Recent editorials from Florida newspapers:
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Aug. 28
The Florida Times-Union on the benefits of starting high school classes later in the day:
The typical Duval County high school starts classes at 7:15 a.m., and science tells us that’s just too early. Once children reach puberty their biological clocks change; a teenager’s biological bedtime is closer to midnight.
A paper from the American Academy of Pediatrics names insufficient sleep among adolescents as “an important public health issue” and declares that high school students shouldn’t start school before 8:30 a.m.
That means that even the Duval high schools that do start classes later than 7:15 a.m. - like at 8:10 a.m. (Stanton and Paxon) or 8:25 a.m. (Douglas Anderson, Randolph and Peterson) - are still kicking off earlier than they should be.
It’s also worth noting that in St. Johns County, Florida’s No. 1 school district, high school starts at 9:15 a.m.
No trivial matter
The issue of starting school times is hardly a trivial matter: the American Academy of Sleep Medicine states that teens who don’t get enough sleep are more likely to be overweight and depressed; they are also more likely to smoke, drink and use drugs.
In other words they are more likely to do poorly in school.
The Academy of Pediatrics paper notes that chronic sleep loss has become the norm among teens, and simply going to bed earlier won’t work if the body’s clock is set later. Typically teens try to catch up on sleep during weekends, but that’s no substitute.
In fact about one-third of teens reported falling asleep at school at least once a week, according to a poll from the National Sleep Foundation.
Sleepy high school students are driving cars, too: drivers ages 25 and younger are involved in more than half of the 100,000 fatigue-related traffic crashes each year.
Duval says a change would be costly
While the Duval County school system has studied the issue of having later start times, it has determined that a change would be too costly on several levels, according to district spokesman Tracy Pierce.
Changing to later start times would result in fewer school bus trips - a loss of efficiency that would lead to Duval receiving penalties in state funding. In short it would cost the Duval district $30 million to make the switch, Pierce wrote in an email.
Pierce said changing the start times would also have ripple effects on students, such as affecting their ability to hold after-school jobs or care for siblings.
However, the Hillsborough County school district moved the start times for most of its high schools to 8:30 a.m. - and the change actually increased the efficiency of the district’s busing operations. The Hillsborough and Duval districts are both large urban school systems, so it would be worthwhile for Duval to examine how Hillsborough has been able to make later start times work.
One thing should be clear: the status quo should no longer be accepted. This is about simple biology, and it just makes no sense to fight Mother Nature.
Later start times would allow Duval’s high school students to get the sleep they need to perform well in the classroom.
Online: www.jacksonville.com
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Aug. 25
The Ledger of Lakeland on how the Trump abortion rule will affect local clinics:
Recently The Ledger detailed how a cadre of about two dozen pro-choice advocates usher women contemplating abortions into the Lakeland Women’s Health Center in South Lakeland. The escorts do so ostensibly to shield the women from “harassment” from pro-life proponents.
In 2007 Massachusetts passed a law creating a 35-foot “buffer zone” around entrances to abortion clinics for prospective patients. Seven years later the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously struck down the law as an affront to the First Amendment.
Yet as of last week location in a different sense became critical for women in Lakeland considering this procedure.
As The Ledger noted, the Lakeland Women’s Health Center is the only abortion clinic in Polk County and is not affiliated with Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood closed its local abortion provider, in Winter Haven, in 2016. Planned Parenthood’s Lakeland facility, however, still referred patients for abortions. Presumably, if you’re from Polk County, the clinic informed women that the Lakeland Women’s Health Center was their closest alternative.
But as of this month, that will no longer be the case for Planned Parenthood, now that the Trump administration has rightly affirmed that federal dollars should not be used for abortion.
Earlier this year the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services proposed a rule prohibiting abortions by providers that receive federal funding for family-planning services under Title X. The rule took effect Aug. 19. Thus, by March providers must physically separate abortion facilities from their other healthcare services, such as birth control or cancer screenings. They also are forbidden from co-mingling Title X funds with other revenue, nor can they refer women for abortions as a method of family planning - because Planned Parenthood’s clinics often directed patients to the organization’s other offices.
It’s not a “gag rule,” as critics portray it. The HHS says while referrals for abortion as a method of family planning are not permitted, pregnant women can be directed to such providers in emergency medical situations, and can be given a list of practitioners who perform abortions in offering comprehensive healthcare services, so long as they are not the majority on the roster and the list itself is not a referral for an abortion.
On Aug. 26, Planned Parenthood, which performs roughly one-third of the nation’s 900,000 annual abortions, opted out of Title X after 49 years. In the process, the organization also surrendered $60 million in federal funding, which assists an estimated 1.5 million low-income women.
The group and its supporters argue HHS forced Planned Parenthood out of Title X. That’s not the case. The administration presented Planned Parenthood and other Title X recipients with a clear choice in enforcing a federal law that has banned taxpayer-funded abortions since 1976.
Planned Parenthood had the opportunity to sever its abortion operation from the rest of its services. It chose not to. Which made the group’s decision stunning - and affirmed what pro-life advocates have long maintained about Planned Parenthood: that despite its rhetoric about healthcare, the organization was first and foremost about abortion.
