PAGE A7
,perspectives
pirit of JEFFERSON and VAP.!R'S ADVOCATE Wednesday, May 21,2014
TOM MILLER
Young West Virginians show modest gains in math
The good news is that high school se-
niors in West Virginia have made some
modest progress in their math scores
while nationwide the average scores for
high school seniors in both math and
reading have not changed since 2009.
This alarming report released earlier
this month from the National Assess-
ment of Educational Progress (NAEP)
concludes that the average math score
remains at 153 on a scale of 300 while
the average reading score was un-
changed at 288 out of 500.
According to these results, only one
of every four students scored at or above
proficiency in math and only 37 percent
met the same standing when it comes to
reading.
Former West Virginia Gov. Bob Wise,
who is now president of the Alliance for
Excellent Education, said the Nation's
Report Card results reflect a "desperate"
need for aggressive implementation of
Common Core standards.
The latest numbers indicate that about
14 percent of high school seniors in
West Virginia demonstrate proficiency
in math and reading respectively, com-
pared to 24 percent and 36 percent of
seniors nationwide. But proficiency in
math in this state has improved by only
one percent since 2009 while test scores
have increased four points.
Administering the NAEP tests to
fourth and fifth graders is a require-
ment to receive federal aid under the No
Child Left Behind Act, but states can
volunteer to have additional testing of
high school seniors.
West Virginia participated in volun-
tary in 2009 and was one of 11 sates
to do so this year. Only four of those
states-Arkansas, Connecticut, Idaho
and West Virginia-showed improve-
ment in math while only Arkansas and
Connecticut also made improvements in
reading.
Test scores have also remained un-
changed when broken down into gender
and race subcategories. White students
have tested higher than black students
by about 30 points both in 2009 and
2013. In 2013, 33 percent of the white
students scored proficient or above in
math compared to only seven percent of
black students. The same gap is pres-
ent in reading test scores with 47 per-
cent of white students scoring proficient
or above compared to only 16 percent of
black students.
In West Virginia, where 92 percent
of the students are white, minority stu-
dents also have lower test scores in math
and reading. The current trends are that
black students have average math and
reading scores that are 12 and 11 points
lower than white students. But that gap
has been reduced since 2009. That year,
black students scored 21 fewer points on
the math test than white students did.
And reading scores for black students
in West Virginia have dropped by six
points, even though the gap in reading
proficiency is more closer than the na-
tional average. So not all of the present
statistics are as promising in this state
just as they are not so promising nation-
wide...
MEANWHILE, while more than 90
percent of Kanawha County residents
who responded to a Kanawha-Charles-
ton Health Department survey back on
April 3-8 said they were using West Vir-
ginia American Water--three months af-
ter the Jan. 9 spill--only 36 percent were
using it for drinking and just 28 percent
said they believed the water was "safe".
Most important was the fact that four
of every five respondents said they
found out about the "do not use" or-
der on the day of the incident in Janu-
ary. Yet, nearly one in four of those re-
sponding said they used the water any-
way when the do-not-use order was in
effect. More than three of every four
respondents said they used the water to
take showers while only 37 percent used
the water for drinking.
While the do-not-use order was in ef-
fect, nearly one of every four respon-
dents to the survey said they used the
water anyway. More than three-fourths
of those responding said they used the
water to take showers while only 37 per-
cent said they used the water for drink-
ing. The majority of respondents relied
on alternative drinking water, most ei-
ther going to a large retailer or to an un-
affected commtmity.
According to information received
in the April survey, about one of every
three respondents said they had less than
one gallon of purchased water on hand
at the time of the spill. And about one in
ten admitted to collecting rain water for
a water source, something that Health
Department Director Rahul Gupta said
"intrigued" him because of the national
media stories on the subject...
FINALLY, Congressman Nick Ra-
hall, D-WV, easily won his 20th race in
last week's primary election to represent
West Virginia's 3rd District by defeating
political newcomer Richard Ojeda. But
now he must prepare for a general elec-
tion battle in November with Republi-
can challenger Evan Jenkins of Hun-
tington.
Jenkins recently switched political
parties while serving in the West Virgin-
ia State Senate from the 5th Senatorial
District of Cabell and Wayne counties,
moving from the lopsided Democratic
majority in the 34-member upper house
of the Legislature to a back-row seat in
the Republican minority there. Rahall
said he wants to challenge Jenkins to
several debates during the months lead-
ing up to the November general elec-
tion...
[)ON B U.RGE S
Hilltop Hotc,1 study scales
new heights of incredulity
About three weeks ago, on April
29, the Harpers Ferry Planning
Commission held a "Special Pub-
lic Workshop" where a group called
the "Harpers Ferry Residents Group"
presented a report from an expert
planning consultant they hired to as-
sess a concept plan for redevelop-
ment of the Hilltop House Hotel.
