January 24, 1995
The Republicans want to reexamine health and safety regulations and require the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and other regulatory agencies to make a cost/benefit analysis prior to making regulations. Clinton and other liberals have accused Republicans of callously disregarding the health and safety of America's children. That's nonsense. It's liberal regulatory excesses that beg for relief and here's just one example why.
Mrs. Cleaster Mims is founder and director of Marva Collins Preparatory School of Cincinnati. It's a private school with a student body of 185 mostly low- and middle-income black students enrolled in grades K through eight. Virtually all of her students score at and, in some cases, two, three, and four years above grade level. The school radiates with discipline, love, and high expectations. Scores of students are on her enrollment waiting list.
To meet the demand for Marva Collins's superior, not to mention safer, education, Mrs. Mims has started a campaign to raise money to purchase a $450,000 former nursing home that will allow her a five-hundred-student capacity and provide facilities for a few boarding students. While quite a bargain, the building is in need of repairs and alterations that include mechanical-electrical modifications, teaching space renovations, painting, roofing, and exterior work that could easily run the price tag to close to $1 million. To raise that kind of money in and of itself is a daunting challenge but regulations created by “caring” liberals could easily put her mission entirely out of the question.
Because of the building's age, asbestos and lead paint are present. But according to Cincinnati architect William Miller, who made an inspection of the building, “The materials are sound and non-hazardous by prudent reasonable standards of safety.” He concludes that only relatively minor repairs need to be made to address existing asbestos and lead paint hazards.
But when have you heard of OSHA and EPA being reasonable? Miller estimates the combined cost of regulatory mandates for asbestos and lead paint removal could add as much as $200,000 to the renovation. Then there're close to two hundred doors in the building. To bring them up to Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) mandates, plus construct ramps and meet other mandates, might add another $150,000 to costs.
Mrs. Mims's plight is a result of the liberal vision of the world. Liberals see only benefits from regulations and ignore costs. Sure, it would be wonderful if the five hundred students at the new school had zero risk of asbestos and lead paint hazard. It would be wonderful if a wheelchair-bound student, who might enroll, would find no physical impediments. That's the wonderfulness of OSHA, EPA, and ADA regulations. On the other hand, the cost of those regulations, and hence their invisible victims, is the five hundred black students who might have had a better and safer education. You can bet the rent money that the hazards of government education are far greater than those posed by asbestos and lead paint in the building Mrs. Mims’ wants to purchase.
All's not lost. Mrs. Mims is a woman who knows no false pride and has boundless energy. She is willing to beg, plea, and cajole these federal and state agencies who have been allowed to proliferate arbitrary, punitive, and heartless mandates. She should get our political and financial support. While we're at it, we might just ask who is more callous: politicians who support regulations that make Mrs. Mims's dream of a better education impossible or those who want to make those regulations more sensible?