DeGrasse's Vote

The speaker of the New York Assembly, Sheldon Silver, yesterday laid out a plan for the State to spend another $6.1 billion a year on public schools, with an additional $1.2 billion from New York City to be spent on city schools. Albany Republicans denounced Mr. Silver's plan as irresponsible, but they also want to up state spending on schools between $4.5 billion and $4.7 billion.

To a newcomer, this might seem strange. After all, the state and the city's school spending is already near the nation's highest for each student. The combined state and local tax burden in New York is the nation's highest. And the school spending has increased in recent years with little appreciable effect on test scores. Why pour more money into a system that even its own leaders acknowledge has failed?

The answer is Judge Leland DeGrasse. He is the state judge who ruled in Campaign for Fiscal Equity v. State of New York that the state had failed in its responsibility under its constitution to provide a sound basic education to the students of New York.

So far, the response to the problem from all parts in Albany has been conventional — throw more money at it. Hardly a peep about creative solutions like school choice. If the politicians in Albany would show a little more creativity and boldness, maybe they would emerge as the ones really running the state instead of a lone judge.