I mentioned a couple days ago
the segregation case in Omaha, Nebraska. Now, what has been a local issue over the control of local schools has turned into something of a national story.
Lou Dobbs had Senator Ernie Chambers on last night, to defend his position. The
New York Times did a feature on the Nebraska law.
How does this happen? How does the only black Senator in the state put up such a high-profile challenge to Brown?
Even though I'm repeating myself somewhat, I think it's very important to lay out some of the history and the players in this fight. Omaha did not fully integrate its public school system until the 1970s when it started busing. Concurrently, the city of Omaha was expanding westward. The town of Millard was annexed around this time. The fight was hard enough just to annex the town, so Omaha left the schools alone. The same thing happened years earlier with District 66 and Westside Community Schools. So, when Omaha was forced to integrate its schools, westward movement - white flight to the suburbs - began. In 1999, Omaha passed a bond issue that ended busing.
Over the past thirty years, Omaha has continued to grow westward. Part of the controversy began in 2004-2005, when Omaha Mayor Mike Fahey began the push toward annexing the nearby town of Elkhorn. Eventually, the debate moved toward school consolidation, and someone, somewhere, found an old Nebraska law that states simply that one city = one school district. Omaha Public Schools superintendent John Mackiel announced his "One City, One School District" campaign in June of last year. Over the last ten months, it's grown into the most important issue in the Omaha area, and the one that no politician dare touch.
Mayor Fahey, who is the rarest of breeds in Nebraska - a popular Democrat - stayed far away from taking a position in the controversy, though he did try to mediate. On the surface, it looked like a money issue. Omaha Public Schools does not get the property tax base of the more expensive West Omaha land that lies in the Millard district. This was the attack supporters of the Millard schools used. But anyone who has lived in Omaha and grown up in the school system can tell you what it was really about.
My confession, before we go any further, is that I graduated from Creighton Prep, a private school. I was probably in the bottom 5-10% of wealth at that school, and I could count the number of minority students in my graduating class on one hand. But I was lucky enough that my parents sacrificed so I could get that education. I can honestly say that it shaped who I am today and what I believe. I cannot, therefore, make a value judgement of the quality of OPS education vs. Millard or Westside or any of the other schools involved. I know many people who graduated from OPS schools with a quality education. But any examples I give will be purely anecdotal and add little to the discussion.
The statistics don't lie. Omaha Public Schools are 56% minority, while Millard schools are 9%. The inequality is there. The segregation is apparent by neighborhoods. North Omaha is predominantly black, South Omaha is Hispanic. West of 72nd Street, generally considered the center of the city, is mostly white. Until those root causes are explored, nothing will be done about it. But the push for equality of education was a step in the right direction. Students at Westside High School have laptop computers for use at school. It's only one example, but indicative of the inequality of funding that exists between the white districts and the minority districts; Or, as it really is: economic segregation, not racial. These were the conditions as they existed before this law was passed. Segregation existed in this city, in the form of suburban districts. The "one city, one district" fight was trying to change that. The state legislature took up the question when its session began early this year.
In the month of April, the legislature rushed toward some kind of resolution as they raced the clock toward the end of the session. Independent Ron Raikes of Lincoln introduced LB 1024, a compromise bill designed to bring the two sides closer together. It would combine Douglas County (Omaha and surrounding areas) and Sarpy County (Bellevue, Papillion, etc.) school districts (11 in all) into one "learning community." They would share the tax base, but all school districts would remain in control. A student could petition to go to any school within the learning community. This bill left both sides feeling dissatisfied, and Sarpy County schools wondering how they got dragged into this debate.
Over the next few days, several proposals were floated. Democrat Patrick Bourne of Omaha proposed an integration amendment - it was struck down heavily by the body. A call for an integration task force to study the matter was approved. Then the bombshell came from Senator Ernie Chambers, the only black Senator and a legislative veteran of some 36 years. To hear him tell it, Chambers believes this is about taking matters into their own hands:
Every proposal made by the white people has failed. Nothing has altered the situation in these schools. I offer a plan. And because it is going to work, white people have gotten alarmed because when we do have control of our schools, the parents will be interested because they have a stake.
I encourage you to read the transcript. Ernie Chambers is eccentric, and at times he pisses a lot of people off, but he is a great senator. I happen to disagree with him here, because I think it puts us down a dangerous path, but I understand his position, something I cannot say I did a week ago. In 2008, Ernie Chambers will be term limited out of office. The term limits were in part designed to target Ernie Chambers.
I think this is an important discussion that we must have. Ernie Chambers managed to get every politician and important figure in the state to take a stand on this issue. But I still disagree. This is the kind of thing that could set civil rights back 50 years. If this law is upheld in court, how far will other cities take it? What happens in the deep south? It's a serious concern.