Salmonella poisoning

The (Findlay) Courier, July 10

The most recent outbreak of salmonella poisoning, the result of who knows what -- tomatoes? jalapeño peppers? cilantro? -- is a sign that the U.S. needs to do a better job on food safety.

... It seems clear that a way to track agricultural products is needed. The same stickers that include pricing codes could also include a bar code or symbols indicating the country and farm of origin. ...

That's part of the solution, but it's only a start. The rest involves our system of food inspections, which the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) acknowledges is woefully inadequate. ...

If the FDA can devise a reliable way to track food products to their source so U.S. producers aren't blamed unless they are truly at fault, and increase border inspections so more unsafe food products are stopped before they reach U.S. tables, that should at least get the problem under control.

As Congress works with the administration to develop a budget for the coming year, it should insist that the FDA request and receive enough funding to make the necessary changes.

No Child Left Behind

The Columbus Dispatch, July 14

Ohio has been given a rare chance to tweak some of the inflexible aspects of the federal No Child Left Behind law.

How to make the most of that opportunity should be one of the primary topics as the State Board of Education and Gov. Ted Strickland go about choosing a superintendent of public instruction. ...

Ohio is one of six states, among 17 applicants, given the authority by the U.S. Department of Education to vary from some of the law's provisions.

No Child has sparked better performance in some of the nation's weakest schools, by forcing states to set goals for those schools, holding them accountable for meeting the goals and taking corrective action when the goals aren't met.

But schools and districts have been frustrated by the law's across-the-board approach to problems and solutions. For example, the rule that requires corrective intervention for schools that fail to meet yearly improvement goals makes no distinction between schools that barely miss the mark, in one of many categories, and those that miss by a mile on many counts.

Part of Ohio's proposal is to make those distinctions. ...

Those with the fewest missed targets would be subject to the least-invasive remedies; those that fail on the most measures would receive the most-intensive intervention. ...

With a state superintendent, state school board and legislature committed to improving, rather than punishing, schools, Ohio can help lead the process.

Banking rules

The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer, July 14

Federal banking regulators will have a crack this week at tightening rules that should have been cinched long ago, and that could have curtailed -- if not prevented -- the current housing crisis and credit crunch.

The changes are mostly common sense: They would force lenders to make less-credit-worthy borrowers put aside money to pay for taxes and insurance and prevent lenders from penalizing those who pay loans off early. Lenders would also be barred from making loans without having proof of a borrower's income and assets.

It's an attempt to end the shady practices that created the subprime loan epidemic and the ripple effects of devastation that have caused so much damage here and elsewhere.

The rules, assuming they are approved, won't help with the mess we're in right now.

But better tools for regulators and wiser rules for lenders certainly could help the nation avoid a "next time."