This plan was submitted in 2009
by SWAN, the hotel developer, and
withdrawn in 2010 when SWaN
walked away "for now" because of
a "local political firestorm that re-
sulted in ethical and criminal accu-
sations against multiple parties."
The expert consultant's report
said that 1,147 parking spaces are
required for a 160-room hotel with
a restaurant and a ballroom. That
makes about seven parking spaces
per room. At two people per car, ap-
parently he believes the hotel could
be packed to the gills with 2,300
people. Total nonsense. According to
the Urban Land Institute guidelines,
the proposed hotel with 160 rooms,
dining for 180 and ballroom for 300
would require about 390 parking
spaces while the consultant claims
a parking requirement about three
times higher.
The expert consultant said the cur-
rent traffic on Washington Street is
at capacity with 1,500 vehicles a
day. That makes about one vehicle a
minute. Apparently he considers this
gridlock. Total nonsense. The 2009
traffic impact study done by Gordon
Associates of Charles Town showed
about 130 peak-hour trips on Satur-
day for the proposed hotel which is
only 40 percent of the level of ser-
vice of 330 vehicles per hour where
the Transportation Research Board
Highway Capacity Manual says traf-
fic on a Class III urban arterial like
Washington Street is "freely flow-
ing."
The Highway Capacity Manual
also says traffic would be "at capaci-
ty" when the traffic is 1,350 vehicles
"The expert consultant said redevelopment
of Hilltop House would create impervious
surfaces making the nearby Ridge Street
Valley Stream unsafe for human contact
and that children who swim in it could con-
tract diseases. Say what? Where did the
consultant find a deep swimming hole in
this itty bitty stream? .... the expert consul-
tant did not realize that the "headwaters"
of this stream is actually a storm drain on
Washington Street and the stream is fed by
two other storm drains. "
per hour, which is about 10 times
higher than implied by the consul-
tant.
The expert consultant said rede-
velopment of Hilltop House would
create impervious surfaces mak-
ing the nearby Ridge Street Valley
Stream unsafe for human contact and
that children who swim in it could
contract diseases. Say what? Where
did the consultant find a deep swim-
ming hole in this itty bitty stream?
The consultant was also totally un-
aware the town will require a storm
water management plan that meets
state guidelines that will require a
reduction of pollutant discharges.
He also failed to look at the topogra-
phy and see that runoff from the ho-
tel discharges down the hillside to-
wards the Potomac River not into the
stream.
Even worse, the expert consultant
did not realize that the "headwaters"
of this stream is actually a storm drain
on Washington Street and the stream
is fed by two other storm drains. If
he had simply inspected the stream
he would have easily seen it is es-
sentially a drainage ditch filled with
gravel, blacktop, and grime from
runoff from Washington Street.
The expert consultant also recom-
mended the size of the hotel be re-
duced to provide more parking for
visitors to Lower Town Harpers Fer-
ry. He estimated that 356 more park-
ing spaces were needed. Say what?
This is totally bizarre. The Harpers
Ferry Residents Group complains
about traffic from a 160-room hotel,
then proposes the hotel be reduced to
80 rooms in order to construct a huge
parking lot/garage with cars coming
and going all the time.
Almost four years ago in Septem-
ber 2010, SWaN walked from discus-
sions about the hotel, which had be-
come quite a circus. Currently, SWaN
is not engaging the town and likely
will not do so until the town stops
putting up with shenanigans involv-
ing feeble, inaccurate and mislead-
ing information by this small group.
-- Don Burgess writes from Bolivar
EH.3.0T SI[MON
Government creates the
problem, not. the jobs
I would like to thank Alyson Cle-
ments of the West Virginia Center on
Budget and Policy for setting the re-
cord straight in her April 30 letter to
the editor. The legislation passed by
the state Legislature raises the state
minimum wage to $8.75, not $10.10.
It is the proposed federal legislation
that would raise the national minimum
wage to $10.10 per hour if passed.
That said, the recently passed state
legislation goes beyond current feder-
al minimum wage law in very impor-
tant ways and the wage portion isn't
even the most concerning. Federal law
contains exemptions that are currently
relied upon by small businesses, hos-
pitals and municipalities in West Vir-
ginia. The new state law would nullify
those exemptions.
Almost everyone, including my-
self, wants to see everyone, especially
those at the bottom of the pay scale, do
better. Doing so by government decree
may not be the most effective way to
go about it. To those who claim that
raising the minimum wage will create
a boom in the West Virginia economy
I ask the obvious question: the mini-
mum wage has been raised in West
Virginia before - has that ever caused
an economic boom?
