The more I think about Mayor Sly James&#x92; plan to seek control of Kansas City schools, the less sense it makes.</p><p> Kansas City&#x92;s mayor has a bit of extra heft in shaping the budget and determining who the city manager should be, but the mayor under our charter is still only one of 13 votes on the City Council. If he got school-district control, he&#x92;d have more power there than he does in City Hall.</p><p> Everyone in the district would essentially serve at his pleasure. The only real source of accountability would be an election every four years in which school issues would be diluted by other city concerns.</p><p> I have no doubt that James&#x92; heart is in the right place, but you don&#x92;t set up institutions with the assumption your successors will be of equal good will. Count on it: Someone down the line would try to benefit personally and use this kind of power for enrichment or empire-building.</p><p> That&#x92;s especially true in our city, with its dysfunctional civic culture. Look at how many agencies have been run into the ground and taken over by the federal courts. These include the housing authority, the jail and the school district itself, which spent several years under court supervision.</p><p> Earlier, local control over the police department was yanked because of corruption during the Pendergast era.</p><p> As recently outlined by James, he proposes that the Kansas City mayor be given power to appoint the district&#x92;s top officials &#x97; a CEO, a chief academic officer and a chief business officer.</p><p> He also wants an appointed board to provide guidance, but its role would be strictly advisory. On all weighty matters, the mayor would apparently have the last word.</p><p>If such an arrangement is approved, the mayor would be targeted immediately by every pressure group whose existence depends on grabbing a portion of the district&#x92;s tax revenue. The mayor would be pressured by behind-the-scenes players and campaign contributors, intent on retaining their vending contracts or maintaining their relatives&#x92; employment at this or that school. </p><p>One of the greatest challenges for anyone trying to run this district is the number of people who tend to see it less as a school system than a jobs program. </p><p> An earlier version of this column appeared as a blog post at voices.kansascity.com. A commentator asked, &#x93;So what do you propose (and don&#x92;t say vouchers)?&#x94; I wish I could suggest some silver bullet policy that could be deployed quickly, but there aren&#x92;t any. As for vouchers, I do see a competitive process as the long-term answer to America&#x92;s education woes, although in Missouri they&#x92;re effectively barred by the state Constitution.</p><p> The relevant language says, &#x93;no money shall ever be taken from the public treasury, directly or indirectly, in aid of any church ... or teacher thereof.&#x94; That would limit the effectiveness of vouchers by removing religious schools from the array of choices. </p><p>Some lawmakers have tried, unsuccessfully, to get around this provision by creating scholarships funded by tax credits. Students receiving the money could use it for tuition at private or public schools of their choice, creating the competitive environment on which real improvement depends. Approval of such a program would be a big step forward.</p><p> We&#x92;re told that James&#x92; motivation is to retain local control and avoid a district breakup. But over the long term, his plan could bring a worse set of problems.</p><p>It&#x92;s a shame that all this comes as the local school board seems to have achieved a measure of coherence and unity. But the Missouri legislature will probably view the loss of Kansas City&#x92;s accreditation as the capstone of a multi-generational failure &#x97; a drastic event requiring drastic measures.</p><p> Even so, lawmakers should not turn the mayor of a city with a weak-mayor charter into a &#x93;strong-mayor&#x94; school superintendent.