As crisis grows, WAES goes after
"Pennies for Kids"
The crisis of funding in Wisconsin’s public schools
is so deep and so wide that immediate legislative action is
needed to just protect the education our children have  now
— much less the education they deserve in the future.
To address that crisis, WAES has launched “Pennies
for Kids,” a campaign to raise the sales tax one-cent
to help fill the gap in public school funding created by the
2009-11 budget and to try to keep the lid on property taxes.
If passed, a one-cent increase in the sales tax will raise
about $830 million annually to increase the state’s
school aid. The WAES members have targeted the largest portion
of that revenue for children in the classrooms. With more
state aid for school districts, “Pennies for Kids”
would help reduce the hike in property taxes caused by the
recent state budget cuts to school funding.
“For 15 years public school communities have been grappling
with the annual gap between the cost to continue education
systems and the funding available – we are falling further
behind every year.” said Ruth Page Jones, the president
of WAES. “School districts have merged services, dipped
into their fund balances, shared administrators, found innovative
ways to deal with energy consumption, and negotiated less
expensive compensation packages for staff. They have focused
on delivering quality education with fewer resources.”
“The system has now forced schools to cut vital programs
and services to kids and delivered tax increases to property
owners,” Page Jones said. “Students aren’t
to blame. The state is to blame. Right now, however, placing
blame isn’t helping anyone. Schools
are in crisis, property taxpayers need help, and its time
for legislators to do the right thing and put needed revenue
back into our state’s classrooms.”
The crisis in our schools is getting worse, the state school
funding system doesn’t work. For the last fifteen years,
school districts have had to lay off staff, increase class
sizes, go to referendum, or cut programs and services. Why?
The state school aid system was designed to supply an average
of two-thirds of the cost of education while school districts
had a strict cap on how much could be raised each year. Now
the state is paying about 50 percent of the cost. As the state’s
share has decreased, the share paid by local property taxpayers
has increased – but not enough to prevent significant
reductions in school programming.
Simultaneously, school districts are being blamed for a decrease
in the quality and quantity of education while property taxes
go up. The big losers are our children.
“We need comprehensive school-funding reform to change
the decline of the last 15 years,” Page Jones said.
“WAES has been in the forefront of the fight for school
funding reform. We are now faced with an immediate crisis.
Children’s futures can’t be put on hold while
the adults play politics with their education. We need ‘Pennies
for Kids’ now.”
While some groups talk about property taxpayer revolts and
others talk about the probability that school districts will
face bankruptcy in the next few years, WAES has initiated
a real solution … one-penny of sales tax for our children’s
futures and the security of our communities.
The
impact of the sales tax increase would be about $830 million.
If approved by the Legislature, the penny tax would generate
additional revenue for programs to close the achievement gap
for children in poverty, to bolster programs for English language
learners and supplement the high costs of meeting special
education needs. Especially crucial to WAES, a portion of
the new resources would go to small and rural districts who
face higher educational costs educating children dispersed
across hundreds of miles of rural countryside.
“Wisconsin schools have done the best job they can
with declining revenues,”Page Jones said. “Now
its time to start rebuilding the foundation by increasing
the state’s investment.”
In addition to working on the plan itself, WAES members are
fanning out across the state to begin building coalitions
of individuals and organizations to work with legislators
in the coming weeks and months. WAES organizing is focused
on building broad-based support for early 2010 when lawmakers
are expected to meet in a budget repair session.
School board members could get a shot at the putting the
considerable support of the Wisconsin
Association of School Boards behind an increase in the
sales tax. The Madison
Metropolitan School Board submitted Resolution IV to be
considered when the WASB delegate assembly meets in January.
It would amend existing resolutions to say that WASB supports
an increase in the sales tax to “assist in the development
of a well-balanced tax system that lowers Wisconsin’s
heavy reliance on the income and property taxes and to reach
the promised two-thirds funding.”
The Madison board also submitted a resolution urging WASB
to support introduction of school-funding reform into the
Legislature “based on a plan developed by the
School Finance Network.
In the meantime, the public “Pennies for Kids”
campaign is taking shape. Promotional materials are being
printed, a new website will be coming online soon, and folks
are working on methods to help legislators understand how
important it is to adequately and equitably fund our public
schools.
For more information or to get involved, contact Tom Beebe
at 920-650-0525 or tbeebe@excellentschools.org.
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