People are very angry with their local governments these days.

That is one of the overriding lessons Missouri State Auditor Tom Schweich said that he has learned in his first year on the job.

"I was surprised at the level of animosity that exists," Mr. Scwheich told us during a recent visit.

Nowhere was the angst more vicious, he said, than in local school districts.

To some degree, that makes sense. More than any other level of government, local schools are ingrained in families' daily lives. What they do — or don't do — goes a long way toward determining the success or failure of our children. Our homes lose or gain value because of the relative quality of local schools, and the taxes we pay on those homes support education regardless of whether we have school-age children.

So when school districts fall short of state standards, as is the case in St. Louis and Kansas City, it's easy to understand the anger. When a district such as Rockwood spends millions on companies with ties to school board members, it's not difficult to empathize when tempers flare.

The sad reality, though, is that all of this animosity, even the justifiable outrage, interferes with improving our schools.

A DIVISIVE MOMENT

In an essay in The Atlantic last month, education policy analyst Kevin Carey traces the public school reform movement back to its 1950s roots and notes that many of the issues, from school choice to teacher accountability, became embroiled very quickly in partisan political battles far removed from the goals of the discussion, ostensibly to improve the education of schoolchildren.

"School choice is a perfect example of a fundamentally sound public policy idea that has been corrupted by a combination of ideology and naivete," Mr. Carey writes.

Last week, the Missouri Legislature helped make this point in important hearings on the future of the public schools in the state's two largest cities that were timed, for political purposes, to coincide with what some school reform groups were calling "School Choice Week."

In debates over how to make sure that children in unaccredited school districts in St. Louis and Kansas City get access to better schools, the same old arguments were tossed back and forth from partisans who have been engaged in this fight for decades. Missouri became a pawn in a national political debate. Republicans pushed vouchers, though they are now redesigned as tax credits. Democrats railed against the failure of charter schools, even as St. Louis school leaders were proposing some of their own.

"For Republicans, vouchers were a way to be pro-God, pro-market and anti-labor all at the same time," Mr. Carey wrote in his essay. "Similarly, liberals could use vouchers to support their union allies and fight for the separation of church and state."

What can get lost in all of this political positioning, all this deep-seated angst, is that there is widespread agreement on some of the biggest issues, at least the ones involving the St. Louis schools.

FIX WHAT'S BROKEN

The key education bill before the Legislature is sponsored by Sen. Jane Cunningham, R-Chesterfield, which would seek to enforce the Missouri Supreme Court decision in Turner vs. the School District of Clayton that says that school districts must accept students from an unaccredited school district in the same or an adjacent county. Ms. Cunningham's bill would enable suburban districts in St. Louis to open charter schools within the existing St. Louis Public Schools district. It would allow other students to transfer directly to those suburban districts, if space were available.

But then, as if on cue, Ms. Cunningham's bill drifts too far, seeking to pass a voucher-like system long sought by conservative Republicans. That system would allow public school money to fund children attending private schools.

There is no way the voucher proposal will pass the Missouri Legislature, and it shouldn't. It has constitutional questions. It's opposed vehemently by the school districts and some religious school leaders who worry about the intruding long arm of the state.

Vouchers are the ticking time-bomb that blows up the discussion on school reform every year.

So why go there when other progress is being made and when many people from disparate political backgrounds are coming together on common solutions to a very serious problem?

Last year in Illinois, the teachers unions, school administrators and national school reformers negotiated a bill to increase teacher accountability by reducing seniority protections in exchange for more performance-based measurements. The key to success was a mutual respect for each other's common goals. Reformers didn't overreach and there was little name-calling. Unions gave ground and, in return, held on to key job protections.

In Missouri's politically divisive climate, it's hard to imagine what happened in Illinois repeating itself in the Show-Me State.

And that's a shame.

FIND COMMON GROUND

Our passion for local schools is well placed, but our debates do not have to be personal. We should, as we expect of our children, find a way to work together.

When Mr. Schweich presents his fact-based audit findings for a dysfunctional school district, he said he starts by telling all sides of the issue that he's not there to settle old scores.

That's a good place to start.

Common ground can be found on making St. Louis public schools better. The solutions involve accountable charter schools, more effective teachers, more community support, increasing regionalism, creating proper funding and more help, a lot of it, from parents.

We can get there from here. But let's not use one good idea as leverage for a bad one. Purge the political rhetoric and vitriol. And stop worrying so much about who will take the credit.