Barb wrote on CJ Online:
We all need to take stock of our values right now. What is it we want from our government? Because of the decline in tax revenues, we cannot continue to expect the same level of services.
Do you want the police to protect you and your property? Do you want the fire department to respond quickly when you have a fire? Do you want our children to get an education that leads to a job that will support them so they can pay taxes?
The way we pay for those needed services is with taxes. Tax is not a dirty word - especially at the state and local level, where we see the benefits of our taxes every day. Politicians who say "No new taxes" are only kidding themselves. We've gone backwards in funding many basic services. It's time to move forward.
BARBARA PETTY,
We all need to take stock of our values right now. What is it we want from our government? Because of the decline in tax revenues, we cannot continue to expect the same level of services.
Do you want the police to protect you and your property? Do you want the fire department to respond quickly when you have a fire? Do you want our children to get an education that leads to a job that will support them so they can pay taxes?
The way we pay for those needed services is with taxes. Tax is not a dirty word - especially at the state and local level, where we see the benefits of our taxes every day. Politicians who say "No new taxes" are only kidding themselves. We've gone backwards in funding many basic services. It's time to move forward.
BARBARA PETTY,
This caused 55 comments to be posted in the comments section. A whole bunch of people didn't get it. I think Barb's trying to get people to look at the entire question and not to close their minds to all taxes. First of all, let me assure you that Barb pays a chunk of taxes and she doesn't speak from an empty position. She isn't just sitting back and letting you all pay and not paying her fair share. She is basically saying that at the local level, we get what we pay for. You want great schools, you have to pay for them. You want Police and Fire protection, you have to pay for it. Taxes aren't the cause of our problems, it is people that vote to close an intersection for six months to build a roundabout and spend several hundred thousand dollars without considering the benefit/cost ratio. I think a lot of our problems stem from the fact that people are not paying attention to what the politicians are doing and don't get out and vote the rascals out of office.
Like I said yesterday, we should teach our kids to think and not shut down what they think about. We should have a generation of people out there that think about the hard things and work on solutions. Our lives should be full of ways to develop ideas about the problems today and not a bunch of FACEBOOK games to play away the hours.
MUD
Our latest district newsletter talked about cuts the state was making to the education budget. I think the whole first page was from the state teacher's association or board association and not the local district, but I'm not sure where their part ended and local opinion started. One of the things mentioned was to the effect that the standard of education expected for everyone (including developmentally disabled kids) continued to be high while funding was being cut. I agree that that does not seem fair, but neither does it seem fair to question whether expected educational standards should remain high for all children while on page two the board has approved bidding on a new bus. Now, I can't vouch for the condition of the buses that run for our small town, but they look okay to me. I'd like to know if this is another fancy bus for the sports teams to travel on. It is nice to have such buses, all decked out in school colors, but I'd put the education of developmentally disabled children at a higher priority than having a classy ride for the athletes. And my kids have been among those athletes.
ReplyDeleteThe issue for me is not so much paying the taxes as being assured that my tax money is being well spent. I try to keep up with what is going on, but it's hard to understand it all. I wish I could just go to a website and see an accounting of all tax dollars spent at each level with a little hyper link that would explain each line that might need clarifying. I think our tiny school district generally does a pretty good job of managing funds, but the stories I hear coming from larger districts like Wichita horrify me. The bigger the government entity, the worse the waste tends to be.
The bigger the district, the less they need to manage each dollar in the times where there is a lot of money. This makes it somewhat tough to cut the spending but there is always enough slack to do most of the things they want to do. What is happening right now is that districts are offering the older teachers early retirement and hiring younger (Cheaper) teachers. In some ways the younger teachers bring a newness to the process but the older teachers have been there to handle most of the situations. Great Comments. MUD
ReplyDeleteInteresting point about buses, Jenni. They can be purchased from the Capital Outlay Fund, a fund which cannot be used for special ed or regular ed daily operating costs such as salaries or paying for electricity. School districts because of state regs could be in the strange position of having money for buses and other things but not for paying teachers who actually work with students. I think we should all lobby our reps to ask them to allow this fund to be used more flexibly in these difficult economic times.
ReplyDeleteBarb aka MG