Occasionally we receive an email from an anonymous correspondent. Usually, we ignore such missives but this person — he or she — writes in a refined manner and offers commentary that we find interesting.
Such an email arrived this week, containing a chart.
“One measure of the health and future of a community is the number of students graduating in the community,” the email began. An accompanying chart told a story: “The number of students graduated from Iola High in 2017 fell to a level that has not been seen since 1916.
“These numbers do not bode well for the future of Iola,” and salvation rests with the trend being reversed. “The numbers also clearly demonstrate the need for a single countywide consolidated school district.”
We concede, simply because over the years we’ve stumped for consolidation.
During meetings of the “new-school” committee, Chuck Apt, an Iola attorney, pointed out the number of students graduated in Iola, Moran and Humboldt this year were fewer than were in his senior class at IHS.
The committee was drawn together, including proponents and opponents of the failed new schools bond issue of two years ago, to consider what could be done to meet needs of Iola High and other USD 257 schools.
Mention was made of some form of consolidation, mainly of high schools in the county. Discussion was derailed before it started.
Too bad.

NO ONE should fuss with the needs clearly demonstrated from surveys of schools in Iola.
Elementary students would be better served with a school (assuming a single one was built) that provided all the modern amenities catalogued for students of that age. Teachers could detail individual programs better by working together and a multitude of physical improvements would be a part.
Iola High appears old but spiffy; it isn’t. Much could be done to improve its educational environment. The middle school probably is the crown jewel, if one exists in the district.
Moran and Humboldt have better facilities leading into upper secondary school, but they too could benefit from upgrades.
The Regional Rural Technical Center just outside LaHarpe — bless Ray Maloney for his foresight — quickly proved to be of advantage for students driving there daily, and also demonstrated it was not asking high school kids to perform an unsafe chore by motoring from their high schools to the center.
The tech center offers disciplines that would be unlikely to come about in single high schools. More offerings are planned.

CONSOLIDATION wouldn’t save huge sums of tax money, although having all districts in the county under the thumb of one administrative team would reap benefits in that arena. Many districts larger than Allen County’s three operate with one lead administration and support group.
No thoughtful person would propose transporting elementary students to a central school, and most in lower grades of secondary level should be kept at home. That would leave only high school students on the road. The assumption is they are perfectly capable of dealing with that issue.
Where to build?
Howard Morrison, a bachelor farmer who lived south of LaHarpe, wrote numerous letters to the Register 40 and 50 years ago, detailing the wisdom of a centrally located high school; he called it Allen Central. His proposed site was a few miles south of LaHarpe, equidistant from Moran, Humboldt and Iola.
Following that directive would be expensive, because of road access and utilities, and also would put it at bit out of reach for quick emergency services.
A school east of Iola, near the intersection of highways 54 and 169 would seem logical, though it would have to be situated outside the floodplain. Utilities wouldn’t be far away, nor would emergency services and necessities not available in a rural setting would be at hand.
Yet another site would be near Humboldt’s remarkable sports complex at the east edge of town. Utilities have been extended, land is available and U.S. 169  and access ramps are just a short drive away.
Other possibilities exist.

IOLA committee members bearing down on Iola schools is understandable.
However, as our unnamed friend pointed out in his email, we would be wise to at least look at some means of delivering education to our kids in the best of all ways.
Consolidation usually is mentioned in the same breathe with saving money, but a greater advantage would be increased offerings, both within traditional classes and those that escape smaller schools.
The regional tech center immediately demonstrated what can be done with forward-thinking in that vein. The same could be true with consolidated districts, and one high school.
Don’t throw the idea on the scrap heap. Think about it.

— Bob Johnson

Kim Jung-un seems like a megalomaniac with a goofy haircut, but under those outward appearances may be a despot far more calculating than the legion of talking heads on 24-hour so-called news channels would have us  think.
An AP analysis in Tuesday’s Register pointed out that while Kim has resisted efforts by friends (what few North Korea has) and foes to quit marching toward intercontinental nuclear capability, sufficient aid to sustain the country, albeit at a level most Americans would find lacking, is a daily fact of life.
Most generous is China’s — for selfish reasons. Trade with Beijing is 90 percent of the North’s and the Chinese send 500,000 tons of crude oil each year to the country, most for free. That keeps North Korea as a buffer between China and American troops in the South.
North Korea also is a source of cheap labor for China, as well as Russia.
But, the crux of the fledgling cold war status with North Korea, pitted again unfathomable power of the U.S. and its allies, may well be strategy on Kim’s part to become nuclear capable to strengthen his hand in negotiation.
We doubt if Kim and his advisors honestly think they can do more than prod the U.S. into the North’s destruction in the aftermath of any nuclear-tipped missile attack on the American mainland, or against one of our protectorates or allies.
Thus, Kim, unless he is indeed a madman, must know that dealing from a position of strength enhanced with ICBMs will give his country enough significance to demand, and probably receive, lessening of sanctions and perhaps even a better life for the populace, although we doubt he cares about anyone but himself, a handful of concubines and maybe Dennis Rodman.
On the other hand, if Kim is as he sometimes seems, a dreadful outcome may be brewing.

