Editorial: Ybarra fails first test on future for schools

Just as hope emerges that Idaho will upgrade an education system in need of financial remediation, leadership faltered.

In his State of the State address, Gov. Butch Otter dedicated most of his time to education, acknowledging that schools and teachers need a re-infusion of money after being bled during the Great Recession. Last week, the chairmen of the House and Senate education committees said they were optimistic that this is the year schools would get the attention they sorely need.

But the chief advocate for schools was uninspiring in her debut before the Legislature.

As a candidate for state superintendent for public instruction, Sherri Ybarra was circumspect about what she wanted to achieve and how much she was willing to request from the Idaho Legislature. Last Thursday, she remained stingy with details, shifting the onus to legislative budget writers. Though her department represents almost half of the state budget, she spent only 17 minutes presenting a thin agenda. Typically, such presentations take more than an hour.

During the question-and-answer period, members of the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee were able to coax more information from Ybarra, but not much. “In past presentations sometimes there’s a little more detail as to what the budget will entail,” said Senate Finance Chairman Dean Cameron, R-Rupert.

A recurring theme emerged in Ybarra’s answers to specific questions. She won’t know until legislators appropriate the money. Or as she put it, “What I would like to do is build the policy around the funding.”

She has it backward. Her job as the top education official is to outline policies, request money and justify the expense. How else are lawmakers to know how much to budget? She either doesn’t understand this, or she’s shielding her failure to do the requisite homework.

Ybarra called for a 6.4 percent budget increase. The governor asked for 7.4 percent, and included many details. She had no explanation for her smaller number. The state’s teachers, principals and superintendents can’t be happy that their leader low-balled a governor who has been tight with education dollars.

Ybarra called for smaller class sizes in kindergarten through third grade, but her budget doesn’t fund it. However, she did note that if lawmakers came up with the money, she would jump on the bandwagon. She said she would turn the career-ladder idea – designed to increase teacher pay – into a pilot project, and requested $25 million to do so. When asked how it would be spent, she offered few details.

The education budget will be written without her by the same legislators complicit in the shredding done schools since 2009. Finally prepared to entertain a repair plan, Ybarra gave them little guidance.

Idaho needs a dynamic, forceful leader to rally the state behind its schools. So far, Ybarra has been absent, without an excuse.