Recent Kansas editorials

Kansas City Star, July 22

The Kansas Board of Education’s decision Wednesday allowing the state’s school districts to open before Sept. 9 was reckless, putting students, teachers, administrators, workers and parents at risk.

It is now up to leadership in each district to act like adults and delay the start of classes until after Labor Day at the earliest.

Gov. Laura Kelly had ordered the state’s schools to remain closed until Sept. 9 to allow for additional preparations as districts navigate the threat of COVID-19. On Wednesday, five misguided members of the Kansas Board of Education rejected her order, claiming they prefer decision-making by individual districts.

The coronavirus does not know school district boundaries. If one student is infected, students and teachers in other districts, and their parents, are in greater danger. And the danger of COVID-19 in rural areas is clearly growing, further jeopardizing the state’s health.

Epidemiologist Dr. Anthony Fauci outlined the problem this week. “Children who get infected for the most part don’t get serious illness,” he said, “but some children do get seriously ill, and some do pass it on to the adults.”

Do we want that for our children? Does a three-week delay in reopening really put students’ learning at risk? There was a time when August was considered part of the summer recess. There’s no evidence a slightly later start would set back learning.

Is this about fall football and other high school sports? Let’s pray the answer is no. No school district should open unsafely just so students can play and grown-ups can watch - and no athlete should play unless their safety is protected.

There is evidence a later opening would allow districts more time to meet tougher safety standards, including masks for almost everyone in school, cleaning standards, sanitizers and barriers to enforce social distancing requirements. The governor has appropriately ordered those actions, and thankfully, the Kansas Board of Education can’t overrule her.

Wednesday’s decision will leave districts the option of setting later opening dates, and they should do so. Kansas City, Kansas Public Schools, for example, has already voted to begin classes after Labor Day, with remote learning for the first nine weeks of the school year. That decision stands, a spokesman said Wednesday.

Other districts are discussing their reopening plans. The Shawnee Mission School District may make its decision Monday, a spokesman said. Olathe Public Schools could decide Thursday. They, too, should delay the start of the school year.

Days lost to reopening must be made up later in the school year. That’s a small price to pay for safer schools, and districts should meet their responsibility to protect students’ health.

There’s no doubt that this will create a hardship for many parents and for students looking forward to the school year. But those problems pale when compared with the risk of infection and sickness from a virus still ravaging much of the country, including Kansas.

We also sympathize with parents, and teachers, facing uncertainty about the start of the school year. For that confusion, blame the Kansas Board of Education - which, by the way, met remotely Wednesday, for fear of the coronavirus.

Those voting against the governor’s order to delay reopening were: Ben Jones, Deena Horst, Jean Clifford, Michelle Dombrosky and Steve Roberts. Roberts and Dombrosky represent Johnson County, a fact voters should remember.

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to disrupt lives, a regrettable fact but a fact nonetheless. Had the nation responded more appropriately last spring, it’s possible the delay in school openings could have been avoided.

But we are here, and we must react appropriately. Local school districts should keep their doors shut until after Labor Day, and longer if necessary.

Lawrence Journal-World, July 26

The pandemic is working on dominating every part of our lives, yet somehow the country has still managed to avoid several conversations we should be having about it. Here are a few:

• The role of federalism. We may never have this one on a great scale because it sounds too much like government class. But for those who were able to stay awake in government class, we really ought to debate it because a lack of federalism has been America’s greatest failure in this pandemic. Federalism was created for pandemics. Think of it this way. There is a reason America chose to have one army for the entire country instead of 50 separate armies controlled by the states. The latter system would have resulted in all of us speaking German or Japanese or Russian or maybe even English. (The British kind, not our goodly American kind.) It would take too much time to get 50 separate armies organized to execute a coordinated battle plan to win a war. Yet, President Donald Trump says COVID-19 is a war, but he’s chosen to fight it with 50 separate armies. His rejection of federalism in this key moment will go down as one of the greatest failures in the history of the American presidency.

