EDITORIAL
Hawai'i Poll offers major policy directive

As a policy directive, the latest Honolulu Advertiser Hawai'i Poll on key issues and taxes appears to be a slam dunk.

Local residents are willing, they say, to pay more in taxes to resolve almost any of the key issues facing the state. They are particularly — some might say overwhelmingly — willing to pay more taxes to improve public education .

So what's the problem? If the poll adequately measures public opinion — and there's no reason to believe it does not — then lawmakers should have no political fear about boosting taxes and pumping more money into public education.

But as Capitol Bureau writer Lynda Arakawa reports, there is little sentiment at the Legislature for a tax hike, even for an issue as popular and important as public education.

That's because there is a disconnect between the theory of improving our schools and the reality of paying out real dollars at tax time. Politicians know that when taxes go up, even for the best of causes, they hear about it at election time.

So how can this disconnect be connected? The answer lies in the way the question was asked. The poll did not ask respondents if they were willing to pay more taxes to increase the budget of the Department of Education. That would be a non-starter.

Instead, it asked: "Would you be willing to pay more taxes if you believe government has developed a good solution to the problem of (A) making needed repairs to public schools and (B) improving quality of education in public schools?"

There is an implicit bargain in that question: "If we come up with an answer, would you be willing to pay for it?" Short answer: "Yes."

So the first task for lawmakers this session is to come up with ideas for our public school system that make so much sense that it will be impossible to resist them.

Our laundry list includes pouring money in a "Marshall Plan" attack on the physical condition of our schools, from air-conditioning and upgrading of classrooms to making sure that every student has up-to-date textbooks.

That appears to be a minimum base for improvement.

Other priorities include giving teachers the resources and flexibility they need to teach in the classroom as they see fit. When money is short, the natural inclination is to develop programs and policies that are one-size-for-all. That approach is cheaper, surely, but not the best way to make education work.

Another priority we endorse is reduction of class size, if not across the board, then surely in the earliest grades where direct teacher-to-student interaction is most important.

A third priority is to keep momentum going toward universal preschool education.

If lawmakers can identify and successfully argue specific programs with specific budgets attached, there is no reason in the world why they could not persuade their constituents to pay through modestly increased taxes.

A key element would be that the new taxes would go for, and only for, those programs identified as important to our schools. Taxpayers have a natural resistance to tax hikes that are associated with good ideas but, in the end, go into the general fund sinkhole. This suggests earmarking.

Another important element would be guarantees that if additional money is raised for education, it would be in addition to, not as a replacement for, what already is set aside for public schools. That game is often played in state lottery states, where the money raised for education through gambling is simply used as a substitute for general tax fund dollars.

Bottom line: If you find a way to build a better school system, the taxpayers will come. And they'll pay for it.

Let's get going.