Victory, outside of sports, is rarely an end. Gold medals represent dedication and focus but also mark a sort of completion of effort. A political victory, however, represents a beginning. For the well-intentioned, a win in politics is the start of more hard work. Eliot Spitzer’s election as our next governor was a win in every possible way political campaigns can be won — in votes, press, money, and endorsements. What Governor Spitzer does with this victory remains to be seen.

The danger facing any party or person coming into power is this: how to exercise that power creatively and produce accomplishments without getting stale. In addition to copious amounts of prayer, I would suggest that the recipe for sustained success include a commitment to bold thinking and a willingness to take chances on controversial ideas. I would also insist that another crucial ingredient be a decision not to rely on entrenched interests and relationships regardless of whether they helped in the attainment of power. It is precisely because they help others secure power that those interests have become entrenched. Their continued influence depends on stifling the very things that make leaders truly great: creativity and openness.

Governor Spitzer has an opportunity to demonstrate creativity and openness to change in setting education policy by considering a proposal made by communities of faith from throughout New York. These communities champion a plan that would both benefit the parents of public schoolchildren and transform the relationship between state government and tuition-paying parents. The plan is for full state tax deductibility of middleincome family spending on education coupled with an education tax credit for families that don’t benefit from deductions — that is, New York’s poorest families. This tax relief plan would be of general applicability and so benefit more parents of public-school children than families of nonpublic-school students because there are more children in public than in private schools. Nonpublic school children make up 15% of New York’s student population. And because families would be able to tap into this tax break by paying for after-school tutoring, special needs services, tuition, or test-prep classes, this initiative would truly help all of New York’s families with children in all of New York’s schools.

In making this help-for-families plan a priority, Governor Spitzer would show himself to be bold, creative, independent, and willing, in a very big way, to make tremendous use of the victory he so well earned at the polls.

The Reverend Youngblood is spiritual leader of Mt. Pisgah Baptist Church in Bedford-Stuyvesant and of St. Paul Community Baptist Church in East New York.