Oct 3, 2014 4 min read

Editorial voices from newspapers around the country as compiled by the Associated Press:

Whenever possible, smart consumers make it a habit to check quality ratings for all kinds of goods and services.

In West Virginia, however, parents looking for a guide to the quality of child care programs where they might place their children have limited options – a shortcoming that warrants a remedy.

Unfortunately for consumers, only about 7 percent of the state’s 361 licensed childcare centers have national accreditation. That leaves parents wondering where the vast majority of centers rate in terms of quality.

To fill that gap, officials hope to put in place the standards and mechanisms to use something like a five-star rating system for parents to consider when they look for childcare options. Such an approach, with reimbursement rates tied to the quality ratings, was adopted by many other states.

Fully implementing the system won’t necessarily be cheap; a Marshall University study concluded in 2011 a high-quality childcare rating system might cost as much as $82 million. However, children are one of the state’s most important assets for the future, and strategies for improving the quality of their care and development merit the investment.

The tide may be turning on climate change and the public’s willingness to take action. On Sept. 21, in the largest demonstration of its kind ever held, more than 300,000 people, took to the streets of New York to demand action to curb global warming.

The next day, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, a philanthropic organization funded with oil money, announced it was divesting itself of investments in fossil fuel companies. Apple CEO Tim Cook, speaking at the United Nations, told leaders acting to protect the environment does not come at the expense of economic growth. It may, in fact, foster it.

The New York Times reported Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google, announced his company was dropping its membership in the American Legislative Exchange Council, a group backed by energy interests that lobbies against tax and regulatory action to curb global warming. People who oppose taking action, Schmidt said, “are really hurting our children and our grandchildren and making the world a much worse place.”

The time for action on climate change is short. Much of the world is already experiencing unwelcome changes, and the effects of all the carbon dioxide already loosed on the atmosphere have yet to be felt.

Since the rollout of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, students and their parents have easily been the loudest critics of the new federal school lunch standards.

Portions are too small yet cost more. Side dishes, entrees and even condiments aren’t very tasty. And, of course, few to no “junk food” choices.

While that last complaint is hard to justify, the others are not – especially for students who are supposed to find an 850-calorie lunch adequate sustenance before an after-school activity that may require them to burn double those calories by day’s end.

But heading into this school year, the more troubling statement about the new federal standards came from a survey by the School Nutrition Association. Among survey findings about the new standards were these: Last school year, 46 percent of respondents reported overall program revenue decreased while 87 percent reported an increase in food costs. And 85 percent predict their costs will increase during the school year while 43 percent expect revenues to decline.

While it might be easy to ignore angry students and parents, those survey results clearly show the federal program has gone too far. It’s time for Congress to dial back parts of the act and find a more balanced approach to providing appealing, healthy meals to students.