In Australia, the minimum wage is
over $16 per hour. However, if you go
to a Subway in.Sydney and order what
we here in the U.S. would call a "$5
foot long" it will cost you 11 Auss-
ie dollars (the equivalent of approxi-
mately $10.25 in U.S. dollars). Pric-
es adju.st. Market forces cannot be leg-
islated away without consequences -
unintended or otherwise. Unless you
want a completely planned economy
where the government dictates wag-
es and prices, you're spinning your
wheels. And we all know how well
those planned economies perform.
Check out Cuba and Venezuela.
Here in West Virginia, in addition to
minimum wage, we have something
called "prevailing wage." State gov-
ernment contractors must pay their
employees a prevailing wage, fixed by
the state, for work done for the state of
West Virginia. This obviously severe-
ly limits the ability of contractors to
bid competitively. If there isn't much
wiggle room to differentiate on price
that leaves the door open to other dif-
ferentiators, such as cronyism.
There is much debate as to whether
or not prevailing wage is really that.
Why not let the free market calculate
the price? Even many supporters of
prevailing wage acknowledge that it
needs to be "recalculated," meaning
that prevailing wage costs taxpayers
plenty. As Delegate John Overington
of Berkeley County has said on nu-
merous occasions, because of prevail-
ing wage, when West Virginia taxpay-
ers pay for 10 miles of road, they are
only getting seven. Some estimates
put the cost to taxpayers at $300 mil-
lion a year.
I remember a meeting in Charles-
ton concerning prevailing wage that
included members of the Legislature,
officials from the West Virginia De-
partment of Labor and representatives
of then-Gov. Manchin's office. One
commented that West Virginia peren-
nially ranks at or near the bottom in
per capita income and that prevail-
ing wage is designed to help mitigate
that.
The problem with that argument is
that prevailing wage was implement-
ed in West Virginia in 1937. In 1934,
West Virginia ranked 30 th in per capi-
ta income -' not near the top, but con-
siderably closer to the middle than the
bottom. We now rock back and forth
between 49 th and 50 th - near or at the
bottom. Clearly prevailing wage is not
working as intended.
No matter how well-intentioned,
government interventions in the mar-
ket rarely if ever work. So, how do we
achieve our goal to raise worker pay,
especially those at or near the bottom?
First we need to understand where
jobs come from - where they are cre-
ated. Businesses and only businesses
create jobs (no, the government does
not create jobs - but that's a subject
for another day) and small business-
es, especially startups, are the engine
of economic growth and job creation
in America. If the economic climate is
healthy, entrepreneurs start businesses
and hire workers. As economic activi-
ty increases, the demand for labor cre-
ates competition for workers leading
to higher wages. When you artificial-
ly legislate the increase in wages you
decrease demand. Even Warren Buf-
fet acknowledges that minimum wage
laws increase unemployment.
A recent Washington Post article re-
ported that a Brookings Institute study
shows that for the first time in decades
businesses are being destroyed faster
than they are being created. The study
covers the years 1978 through 2011.
Only the last three years in the study,
2009 - 2011, showed more business-
es dying than being created. (Coinci-
dentally, recent government data show
that the work force participation rate in
America currently is back to 1978 lev-
els). The Brookings study also showed
that teen employment has dropped by
a shocking 42 percent since 2000.
While every state showed a negative
differential in the percentage of new
businesses to established business-
es, West Virginia ranked in the bot-
tom fifth of all states in that regard. In
other words, in America, we're losing
"businesses faster than we're creating
them, and inWest Virginia faster still.
We all want a vibrafit economy
where businesses flourish, jobs are
plentiful and employers have to com-
pete for workers. How do we achieve
this? Here's a hint. You can ask exist-
ing business owners, but in some cas-
es it just might be that the status quo
works for them, particularly the real-
ly big guys. Regulations and bureau-
cratic red tape have a tendency to act
as barriers to entry for many entre-
preneurs. Existing businesses may in
some cases consider regulation to be
a protection against upstart competi-
tion.
Instead, go ask an entrepreneur, if
you can find one. The Post article sug-
gested that America may be losing its
entrepreneurial spirit. With all the hur-
dles and obstacles they face, many en-
trepreneurs have come to the conclu-
sion that going into business for one-
self isn't worth the risk. A shortage of
entrepreneurs leads to a shortage of
jobs and a shortage of economic op-
portunity. For all the people out there
that need a job or better pay - that's a
shame.
-- Elliot Simon writes
from Harpers Ferry
