In those days “binding arbitration in collective bargaining” was used to incite terror in the hearts of school superintendants and conservative school boards across the state. The same interests that turned Governor Culver’s ear on Open Scope this time around rallied on the cry that arbitration would cause a skyrocket in settlements and taxes.

Frankly,that never happened. School boards (and I am a former school board member) learned to get hard edged negotiators. Conservative legislators capped the amount of caash for schools. Salaries for teachers (and many other categories of public employees) plummeted to the bottom 20% in the nation. So much for rampant greed.

Open scope would have actually taken some of the budgetary pressure off of school boards and public sector administrations by allowing for job satisfaction issues (such as continuing education and leave of absense policies) to be placed on the table – possibly at a lesser cost than salaries.

But – it is too late for this go-around. If we are trying to follow the “Mississippi model” for economic development, this is a good first start. With this, a horrible precedent has been set that can only bracket the expectations for future private sector bargaining.

A good economic development policy requires first that people make enough to support their families. Then they will stay put and other societal problems will diminish. Over and over, as a school board member, I saw that family income was the best predictor of educational success. A family with a good income can worry about a child’s education instead of barely making rent. A family with a good income does not move from job to job and disrupt the child. A child of a family with a good income is less likely to become a burden to the state.

I am afraid that Governor Culver, by listening to the wrong voices, has set the tone against both public and private sector collective bargaining. By doing that, he has cost the taxpayers much more than he will ever know.

In those days “binding arbitration in collective bargaining” was used to incite terror in the hearts of school superintendants and conservative school boards across the state. The same interests that turned Governor Culver's ear on Open Scope this time around rallied on the cry that arbitration would cause a skyrocket in settlements and taxes.

Frankly,that never happened. School boards (and I am a former school board member) learned to get hard edged negotiators. Conservative legislators capped the amount of caash for schools. Salaries for teachers (and many other categories of public employees) plummeted to the bottom 20% in the nation. So much for rampant greed.

Open scope would have actually taken some of the budgetary pressure off of school boards and public sector administrations by allowing for job satisfaction issues (such as continuing education and leave of absense policies) to be placed on the table – possibly at a lesser cost than salaries.

But – it is too late for this go-around. If we are trying to follow the “Mississippi model” for economic development, this is a good first start. With this, a horrible precedent has been set that can only bracket the expectations for future private sector bargaining.

A good economic development policy requires first that people make enough to support their families. Then they will stay put and other societal problems will diminish. Over and over, as a school board member, I saw that family income was the best predictor of educational success. A family with a good income can worry about a child's education instead of barely making rent. A family with a good income does not move from job to job and disrupt the child. A child of a family with a good income is less likely to become a burden to the state.

I am afraid that Governor Culver, by listening to the wrong voices, has set the tone against both public and private sector collective bargaining. By doing that, he has cost the taxpayers much more than he will ever know.