Giving Chicago Schools an Extra $300 Million Is Hurtful
- on 05.28.05
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The Democrats have come to an agreement in next years State budget. You can read the stories about it in the 2 following articles.
(Hat Tip: Extreme Wisdom)
I just laughed when I saw the title of the first article. How does giving the schools an extra $300 million hurt them. Below is the excerpt about this:
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Although three Chicago Democrats were the chief architects who cobbled together the budget deal, it provides only half of the new money requested by the Chicago board of education.
The budget deal will pump $300 million new dollars into Illinois schools, but that’s not good enough for Chicago Public Schools CEO Arne Duncan. He says that’s only half of what is needed to stave off program cuts, increased class size and layoffs. ……… “It means job cuts, it means program cuts, it means layoffs, because we would not step forward and make the tough decisions,†said State Sen. James Meeks (D-Chicago). “It means kids will read at a sub-par level.†Fearing it would force layoffs, a spokesman for the board of education called it a bad news budget deal that would lead to program cuts and larger class sizes. |
And how are they Legislators going to pay for this? You would expect them to be making spending cuts if the budget is so tight. No, they are to “borrow one billion dollars or more next year from the state’s pension obligations.” Sounds good right, until you see obligation. That means that they are just not paying in the money they are supposed to.
| “What we’re doing is indebting not only ourselves but our children and our grandchildren. This is record amounts of borrowing at the expense of those in the future, who are going to have to pay for it,†said State Sen. Dave Syverson (R-Rockford). |
The second article tells you a little more about the pension payment. Guess what they are calling it.
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Democratic leaders were considering a plan Thursday to close the state budget gap by skipping the government’s annual payment to pension systems for teachers, university employees and state workers.
The “pension holiday” would not interrupt payments to government retirees. However, it would cost the state more in the long run and add to the financial problems of the state pension systems, which are already $35 billion in debt. |
How about that? It’s being called a “pension holiday”. The holiday part is only right for the current Legislators who voted for this plan. They need a permanent holiday when it is time for their re-election. This won’t be a holiday for us taxpayers. We are going to pay for their fun in Springfield later.
