WKNO TRANSCRIPT
CHRISTOPHER BLANK (Host): From license plate cameras to school vouchers, Memphians are learning the limits of what certain amenities can provide. With us again is political analyst, Otis Sanford. Welcome back.
OTIS SANFORD: Thank you, Chris. Good to be back with you.
BLANK: Otis, to start with, Chalkbeat Tennessee revealed some surprising information about the state school voucher program. As you know, taxpayers are now giving families $7,000 a year to put their kids into private schools. But one statistic we won't know is how many families are making that choice -- that school choice. Nowhere on the application for the money, does it ask if a kid is transferring into a private school or if we are all just subsidizing people already enrolled. Other states ask this question on their forms. Otis, why don't Tennessee lawmakers want us to know this information?
SANFORD: The simple fact is they don't care about transparency. This is a Republican-controlled legislature, and I hate to beat up on Republicans all the time, but they're in charge, and it is unconscionable that we don't have that level of transparency to know whether this program is actually going to help people who they say they are trying to help. Kudos to Chalkbeat for pointing this out.
BLANK: Even when the voucher bill was being debated, many Democrats wondered how a state that is 47th in public education funding will find an extra $450 million dollars every year to give private schools with no strings attached. But I happen to be a taxpayer who likes strings, because if Gov. Bill Lee tells us vouchers will improve education in Tennessee, I want to see some numbers on that. What kind of accountability are we missing here, and why?
SANFORD: If we don't know where the students are coming from, then we don't know exactly who is being helped by the vouchers. What we are missing here is information they said would be available to provide proof that vouchers are helping people out of poverty, helping people get an education so they won't resort to crime. We don't have any of that information primarily because the legislature and this governor is not all that concerned about transparency with this program.
BLANK: Well, as everyone who drives in Memphis knows, fake paper tags are, as police have said, "prolific." There's a reason for this. They make it easy for people to commit crimes and escape consequences for accidents and not have to pay car insurance. Now, we know there's been outcry in Memphis about police pulling over people for minor infractions like broken tail lights. But as Police Chief CJ Davis pointed out this week, fake tags are a bigger public safety issue because the license plate readers that police are putting up around the city to track criminal suspects or curb drag racing, they don't read paper tags. So first question, is it time for a crackdown on that?
SANFORD: Oh, I think so. A lot of people with these paper tags are doing things illegally. And I do think it's time to crackdown on that. And there are ways to do it. The paper tags tags should come from an auto dealer. And there should be a way for the dealers to have something on that tag that you can't replicate. And so yes, it is time to crackdown on this use of paper tags that people just drive around forever on their cars.
BLANK: At a city council meeting this week, this issue brought up an old ritual that we remember for Memphis drivers and that was having to take your car in once a year for an inspection in order to renew your license plates. Given where we are now, do you think the public would go for starting annual inspections again in order to clean up the streets?
SANFORD: No, I don't think so. The inspection, the way it was done, waiting in line forever, I don't think anybody -- and I know I don't -- want to go back to that.
BLANK: Well, finally, Otis, there have been attempts to rename Memphis International Airport in the past. All of them rejected. But the airport authority moved very quickly to rename the airport after FedEx founder Fred Smith died last weekend. The board member who proposed it was a close friend of Smith's. Is this a fitting tribute to a man who changed Memphis and certainly the airport area, or should there be more discussion about it?
SANFORD: Oh, I think this is a great idea. The times in the past where there were discussions about renaming the airport -- I think at one point it was for Elvis Presley -- that didn't go anywhere because with all due respect to Elvis Presley, he didn't do anything for the airport. Fred Smith and FedEx made the airport what it is today and made Memphis what it is today. I think it is absolutely appropriate that the airport name be changed to honor the person who basically built up the airport. I support this wholeheartedly and I understand that the airport authorities already voted to do that, and I think it should be done swiftly.
