An Open Letter to Doug and Jackie and Paul and Bill and . . .

I hear a lot of talk about the mayoral election this fall. The announced candidates Paul Goldman and Jackie Jackson tell us how bad things are and try to convince us they each are the one we should trust to fix them. The unannounced candidates Bill Pantele and Bruce Tyler also tell us how bad things are going under our beloved Doug Wilder, and I assume that as soon as they become candidates they will try to convince us that each is the only one that can fix things. The other unannounced candidate, Mayor Wilder, is hoping that he will run for reelection against at least four or five opponents who will split up the anti-Doug vote so that winning four more years will be a snap.

These candidates talk about regionalism and economic growth and master plans and efficiency in government and all those other standard issues that they think the citizens of Richmond are interested in. However, none of them will talk about the key issue that threatens the future of our city. Nobody wants to discuss bad news, especially when they can’t think of a solution. So, for all you once and future candidates. . .

Dear Candidate:

The City of Richmond, Commonwealth of Virginia, is suffering from a serious, perhaps fatal, illness. The symptoms of the disease are apparent from looking at the demographics of our neighborhoods. We have tons of elders who have raised their children in Richmond, have paid off their mortgages, have lived in the same houses for thirty or more years and will continue to live in those houses until they are too feeble to take care of themselves. We also have lots of young couples living in their first homes and enjoying the amenities of our fair city who are either childless or have children younger than school age. Our city also has a large group of people who live at or just above the poverty level and are struggling to feed and clothe their children and pay the rent. What Richmond does not have is a significant middle class. Our former middle class now lives in Chesterfield or Henrico or Hanover or places beyond.

The Richmond “middle class hemorrhaging disease” starts affecting couples when their oldest child turns four years old. They realize that they must start thinking about their child’s education. Being convinced that their precious young ones cannot get a quality education in their neighborhood public school, these middle class parents do one of four things: 1- If they can afford it, they enroll their child in private school; 2- If they can afford it, they choose to home-school their child; 3- If they know the rules of the game, they use Richmond Public Schools’ open enrollment policy to put their kid into one of Richmond’s elite public schools; or 4- They move out of the city. Based on the number of school-age kids I see running around my neighborhood, I’m convinced that option 4 is the most popular one. Our middle class is bleeding to the suburbs. The only parents who enroll their children in most of Richmond’s public schools are those who cannot afford the other options.

The numbers are clear. In the school year 1999-2000, twenty seven thousand children were enrolled in Richmond Public Schools. Every year since then enrollment has gone down. For the current school year, enrollment is about twenty two thousand five hundred students and that number is expected to go down next year. We’re talking about a reduction of over sixteen percent in only eight years. I am sure that there has not been a huge drop in the birth rate of city residents. I can only conclude that families with children are leaving Richmond if they can.

You also need to look at some other numbers. For the most recent years for which Richmond Public Schools’ website gives statistics, eighty eight per cent of the children enrolled are classified as “black” and seven percent are classified as “white.” (I apologize for talking about race. I know that in Richmond “polite” people don’t talk about such things.) Moreover, of our school population more than seventy percent are receiving subsidized lunches at school. If this were the 1960s, I might be tempted to describe Richmond Public Schools as racially and economically segregated. However, this is the twenty first century, so we don’t use such nasty words as segregation.

So, candidate, if you are elected, what do you intend to do to stop the bleeding? I know that under the laws of the Commonwealth it is the School Board, not the mayor, that is responsible for running the public schools. So, you might tell me that the quality and perceived quality of our schools is not an issue you need to be concerned with. However, we are not electing you merely to be chief executive officer of our city government. We are electing you to be our top community leader. And as leader of our community you cannot ignore the plight of our children. You cannot ignore the steady exodus of our middle class. You need to work with the Superintendent of Schools and the School Board and the City Council and civic, religious and business leaders to make Richmond Public Schools a world-class school system.

Providing great schools for our children is not just a matter of economic and racial justice. It is vital to the overall health of the city. A city with a population composed of just the old and the young, with nobody in between, is not healthy. A city population of just the affluent and the poor, with no middle class, is likewise unhealthy. When the middle class leaves a city it takes with it a significant part of the tax base.

If we want to have a city that is vibrant and safe and a wonderful place to live, we must invest in our public schools. How can we attract people to live in Richmond if we do not have great schools? How do we attract businesses to Richmond? Do we tell them this is a great place to work but advise them that their employees should live in the counties because our schools just aren’t that good?

Our current mayor and many members of our City Council believe that the best way to improve our schools is to restrict the amount of money that the city pays for schools. They apparently think that if the School Board and the school administration have to live on reduced rations the result will be a slimmer, more efficient school system. I don’t see them concerned with the quality of the education we provide our children. They fail to see that money that goes to our public schools is not money spent but an investment in our children’s future. Our children cannot afford a continuance of this “starve them to help them” attitude.

So, Madam or Mister Candidate, if we elect you as our next mayor, what will you do to keep and win back some of our exiled middle class? What will you do to guarantee that all the children in Richmond receive a world-class education? Tell me how you intend to turn Richmond Public Schools into a great school system. Without great schools, Richmond can never be a great city.

Maven