The Toledo Blade wrote a commonsense editorial calling for repeal of HB 70, which allows the Ohio State Department of Education to take over and privatize the management of low-scoring school districts. Takeover has been tried and failed in Lorain and Youngstown. Now Toledo and other impoverished districts are threatened.

Frankly, it is  shocking to see such sound logic and reasoning, but it is also gratifying. Privatization is not the answer to poverty.

Here is a demonstration of what a thoughtful editorial writer can produce:

All in one day, back in 2015, a quickie amendment was added to an education bill in Columbus and rushed through the General Assembly with no hearings and no committee research. The measure allows the state to take over failing school districts — and Toledo Public Schools is in real jeopardy of being taken over so that state officials can “fix” the struggling district.

The problem is that the state’s cure looks as if it would be worse than what ails TPS.

Under House Bill 70, signed and defended by former Gov. John Kasich, the state can take over if a school district receives an overall “F” grade on its state report card for three consecutive years.

TPS earned an overall “F” last year. Many experts rightly point out that failing grade is a more accurate measure of a community’s extraordinary poverty than it is the quality of education children are receiving.

And because Toledo probably cannot quickly fix systemic poverty problems — more homeless students than any other Ohio district, 40 percent of Toledo children living below the poverty line, one in four children suffering from hunger — the district’s state report card is not likely to miraculously look like an honor roll contender this year or next.

The idea of a state takeover for truly failing school districts mightbe a good idea. Schools cannot be allowed to fail year after year. Districts cannot be allowed to fail their children and their communities.

But the standardized tests used to determine which schools are failing are recognized by more and more experts, parents, and communities as failed measuring tools.

And in the districts that have already endured state takeover — Youngstown, Lorain, and East Cleveland — the process has been revealed as a sham. Youngstown, the first district targeted for takeover, actually posted worse standardized test scores after an outside CEO took over, dropping from 602nd in the state to 606th.

It is not as if state authorities can point to a failing management team or negligent school board. Under the leadership of Superintendent Romules Durant, TPS has increased its graduation rate from 63 percent to 78 percent in the last three years. It has created successful themed magnet schools to let students focus on art, aeronautics, and business. The district has passed a series of levies in the last three years and has a stable financial forecast.

What, exactly, would state officials expect a privatized management team do differently? There is no magic wand to be waved over poor, urban school districts. If a quick fix were possible, the TPS officials would have used it years ago.

Last year, then-State Rep. Teresa Fedor sponsored a bill to halt state takeovers. The moratorium bill was blocked by Republicans and by Mr. Kasich, who promised to veto it. But the General Assembly did agree to study the effect of takeovers on school districts.

Local control is the cornerstone of American public education. Taxes, hiring, curriculum, and policy for a community’s most important public institution — its schools — are meant to be decided by locally elected officials, not hired guns with zero accountability to parents and taxpayers.

The General Assembly must pass — and Gov. Mike DeWine must sign — a bill that halts state takeovers of school districts.

Schools cannot fail their communities and failing schools must be accountable. But the current school takeover process in Ohio does nothing to make failing schools accountable or successful.

Ohio charter schools are very low-performing. They have also had numerous scandals.

And then there is the story of the Richard Allen Charter Schools.

The Dayton Daily News conducted an investigation and found that the charters “are still being run by a person who was sued by the state attorney general 18 months ago for her role in misspending $2.2 million in school money.”

The school leased a Maserati, two Mercedes, and a Jaguar for its leaders. Nothing but the best with public money! I mean, really, would you expect them to drive a Ford or a Toyota or a Chevy?

The investigation “also found that the schools are operating in buildings that have a bankruptcy case hanging over them, and Richard Allen has had no state financial audits released for the past three school years.”

Can you believe this?

Superintendent Michelle Thomas faces pending legal action, as does the Institute of Management and Resources (IMR), which ran the school for years and listed a leased Maserati and Jaguar in its bankruptcy filing.

Asked last week about Thomas’ role running Richard Allen schools, a state attorney general’s spokesman claimed, “The schools are no longer under Ms. Thomas’ control.”

But both the schools’ website and Ohio Department of Education documents confirm that she is the superintendent, and it was Thomas who responded to questions about the schools after a reporter visited the Talbott Tower office for the schools’ management company.

Asked about the contradiction, attorney general’s spokesman Dominic Binkley said he would have to recheck information provided by the AG’s education division that Thomas was no longer running the schools.

Ohio Senate Education Committee Chair Peggy Lehner, who has led charter school reform efforts in recent years, said state officials will investigate.

“I find this information extremely troubling, and I, along with a number of other entities within the state, will continue to look into this,” Lehner said.

Thomas declined an interview request, sending short emails instead.

“Richard Allen Schools has nothing to do with IMR,” Thomas wrote, adding, “The schools are working hard to respect its leases and to secure the property outside of the bankruptcy. The audits are proceeding and it is my understanding that they should be released soon.”

Until summer 2017, the three Richard Allen schools in Dayton and one in Hamilton were run by The Institute of Management and Resources, a company started by Thomas and her mother, Richard Allen Schools founder Jeanette Harris.

Earlier this decade, the state auditor’s office ruled that IMR misspent $2.2 million in public money running Richard Allen. The company denied wrongdoing and appealed in court, but lost in 2015.

Lingering issues

IMR filed for bankruptcy protection in March 2018. The Daily News pored through hundreds of pages of court records, state audits and school records, finding several lingering issues:

** The state attorney general’s office sued IMR, Harris, Thomas and others in late 2017, seeking to turn those $2.2 million in audit findings into collectible court judgments. The case was stayed when IMR filed for bankruptcy protection months later.

“(In addition to IMR), we also sued Jeannette Harris, her daughter Michelle Thomas, and the schools’ former treasurer (Felix O’Aku),” Binkley said. “We seek to hold those individuals strictly liable for the improper payments that resulted in the findings for recovery…

** IMR’s March 2018 bankruptcy filing says that at the time, the company was leasing four cars that were being paid for by IMR officials — a 2015 Maserati Ghibli for which Thomas is listed as co-lessee, a 2016 Mercedes C300 with deputy superintendent Aleta Benson listed as “guarantor,” and both a 2016 Jaguar XJL and a 2016 Mercedes GL 450 SUV with Harris listed as “guarantor.”.”

Ohio spends a billion dollars annually on its failing charter sector, which is now lobbying for an increase of 22% in state aid.