Pignanelli: "Good questions outrank easy answers." — Paul A. Samuelson

In the otherwise worthwhile pursuit of preventing school closures, a number of east-side activists are deceived by the mirage promising an easy answer — the oasis of smaller school districts.

Salt Lake County is blessed that the three school districts follow east-west geographical dimensions, as opposed to north-south. For a hundred years, this has guaranteed school district officials are aware of problems facing students on either side of State Street. During this time, two districts (Granite, Jordan) evolved from rural to urban in character, and the expansive boundaries ensured a successful metamorphosis.

The closure of two east-side elementary schools six years ago was a wake-up call that Salt Lake City was losing families to the south valley. Salt Lake City slapped the "snooze button" and went back to sleep (no comprehensive housing policy exists today that incentivize the return of families). Fortunately, visionary Salt Lake City School District officials responded to the continual threat of more school closures. Parents, teachers and administrators developed a number of creative programs to attract students from inside and outside the district to maintain the viability of remaining east-side schools while addressing the needs of the expanding school population on the west side of the city. These impressive results offer guidance to resolving the south valley dilemma.

Fashioning new east-side districts is an expensive and inefficient solution in comparison to other effective egalitarian methods. New bureaucracies will fertilize the duplication of administrative costs. While smaller schools are often better suited to providing a quality education, there is no hard evidence that a patchwork of small districts promises any positive results. Indeed, during my legislative service, there was a movement to consolidate many of Utah's 40 school districts for the reasons now recited to increase the number of jurisdictions.

On a larger scale, an enlightened society welcomes the burden to ensure all citizens have access to an adequate education (an objective difficult to achieve when the districts are "red- lined"). No doubt, the population shift in Salt Lake County is breeding a number of problems. Neighborhood schools are closed while other schools are bulging at the seams. Parents believe they are shut out of the decisionmaking process in large districts. But these anxieties are best addressed by developing innovative education programs, streamlining bureaucracy and restructuring district representation. The joint participation of west-side and east-side communities in the ongoing effort to improve our children's education has been successful, and a dynamic to be maintained.

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Republican LaVarr Webb was policy deputy to Gov. Mike Leavitt and Deseret News managing editor. He now is a political consultant and lobbyist. E-mail: lwebb@exoro.com. Democrat Frank Pignanelli is a Salt Lake attorney, lobbyist and political adviser. A former candidate for Salt Lake mayor, Pignanelli served 10 years in the Utah House of Representatives, six years as House minority leader. E-mail: frankp@xmission.com