KC shuts its own schools to deal with budget woes

One path to allowing more school choice is budget constraints.

Obama's crotch-kicks to the economy may have some interesting by-products, making it more and more difficult for state and local government to fund expensive and inefficient government school systems.

The worst contemporary example is in KC-- where they have enacted draconian cuts, with staggering implications for the govt schools there.

Here are two articles from the AP's Heather Hollingsworth and the AP's Maria Fisher-- both in the C-J...

From the first article:

Facing potential bankruptcy, the board that governs the once flush-with-cash Kansas City school district is taking the unusual and contentious step of shuttering almost half its schools.

Administrators say the closures are necessary to keep the district from plowing through what little is left of the $2 billion it received as part of a groundbreaking desegregation case. The Kansas City school board narrowly approved the plan to close 29 out of 61 schools Wednesday night at a meeting packed with angry parents. The schools will close at the end of the school year.

Although other districts nationwide are considering closures as the recession ravages their budgets, Kansas City's plan is striking. In rapidly shrinking Detroit, 29 schools closed before classes began this fall, but that still left the district with 172 schools. Most other districts are closing just one or two schools....

Under the approved plan, teachers at six other low-performing schools will be required to reapply for their jobs, and the district will try to sell its downtown central office. It also is expected to cut about 700 of the district's 3,000 jobs, including about 285 teachers....

Other details from the second article:

Kansas City school officials promised Thursday to shut down nearly half the district's schools by the start of classes in the fall without offering details of how they intend to implement the complicated plan in just a matter of months....

The district's enrollment of fewer than 18,000 students is about half of what the schools had a decade ago, with many students leaving for publicly funded charter schools, private and parochial schools and the suburbs....

He added that the transition plan itself would cost $25 million...