Some Kootenai County residents would willingly trade local control of North Idaho College for property tax relief.

That’s why the siren song from Boise and southeast Idaho for a state-funded community college system resonates in the region. After all, what’s wrong with a state system with control centered in Boise, if it means $100 or so less on your property tax bill? Why should homeowners in the North Idaho College and College of Southern Idaho districts help fund their colleges when four-year programs, like Boise State, offer two-year degrees underwritten by the state?

North Idaho College taxpayers should be wary of the Trojan horse offered by Southern Idaho politicians.

NIC has evolved into a superb community college, with the ability to serve students at lower tuition costs as well as work with job recruiters and the Job Service to address specific local needs. It did so because it is governed by local trustees who understand the role the college plays in training workers for a major new company, such as Buck Knives in Post Falls, and the importance of retraining employees when a mill closes. A statewide board wouldn’t respond quickly to crisis situations or job market needs – or care about providing courses in far-flung areas, such as Sandpoint, Bonners Ferry and Kellogg.

NIC President Michael Burke was right when he told the community college task force in Coeur d’Alene last week: “I would argue that control will follow the money.” State Sen. John Goedde, R-Coeur d’Alene, and other North Idaho lawmakers should fight against a statewide system that eschews local control. If community college boosters in Boise, Nampa and southeast Idaho want independent two-year schools, rather than ones attached to existing four-year institutions, they should launch them the old-fashioned way: by asking their voters to create taxing districts and then partly support them with property tax.

Critics are right when they say it’s unfair that property owners pay taxes to support NIC and CSI when state money funds two-year programs elsewhere. Usually, however, they don’t say that 28 percent of the property tax support for the NIC district comes from out of state or that 76.5 percent of the taxpayers pay less than $100 per year. For that small price, NIC trustees have the freedom to hire a president, set direction and policies, approve budgets, buy land and approve outreach sites without state interference, and the voters have the chance to decide who represents them.

The importance of local control is illustrated by pulling back the curtain on the effort by Jobs Plus to woo California manufacturer Buck Knives to Post Falls.

On the cusp of an important meeting in San Diego with Buck Knives officials, Jobs Plus executive Steve Griffitts asked NIC for help. Griffitts wanted the college to strengthen his hand by allowing transferring Buck Knives employees to attend NIC at in-state tuition rates. Within hours, the trustees had not only given him a verbal commitment to support the proposal but they had extended it to the employees’ families, too.

Idaho should establish community colleges in Treasure Valley and southeast Idaho. But it mustn’t do so at the expense of the quality ones now operating.