Children as Hostages?

Almost from its inception in 1950, the program giving federal aid to "impacted districts"--the awkward bureaucratic term for school systems serving large numbers of federal employees' children--has been the subject of dispute. Each President since Dwight Eisenhower has tried to reform the subsidy scheme or reduce it. Each failed. The basic inequity is that most of the money goes to areas where the Government personnel live in the community and pay real estate tax, rather than to needier towns where the employees live tax-free on Government installations. But the districts of 385 U.S. Representatives benefit from the subsidy, making reform politically difficult.

Last week a breakdown in the system made 8,200 Nebraska schoolchildren pawns in a bureaucratic clash. Thousands of youngsters elsewhere could also become involved.

High Tuition. The Nebraska case involves the town of Bellevue (pop. some 20,000), which has a student enrollment of 10,800, the majority of whom come from nearby Offutt Air Force Base, home of the Strategic Air Command. On the basis of last year's subsidy, Bellevue expected to get about $2,900,000 this year, or 45% of its school budget. The dispute between the Nixon Administration and Congress over the size of the entire education appropriation for the current fiscal year resulted in a compromise that left impacted-aid at roughly the same level as last year. The appropriation made no provision for increasing costs and rising enrollments or for special problems encountered by districts like Bellevue, which has a relatively low tax base of its own. Of the 8,200 children of federal personnel, 4,500 live at Offutt and only 3,700 in homes that are on tax rolls. Bellevue is now to receive $658,000 less than it anticipated. About 30 other school districts around the country are in a similar quandary.

The reaction of Bellevue officials, led by School Superintendent Richard Triplett, was to fight. The school board voted to charge service families tuition for the balance of the current school year. The rate: more than $100 per child. Many of the servicemen simply cannot afford to pay. Major General Timothy Dacey, S.A.C.'s chief of staff, instructed his men to send their children back to school this week without making any payment.

Hostages. The Department of Health, Education and Welfare argued that it would be illegal to impose fees. Replied Triplett: "We're challenging HEW. We feel that we can charge tuition." If the school district remains adamant, however, it risks losing all of its education subsidy. HEW at first hesitated to produce needed funds with which to bail out Bellevue. Last week the Government gave the town an earlier-than-usual payment to tide it over. But the sum was still pegged at the low rate.

Beyond the immediate deadlock is the threat of growing controversy in which children will be held hostage. Grand Forks, N.D., is now threatening to charge tuition. Langdon, N.D., the future site of an anti-ballistic missile installation, has said that it will bar servicemen's children from its schools unless Washington fully defrays local expense for their education. Finally, HEW said that it has now developed a program of reform that it will submit to Congress some time this year.

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