MEANWHILE, we can’t be completely certain of what would occur if Kim stepped over the line.
Trump often is full of bluster, and he also has a tendency, as too many events since his ascendency have shown, to act impetuously and without regard for consequences.
The last thing we need as a nation — and a world — is a nuclear exchange. The only one to date —to our favor against the Japanese — occurred 72 years ago this coming Sunday and Wednesday of next week when atomic bombs devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Those extraordinary events ended World War II in the Pacific Theater, saved countless American lives that would have been lost in an invasion, but also showed in far too graphic detail what a nuclear blast, even as small as those were in comparison to today’s, can do.

J. ROBERT Oppenheimer, instrumental in developing the WWII atomic bombs, prophetically said:
“If atomic bombs are to be added as new weapons to the arsenals of a warring world, or to the arsenals of nations preparing for war, then the time will come when mankind will curse the names of Los Alamos and Hiroshima.”
And curse them we should, as well as Kim, whose itchy trigger finger could deliver more than even he ever imagined possible.

— Bob Johnson

Why, with reserves of $5 million or so, don’t Allen County commissioners lower the county’s tax levy?

They’d love to, Commissioner Tom Williams told the Register Monday, but are locked into budget authority (projected expenditures) to avoid becoming a victim of the Legislature’s befuddling decision to impose a tax-dollar lid on local budgets.

Same is true of city governing bodies, and to a lesser degree school districts, which have operated at the Legislature’s fiscal behest since the early 1990s.

Allen County is a clear example of what is wrong with the law, which took effect a year ago and put local governors between the proverbial rock and a hard place.

County commissioners could slash the ad valorem tax levy by many mills, but in so doing very likely would have themselves facing innumerable machinations in years to come. 

Why, you ask? Because legislators, while not able to handle the state’s finances in much of a satisfactory way, thought it appropriate to tell local folks how to collect, and consequently spend, local tax dollars. Talk about arrogance.

The lid is determined by the consumer price index (commonly referred to as inflation) for upcoming years. Thus, if the CPI is judged to be 1.4 percent, as it was this year, a council or commission may increase the amount of tax dollars collected only by that amount. If any body wants to raise more, for any worthwhile project, recourse is a referendum. 

That creates an unwarranted interruption of the local process, because an election has to be before the coming year’s budget may be approved and put in place. With regulations being what they, an election can be scheduled but if the decision to do so comes late in budget preparation, it is difficult to accomplish.

So, to get around all the debilitating rigmarole created by the Legislature — and signed into law without hesitation by Gov. Sam Brownback — most local governing bodies opt to budget the maximum allowable to avoid any last minute problems, in the current year and those ahead.

The law does have some exceptions — emergency medical services, money raised because of increased property valuation and to deal with library needs, indicating perhaps legislators are more literate than they sometimes seem.

To his credit, and likely in part because of his years of serving as an Allen County commissioner, our representative, Kent Thompson, voted against the tax-dollar lid.

We assume the Kansas Association of Counties and League of Kansas Municipalities are leading the charge to have the tax lid law repealed. The vast majority of council and commission members also are of that opinion.

REASON to abrogate the law is simple.

Town council members, as well as county commissioners Williams, Jim Talkington and Jerry Daniels, know much better what is needed within their districts than someone in western Kansas or the rich suburbs of Kansas City, perched and protected in either chamber of the Legislature.

The Register has reported multiple times on the angst that arises during preparation of budgets. Efforts are made to deal with needs without putting too much of a burden on taxpayers. After all, those computing budgets are taxpayers, and they want to do right by friends, neighbors and many others.

That is why county commissioners feel so put upon. They would be delighted to stream significant increases in assessed valuation flowing from the Enbridge pipeline and pumping station to lower tax rates that affect us all. In so doing, though, they would be putting a strangle hold on progress within the county that benefits us all — later if not sooner.

With wind farms on the cusp of sprouting in the county, additional income will find its way to county coffers. Advantage is payments in lieu of taxes for the first 10 years, before the installations become subject to property taxes, will not be affected by the tax lid. 

Meanwhile, the better outcome lying directly ahead is that  Rep. Thompson and others with his knowledge and experience will be able to convince their colleagues on both sides of the aisle to turn back the tax lid when the 2018 session convenes in early January.

That’s what responsive government is all about.

— Bob Johnson