Planned Parenthood signaled as much in mid-July when it fired Dr. Leana Wen as president after just eight months on the job. Wen, who had been a public health official in Baltimore before leading the nation’s most recognizable abortion-advocacy agency, was the first medical doctor to lead Planned Parenthood in nearly 50 years. Wen exited amid a rift over her efforts to promote Planned Parenthood as a less politicized, more holistic healthcare provider.
It’s unclear what this might mean for women in Polk County who seek Planned Parenthood’s services. After all, it’s difficult to see how HHS can police this, and what penalty a clinic might face for violating the rule.
Despite that, the Trump administration has greatly clarified an issue we’ve argued over as a society for nearly 50 years.
Planned Parenthood has long maintained that abortion was a small fraction of its work - 3% was an oft-cited figure - and the rule only affects about 10% of the taxpayer dollars it receives yearly. Yet by its decisions on the Title X rule and Dr. Wen, Planned Parenthood has made abundantly clear that abortion is the dominant aspect of its identity, if not its operations.
Online: https://www.theledger.com
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Aug. 25
The Orlando Sentinel on the need for more government ethics boards:
Just because something smells fishy, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s rotten. It does mean you should give it a good, hard look.
A whiff of ethical fishiness is coming from two government agencies in Central Florida. It’s linked to two people.
Robert Saltsman was a member of Florida Virtual School’s Board of Trustees. He also worked, at least for a brief time, as a consultant for Frank Kruppenbacher’s law firm.
Kruppenbacher was the general counsel for FLVS. So while he reported to Saltsman in one job, Saltsman reported to him in another.
Kruppenbacher was also chairman of the Orlando International Airport board, which had a $4.2 billion capital spending budget. Saltsman was a lobbyist for companies that competed for bids that Kruppenbacher’s board doled out.
The setup passed the government’s smell test, which basically consisted of an airport attorney giving it a seal of approval.
Ethics watchdogs aren’t so sure.
“You have to go further if you’re in the public sector,” said Peter Cruise, the executive director at Florida Atlantic University’s LeRoy Collins Public Ethics Academy. “You’re dealing with other people’s money and other people’s trust.”
Dealings with such things is surprisingly difficult in Florida. The Florida Commission on Ethics was powerless to look into the FLVS/OIA affair because nobody filed a complaint, and the commission cannot initiate investigations.
The Orange County Commission on Ethics couldn’t investigate because there is no Orange County Commission on Ethics.
The City of Orlando also has no ethics commission.
It’s time for local governments to stop relying on the creaky state system and create their own ethics boards.
“There needs to be a perception that somebody is watching,” said Ben Wilcox, research director for the government watchdog organization Integrity Florida.
That’s especially true these days, when the public thinks most politicians have the ethics of telephone scammers. Yet Jacksonville, Tallahassee, Palm Beach County and Dade County are the only major governments in Florida with ethics boards.
All were formed because local citizens were fed up with politicians defrauding the system and scratching each other’s backs.
That’s not to say every public servant is a crook.
“Most government employees are extremely honest,” Cruise said. “But a few people here and there paint them all with a bad brush.”
That’s assuming those people are exposed, of course.
That’s easier to do when your city our county has its own ethics police force. Those that don’t typically have ethics codes that mirror the state’s code. If a whistleblower files a complaint, the state ethics commission handles it.
Critics say the state code is often too nebulous to prosecute wrongdoers. The state board is also underfunded and not truly independent.
It is regulated by the Legislature - the same people it is supposed to oversee.
And the state board cannot initiate investigations. It could suspect something is wrong, but it can’t do anything unless a complaint is filed.
All those elements have played into the FLVS case.
The mayors of Orange County and Orlando sit on the OIA board, but the city and county codes of ethics leave a lot of legal wiggle room over terms like “employer” and “business relationship.”
An airport attorney ruled the business setup between Kruppenbacher and Saltsman did not violate ethics guidelines. But the guidelines are such that the men didn’t even have to disclose their connections or declare a potential conflict of interest.
Kruppenbacher was on the state ethics commission from 2008 to 2010, which might tell you something about that board’s thoroughness.
He resigned from his FLVS job last year during an investigation into his behavior and spending. Saltsman resigned from the FLVS board last December.
There may have been no quid pro quos between them, but it sure smelled like a barrel of sardines. And what happened there was hardly the first case of questionable dealing by public officials.
If we want to clear the air, a good start would be forming advisory panels to study the feasibility of creating ethics commissions. That’s what Tallahassee did, and we can learn from that process.
There are real concerns, such as funding. The Miami-Dade County Commission on Public Trust has an annual budget of $2.3 million.
There are also pseudo-concerns, like government officials freaking out over supposed unwarranted scrutiny.
Amending a government charter typically begins with a petition drive. About 58,000 registered voters would have to sign to get a referendum on a ballot in Orange County.
The amendment must also be written in a way that gives the board independence and authority.
Creating an ethics commission would not be fast or simple, but creating an advisory committee is an easy first step.
It’s also a necessary step. Most public officials are ethical, but we need more authority to sniff out the fishy ones.
Especially when they are right under our noses.
Online: http://www.orlandosentinel.com
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