’s front page this morning, only to discover that Matt Tully had already written my intended post.

It’s embarrassing. Even those of us who hate football have to be impressed with the skill and energy and sheer hard work that has gone into SuperBowl preparations. Even those of us who disagree with the city’s persistent prioritizing of sports arenas over, say, schools and parks, have to be impressed–and considerably mollified–by the use of this particular sporting event to trigger reinvestment in the near-Eastside neighborhood. And even Indy dwellers who are urbanists with a permanent sense of our inferiority to great cities like Chicago and New York have to take pride in the ability of Indianapolis to rally thousands of volunteers, master complex logistics, and throw one hell of a party. (I just passed the amazing ice sculpture of the New York skyline that appeared overnight next to the firehouse on Mass Avenue. Very cool–in both senses of the word!)

And then there’s our legislature.

Tully compares the General Assembly to that weird cousin everyone has, and asks visitors to simply discount them. And there is certainly more than a grain of truth in that observation. Just like the weird cousin who is so fixated on his collection of Star Wars figurines he can’t carry on an adult conversation, Indiana’s lawmakers are so firmly rooted in their alternate realities they can’t be bothered to do the state’s business. After all, if they paid attention to water pollution or public transportation, who would undermine science education or ensure the proper singing of the national anthem?

That said, the spectacle that is the Indiana General Assembly can’t all be attributed to its rampant assault on science and reason. The anti-Indianapolis resentment that has long characterized our state legislature has played a prominent role, and it has been aided and abetted by a Governor who knew exactly what he was doing.

A video of a speech Mitch Daniels gave barely a year ago has been all over Facebook and local blogs; it shows the Governor disclaiming any interest in proposing a “divisive” Right to Work law, which he accurately described as something that would set off a “civil war.” Leaving aside the merits–or lack thereof–of the law itself, why would the Governor reverse himself and promote a measure he clearly knew would enrage thousands of Hoosiers at the very time the state capitol would be hosting the SuperBowl?

Hosting an event of this magnitude is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to put our best foot forward, to use our brief visibility to impress potential visitors and employers. It’s bad enough that the usual buffoonery at the statehouse is an embarrassment, potentially undermining the efforts of countless volunteers. It’s inexcusable that the Governor and Speaker–who actually do have IQs–preferred an opportunity to weaken Indiana’s few remaining unions over a chance to support the efforts of citizens who have worked countless hours to host this event.

At the end of the day and despite our sorry excuse for state government, Indianapolis will still shine. Most visitors will accept Tully’s (apt) characterization of our horrendous legislature, if they think about it at all. But those of us who live in Central Indiana need to remember who embarrassed us in February–and we need to deal with them in November.

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I’m Trying Not to Cry…..

A student who is interning at the General Assembly sent me this description of legislation working its way through the process:

“Silencers when hunting. Repeals the law that prohibits the possession or use of a silencer while in the act of hunting. Provides that a person who takes or possesses a deer or wild turkey: (1) unlawfully; (2) by illegal methods; or (3) with illegal devices; while using or possessing a silencer commits a Class C misdemeanor. Makes hunting on private land without the permission of the owner a Class B misdemeanor if the person does so while using a silencer. Makes a technical correction.”

There was a news report yesterday about Indiana’s polluted drinking water, and lawmakers’ explanation that, due to it being a short session and all, there wouldn’t be time to address that issue.

After all, they had to spend a lot of time working on the really important stuff, like teaching creationism and cursive, praying in school and “Right to Work.” And silencers.

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What is Ballard Smoking?

When the dust cleared after the November elections, Indianapolis was left with divided city government. The Mayor is Republican. The Council majority is Democrat. The challenge for the next four years will be to get along–to make decent policy despite partisan divisions.

An article in this morning’s Star suggests we’re not getting off to an auspicious start.

Indianapolis has been struggling for several months to enact a smoking ban that actually has some teeth. After a couple of false starts, the Council has produced a (bipartisan!) draft, to be voted on tonight. But according to the Star,

“The proposal’s effect on veterans halls and private clubs has become a focal point of debate and has raised the likelihood of a mayoral veto.

As written, the proposal would give those places an exemption from the smoking ban but only with a hard choice: Keep smoking, or allow children on the premises. But not both.

Mayor Greg Ballard said Friday through a spokesman that unless the council removes the restriction on children tonight, he will veto the measure. That statement was his most forceful yet since the council resumed the years-old smoking ban debate two months ago.”

When Ballard first ran for Mayor, he promised to support a smoking ban. When actually faced with an earlier iteration, he withdrew that support, and he’s been a roadblock ever since. The question is: why? The current compromise protects children from the documented health hazards of secondhand smoke, while still allowing adults in private clubs to smoke. That seems entirely reasonable. But my question goes well beyond the merits of this particular ordinance.

