Maryland's Slush Fund
Alms for the rich, and other strange ideas, still hold sway in Annapolis.

Friday, March 30, 2007

MARYLAND lawmakers are moving to outlaw the odious practice of awarding cash scholarships to their own college-bound spouses, children and grandchildren. That's a welcome sign of modernity's belated dawn in Annapolis, but it's really just a baby step. For even as they take it, the Maryland legislators have no intention of undertaking a broader ban on the outrageous, anachronistic slush funds of which they freely avail themselves under the innocuous-sounding banner of "legislative scholarships."

Here's how legislative scholarships work: In an arrangement that most states scrapped decades ago, senators in Maryland are granted $552,000 each in state scholarship money over the course of their four-year terms, to dispense as they please. That works out to $138,000 a year, which may be bestowed as readily on the promising offspring of blue-collar constituents as on the dim-witted ones of rich friends and campaign donors. Members of the House of Delegates also control state scholarship funds, but in much smaller amounts than are available to senators -- about $35,000 a year.

Legislative scholarships, which have been around for nearly a century in their current form, account for 10 percent of the roughly $110 million in overall student financial aid meted out by the state. That they still exist is a testament to the old-boy, go-along-to-get-along culture that still holds sway in Annapolis. Nearly every year, there are attempts in the legislature to ditch the scholarships, but they are regularly beaten back by Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert) and his allies, who cannot grasp that allowing senators to hand out hundreds of thousands of dollars, with no rules or standards, invites cronyism, favoritism and bad government. This year, Mr. Miller's group made sure that a proposed ban on the scholarships could not even be debated on the Senate floor, lest some senators be publicly shamed into having to defend and vote for them.

The scholarships look even more retrograde given that Maryland has lately made enormous strides toward channeling the state's financial aid toward the neediest students. Three years ago, just over half the scholarship aid granted by the state went to low-income students, and there was a huge waiting list of qualified applicants who got nothing. This year about three-quarters of state financial aid will go to the poorest students, and virtually everyone who applies and qualifies for help will get something. But even as the state recalibrates its approach, the legislature continues to indulge in what must be the ultimate incumbent protection program.

A handful of enlightened lawmakers -- seven in the Senate, 16 in the House -- transfer their scholarship money to the state to dispense. Some others have established committees and guidelines to govern the distribution of their portion of the funds. But the broader problem with the program remains: the lack of clearly defined guidelines determining student eligibility, and the primacy of political connections and geographical diversity over financial need.