Spending on K-12 education takes up most of Montana’s state budget, and a significant portion of local property taxes also go to our schools. More importantly, educating our children is a fundamental civic duty. For these reasons, the Superintendent of Public Instruction election deserves attention.
This year’s race pits Elsie Arntzen, a state legislator with 23 years of teaching experience, against Melissa Romano, who has taught for 12 years in Helena. The candidate more fiscally responsible and attuned to the value of “local control” is Elsie Arntzen.
In a July 19th interview with a Missoulian reporter, Romano stated that “[t]o people who say we can’t just keep throwing money at [public education], I say of course we can.” Perhaps she doesn’t understand that spending tax dollars wisely matters more than simply how much is being spent. Or maybe she just knows that acknowledging the tax increases required to fund her various policy proposals would be politically inconvenient.
In the same interview, Romano asserted that “our schools already have a lot of local control.” But consider her unqualified support of Common Core, which was hastily adopted without formal input from school boards across the state. She apparently believes that school boards may be qualified to make some resourcing decisions but are not competent to participate in crafting substantive policy. She is wrong. Her attitude not only slights local elected officials but also serves to erode public interest in local school governance.
In the Legislature, Elsie Arntzen dealt with hard, real-world choices about how best to allocate scarce resources. She respects the state’s taxpayers. She understands that re-empowering local school boards will promote bottom-up, creative ways to educate our children and also will strengthen communities by restoring to them meaningful ownership of their schools.
Elsie Arntzen should be our next State Superintendent.
Dave Bedey
Hamilton