If he is to achieve any of his goals, Ballard will have to be strategic in his relationship with the City-County Council. He will have to choose his fights carefully. Is this really an issue on which he wants to spend his small store of political capital? Is the American Legion’s pique so important that he’s willing to start the new term with a fight that will further divide the branches of local government and further diminish the prospects for cooperation?

Wrong on policy, wrong on process, and politically short-sighted. Welcome to the start of a long four years.

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“Individual” Achievement

Today’s New York Times had a story about a Long Island teenager named Samantha who made a scientific breakthrough important enough to land her on the list of semi-finalists of the Intel Science Talent Search. The young woman is impressive–very bright, very hard-working, exactly the sort of youngster most parents want to produce. It is likely that she will grow up to contribute significantly to the store of public knowledge on which civilizations build and advance.

But that wasn’t why the Times ran the article.

What made this one young woman’s achievement so noteworthy was the fact that she and her family had been hit hard during the recession. Her parents had also been badly injured in an automobile accident, and the family even experienced a period of homelessness. Until then, hers had been a pretty typical middle-class family, and what happened to them, unfortunately, could (and did) happen to other hard-working, self-sufficient families. Their story, and their daughter’s, is thus a cautionary tale on a number of levels.

America is a land that lauds individual achievement. And so we should–we all benefit from their contributions. But it is also important to recognize that no individual achieves in the absence of at least minimal social support. As the saying goes, we all stand on the shoulders of others. Usually, that bromide is taken to mean that each breakthrough in human understanding builds on discoveries that have come before–that science builds on previous scientific knowledge, for example. But it also expresses a deeper truth.

Congressman Steven Isaacs, who represents Long Island, took his high-achieving constituent to the State of the Union; according to the Times, he wanted his Republican colleagues to pay attention, “since they are so determined to starve government programs, weaken the safety net and shun public investment in education and science, all while slashing rich people’s taxes. ‘How does a middle-class family with a daughter who’s a genius find themselves in a homeless shelter through no fault of their own?’ Mr. Israel said. ‘This isn’t just about a celebration of her tenacity.’”

One of the most damaging consequences of the rhetoric of the Right flows from the dogmatic insistence that achievement is a solitary activity, and that the social safety net is a “giveaway” to “them”–“them” being the assorted slackers eager to live off the largesse of “us” hardworking, productive folks. Conservative pundits constantly lecture that “they” need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, seemingly oblivious to the social supports, privileges and plain good luck that have enabled their own comfortable lives.

Here’s the deal: Without government support — public schools, state research institutions and the county shelter that kept her family safe — there is no way that Samantha, brilliant as she is, could have accomplished what she did. Her scientific discoveries will eventually benefit all of us. Those benefits are a return on our investment of tax dollars.

When America is no longer willing to invest in the infrastructure that makes achievement possible, Americans will no longer achieve.

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Our Despicable State Legislature

What can anyone say about Indiana’s legislature that adequately captures the perversity, the stupidity and the venality of the place?

It is hard to believe the sheer amount of embarrassing antics they have managed to cram into a short session. From the patently unconstitutional (teaching creationism, really? Every court that has ever considered the matter has said the same thing–you can’t teach religion in public school science class) to the teaching of cursive (breaking news: you weren’t elected to the school board, and by the way, what happened to your pious devotion to local control?) to Right to Work (go ahead and spend zillions of dollars on slick ads promising jobs, but everyone knows this is all about hardball politics and Republicans weakening the unions because they have the votes), our elected Representatives have spent the session giving the middle finger to the citizens of Indiana.

As if they hadn’t done enough harm, they have now killed the bill that would have allowed Indianapolis to hold a referendum on whether to tax ourselves to support adequate public transportation.

Think about this. These are the lawmakers who’ve been pontificating about the importance of job creation–that’s how they’ve justified Right to Work, which–according to unbiased research–has absolutely no effect on job creation. Good public transportation, on the other hand, is a proven job creator and economic development generator.

So why the hypocrisy? Why deny the citizens of Indianapolis the right to decide for ourselves whether we are willing to pay a few extra bucks on our tax bill for decent transportation?

It is galling enough that we have to go hat in hand to the State for permission to conduct our own business. It is absolutely infuriating that the legislators whose rural districts survive by virtue of taxes generated in central Indiana–the state sales and income taxes that come primarily from the urban areas they routinely piss on–are the ones willing to kill the goose that lays their golden eggs. Our transportation bill was killed by the very people who would share the benefits without contributing to the costs.

I wish I thought we would throw these bums out in November, but Indiana political history suggests that we will go like sheep to the polls, and vote for the same old same old–after all, these are the candidates who promise to arrest immigrants, keep the “wrong” people from voting, and push gays back into the closet where they belong.

Harrison Ullmann was right: Indiana has The World’s Worst Legislature. But we elected them.

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