• What is the most important statistic? We talk about total cases all the time. That is easy to understand but a dumb one to follow. That number never goes down. The average number of new cases per day is better, but only marginally so. The president is right when he says the number of cases per day will go up as the number of tests administered rises. The percentage of tests that are coming back positive is an even better statistic. It is the one that has proven that our spike in cases currently is about much more than an increase in testing. But it also isn’t a great statistic because, again, the president is correct when he asks whether all cases are created equal. It is true that some cases are pretty mild. It is important to still find those cases so those patients don’t infect others, but otherwise those mild cases are not creating many problems for the country as a whole, so a spike in those types of cases perhaps should not be so concerning. The percentage of cases that end up resulting in hospitalization is much better. People getting sick enough that they are hospitalized and risk death is what we really are trying to avoid. That is what is worth shutting down broad swaths of the economy for. We need to settle on how much of that suffering is too much for a compassionate country, and then use that metric as our North Star.

• Are we planning or just reacting? Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly deserves a lot of credit. She is at least trying to fill the void in leadership created by President Trump. She’s trying to create a coordinated response for Kansas. That’s the correct approach. Republicans have been wrong in arguing for local control. However, that doesn’t mean she is coordinating well. The executive order she signed delaying the start of school until after Labor Day was lacking in any detail on what has to happen in order for us to feel fine in reopening schools after Labor Day. Does the average number of daily cases need to come down? If so, by how much? Same question for hospitalization rates. Kansans should stand with Kelly. She has our best interests at heart. But her approach to controlling the pandemic needs to become more sophisticated. Republicans are correct in that the virus has not impacted all areas of the state equally. Kansas leaders should have a map of the state’s hospital system. Each hospital should have a catchment area. The percentage of beds being filled by COVID-19 patients in each hospital should be tracked in real time. Health leaders should set a benchmark. When the percentage of beds reaches a certain point, that is our sign that the number of serious cases is becoming too prevalent. Every community in that hospital’s catchment area should then go on some level of lockdown to slow the disease’s progression. Those numbers should be reported publicly every day. If the public knows it is just five beds away from facing a lockdown, that type of information might cause people to positively change their behavior.

Heaven knows we need something that produces change. Let’s start with more honest conversations.

Topeka Capital-Journal, July 25

Sending federal law enforcement officers into American cities is a decision that should not be taken lightly.

Let’s do a thought experiment. Imagine that a Democratic president, say Barack Obama, decided that federal forces should go into Dallas and Fort Worth to protect undocumented workers. Imagine that a Democratic president, say Hillary Clinton, decided to send federal troops into Nashville to protect transgender people.

What would the reaction of Fox News and Republican leaders be? What would they say? It’s easy enough to imagine their furious tirades against government overreach.

The only reason this thought experiment seems funny is because few could contemplate Democratic presidents would dare to do such a thing, especially given the probably response from their political opponents.

So now let’s look at reality. President Donald Trump, acting expressly against the wishes of local officials, has been sending federal law enforcement officers to Portland, Oregon. He has talked about sending them to Chicago and Kansas City.

Why? Well, the president’s cable network of choice has portrayed these cities as scenes of violent anarchy. As the pandemic rages, he is desperate to change the subject. And protesters have continued to gather across the country to raise their voices in support of racial justice and social transformation. The targets are right there.

Sending in federal forces is playing with fire. There’s little indication that local leaders wanted or asked for Trump’s help. They are actively speaking out against his decision now.

The federal government must be transparent and cautious about federalizing law enforcement in America’s cities. The job is meant to be done at a local level to preserve local accountability. Police forces who obscure their names and ID numbers, who operate in unmarked vehicles, who answer only to the occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., are not suited for this work.

Some have called the federal government’s actions fascist or fundamentally antidemocratic. That seems extreme, especially given how immediate the outcry has been and how quickly the government has been taken to court. Accountability will happen.

But let’s be real. No Republican would stand for a Democratic president behaving in such a way. They wouldn’t be restrained in their rhetoric, no matter the motivation. And no one, no matter their party, should stand for such behavior now.