The Legislature’s Education Committee soon will serve as mediator between the department it oversees and distrusting advocates and parents of developmentally delayed young children. The committee can carry out its work most effectively by removing from legislation sunset provisions that could wipe out regional oversight of programs for these children.

The sunsets are in LD 836, a Department of Education bill ostensibly designed to help Maine to meet federal standards under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, an act that makes no demand to eliminate regional Child Development Service sites. Currently, CDS provides services in such areas as speech and physical therapy and social and cognitive development at 16 sites statewide. It has been a high-performing system and a national model.

Last year, under LD 1772, the department proposed dropping the regional units, temporarily centralizing services then shifting the services to public schools. The committee properly thought that was moving too fast with too little evidence, but it did amend the bill to temporarily centralize some services. Unless lawmakers acted before the end of that time, the administrative structure of CDS would revert to its previous status. That is not the case with the new sunsets, which, if not acted upon, would eliminate regional boards and administration, precisely the opposite policy established by the Legislature.

According to the department, the new sunset provisions were placed in the bill to give lawmakers a sense of urgency and spur conversation about the federally required changes. They have certainly gotten the advocates’ attention. But there is no indication this state is behind others in these services. Certainly, Maine must come into federal compliance, but it doesn’t need drastic action to get there.

Legislators should agree upfront that based on previous committee decisions, the extensive work of a task force on this issue and the department’s own claims of its goals, the sunsets should be stripped from LD 836. Having accomplished that, they will find some areas of agreement and an underlying question that should be addressed.

For instance, the bill includes CDS sites and governing boards under the Maine Tort Claims Act, a correction from an earlier oversight. No arguments are likely to be found there. Much more complicated to answer is a question tacitly asked through the legislation: Are these services for birth to age 5 more effectively provided though a centralized education-driven system or a regional child-and-family system?

Fortunately for lawmakers, the recent report by the Subcommittee to Study Early Childhood Education responds to this question in detail and offers insightful legislative guidance. The group’s findings support keeping services at the regional level while increasing cooperation between Education and Human Services and increasing accountability within the system. Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of this collection of ideas – regional districts, more cooperation, more accountability – is that it looks like what the Education Department says it wants in Maine’s K-12 system.

The legislative committee has a very large workload this session, and should recognize the major policy changes that would be set in motion by LD 836. These aren’t changes that should be enacted by default through sunset provisions and certainly not without extensive hearings and a lot more public comment.