Orange County takes good first step on two issues

Diversifying economy? Later start times for high schools? Yes!

Maxwell: After years of writing about it, leaders try to diversify low-wage economy and push later high school start times.

I’ve written about some issues in Central Florida for so long with so little success that I’ve sometimes felt like Don Quixote tilting at windmills.

But just when I thought maybe I should shelve my lance and put my donkey out to pasture, we’re finally seeing progress on two of them — efforts to diversify our low-wage economy and to get later start times for high schoolers.

Let’s start with the economy, since Mayor Jerry Demings and the Orange County commission recently voted to spend $2 million on efforts to grow and recruit highwage jobs.

Hallelujah.

Now, the money is a drop in the bucket, compared to what this county continues to spend every year subsidizing tourism — as much as $150 million a year on Visit Orlando and the convention center alone.

But that $2 million is still $2 million more than the county has invested in many years past.

As the Sentinel recently reported, the money will be used as part of a “diversification initiative” that includes funding programs at the University of Central Florida designed to help entrepreneurs and start-up tech companies, as well as programs aimed at helping veterans and minorities get new businesses off the ground.

Most of the money goes to schools or nonprofits that help businesses start, grow and expand.

Better-paying jobs are direly needed in industries less susceptible to recessions and economic swings.

Just look at the numbers. The average hotel and motel desk clerk in Orlando makes $26,350 a year, according to the latest Census data. The average full-time fast food worker makes $21,080. The average amusement park attendant makes $24,020.

None of those jobs pay enough to get by in Orlando. Yet this community has spent billions of dollars growing these low-wage sectors.

It is a recipe for economic failure — which is why metro Orlando has traditionally ranked dead last

among the country’s 50 largest metros when it comes to median wages.

And we all suffer. Taxpayers are forced to cough up money for housing and food subsidies. Nonprofits are strained. The workers themselves are often forced to live in cheap motels.

Now, compare that to other occupations — like computer programmers and analysts who pull down an average annual wage of $84,080 in Central Florida. Or software developers, who earn $102,390. Or health care workers, who average $73,850.

All of those jobs make our community stronger, which is what Mayor Jerry Demings says he wants.

“My goal is for Orange County to not just recover from the pandemic, but to come back stronger and grow our economy,” Demings said.

This new initiative’s success and spending will need to be carefully tracked. But if this community ever hopes to dig itself out of this taxpayer-subsidized hole, this seems like a good start.

Later high school start times

In more good news, Orange County school leaders are debuting a pilot program that will allow students at three high schools to try out later start times. This is way overdue.

Right now, high schools start at 7:20 — earlier than they do in 90% of American school districts and too early for effective learning or student safety, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics.

This isn’t about lazy students wanting to sleep or stay up late. It’s about extensive research that shows hormone-fueled adolescent brains run on a different cycle and don’t start firing on all cylinders until later in the morning.

It’s also about ending the dangerous practice of asking students to scurry a quarter-mile or more to bus stops in darkness at 6:30, 6:15 or as early as 5:45 for longer routes.

As the Sentinel reported, Orange County’s pilot program will start at three schools — East River, Evans and Windermere — where students can choose from flexible schedules with start times ranging from 7:20 to 10.

A school could offer 10 periods, and a student would select seven to attend. Some students could even start early, take a midday break and then end later if they wanted.

Much like the economic-diversification program mentioned above, this is just a first step. And there are still concerns to be addressed, including transportation, since flexible class times without flexible bus schedules won’t help everyone.

But it’s solid start. Districts in other parts of the country that have moved start times later have seen better grades and fewer absences.

And since virtually all the medical and brain experts say this is the best thing to do for teen learning, we owe it to our own teenage students to make it happen.