Category Archives: Take Action

by | July 17, 2007 · 10:33 pm

School Finance Update from WAES

From the Wisconsin Alliance for Excellent Schools:

Hopes for early state budget fade into the distance
School districts lose under Assembly version of the budget
“Extra” Assembly school aid goes to taxpayers, not kids

School-funding reform calendar
The Wisconsin Alliance for Excellent Schools (WAES) is a statewide network of educators, school board members, parents, community leaders, and researchers. Its Wisconsin Adequacy Plan — a proposal for school-finance reform — is the result of research into the cost of educating children to meet state proficiency standards.

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Hopes for early budget fade into the distance

It seems to happen every two years: Wisconsin gets into the budget season, the rhetoric begin to fly, and … before you know it … school-funding reform once again recedes into the background and the crisis continues to grow. This budget cycle is no exception, and it could go on for quite a while.

The Senate and the Assembly passed vastly different versions of the budget — by some reports up to $10 billion apart — along party lines. Additionally, the policy focus of the budgets is quite different, leading many to believe it could be well into the fall before a conference committee agrees on a compromise budget and sends it to both houses and eventually the Governor for approval.

Your best bet to follow news coverage of the budget process is to log into your hometown newspaper or go to one of two excellent statewide sites and follow the links. Your choices are The Wheeler Report or wispolitics.com.

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School districts lose under Assembly version of the budget

Depending upon your party affiliation, political or social point-of-view, or how much stake you put in the need for adequate school funding, the differing versions of the 2007-09 budget are the best and worst of all possible worlds.

If you want to wade through the hundreds of pages in both the Senate and Assembly versions, go here. The sad fact is that once the numbers are run through the filter of the Assembly budget, every district in the state loses or stands pat in the revenue limit formula.

Also analyzing the Assembly version of the budget are: WEAC; the Wisconsin School Administrators Alliance; and the Wisconsin Council on Children and Families You can also find analysis on the websites of The Wheeler Report or wispolitics.com.

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“Extra” Assembly school aid goes to taxpayers, not kids

Between passage of the budget and the start of the work of the conference committee, points and counterpoints have been flying between legislators, especially over what the budget really means to Wisconsin public school districts.

One claim being made by many legislators is that the Assembly budget actually puts more money into public schools … more money, for example, than the Governor’s budget.

One such claim was made by Assembly Education Committee chair and 80th Assembly District Rep. Brett Davis. Reacting to 79th Assembly District Rep. Sondy Pope-Roberts criticizing him for comments during the budget debate, Rep. Davis said the Assembly actually put more state money into the budget for schools than the Governor asked for.

Technically, he was right. The Assembly budget reduced the amount of school aid in the Joint Finance Committee version by $85 million and did increase the state share of school funding by $200 million over two years — with the key phrase being state share. What Rep. Davis didn’t say was that the net effect of the Assembly action was to take money away from public school children. Every cent of the $200 million increase went for property tax relief (bringing the total to just short of $800 million). Not one penny went into a classroom or to a child.

As Rep. Pope-Roberts said, “You’d have to be delusional to divert money from students and classrooms, squander it on tax cuts, and still call it an ‘investment in education.'” Another take on the Pope-Roberts vs. Davis debate can be found here.

After taking a look at the Assembly budget, the budget coverage, the budget analysis, the budget comment, and the budget vote, please contact your state representatives and let them know what you think. To find out who represents you, go to http://waml.legis.state.wi.us/. Remember, this is the starting point for the compromise our schools will have to live with for the next two years.

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Help us better serve you by letting us know when you change e-mail addresses. In that way we can stop sending the update to the old one and switch over to the new one as soon as possible.

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School-funding reform calendar

Sept. 8 — Jack Norman, IWF research director, will be part of a discussion on TABOR and school funding at Fighting Bob Fest (http://www.fightingbobfest.org/), noon, at the Sauk County Fairgrounds in Baraboo (follow the link to “getting there” at the website)

Sept. 13 — School-funding reform presentation at Hayward High School, details to follow
Sept. 20 — School-funding reform presentation for District 1 of the Coalition of Wisconsin Aging Groups, 10 a.m. at the Behring Senior Center, 113 10th St., Monroe

Sept. 20 — School-funding reform presentation for the Manitowoc League of Women’s Voters, 7 p.m., other details to follow

Oct. 23 — School-funding reform presentation for the Janesville Retired Educators Association

Please feel free to share your copy of the WAES school-funding update with anyone interested in school-finance reform. Contact Tom Beebe (tbeebe@wisconsinsfuture.org) at 414-384-9094 for details.

Thomas J. Mertz

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Filed under AMPS, Budget, Pope-Roberts/Breske Resolution, School Finance, Take Action

by | July 17, 2007 · 5:06 am

State Budget News Roundup

The biggest news is the appointment of the Budget Conference Committee. Here are the members’ home pages:

Senate

Judy Robson (D)
Russell Decker (D)
Robert Jauch (D)
Scott Fitzgerald (R)

Assembly

Michael Huebsch (R)
Kitty Rhoades (R)
Jeff Fitzgerald (R)
James Kreuser (D)

Not really news, but I think it is timely to give a plug for the Take Back the Assembly project.

In Effect is optimistic (more here and some good links in both):

Sure, a handful of Republicans in the Assembly will hold out for a budget like this one, but enough will ultimately side with a budget that looks far more like what came out of the JFC last month.

Adam Wise (Wisconsin Rapids Tribune) correctly locates education issues at the center of the budget conflicts.

WCLO (Janesville) reports that “Assembly budget would hurt many school districts.”

The Herald Times (Manitowoc) editorializes “Major policy issues don’t belong in budgeting process.”

The Journal Sentinel (Milwaukee) saw through the GOP rhetoric on school funding and correctly reported “Assembly aims to limit taxes, as well as school funds.”

The Beloit daily News continues this theme with the story: “Proposed budget hurts schools.”

The Appleton Post Crescent reports on the partisanship of the process but also includes a reminder that the state GOP is not all on board with the extremism of the Assembly budget.

Appleton Mayor Tim Hanna sided with the governor, literally, at a news conference at an Appleton fire station.

“I don’t necessarily agree with everything the governor has to say, but I do agree that that what’s in the Republican Assembly package would be bad for Appleton and it would be bad for the state,” said Hanna, a longtime Republican. “However, I believe the Senate Democratic package is just as extreme on the other end.”

More reports and press releases from the Governor’s swing around the state:

Milwaukee, Madison, Superior, La Crosse, Wausau, and Kenosha.

As always, the WisPolitics Budget Blog has more.

Don’t forget to let your Reps and Senators know how you feel.

Thomas J. Mertz

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Filed under AMPS, Budget, Elections, Local News, School Finance, Take Action

by | July 12, 2007 · 6:54 pm

Tell the Truth!

From Ruth Page Jones, Project ABC (Waukesha)

Hello,
Thanks to those who wrote or called our Assembly representatives about the budget. Unfortunately, they didn’t listen. But we must continue to share our views with them.

Some of you received responses like this:

Thanks so much for taking the time to let me know your thoughts regarding this important issue. By way of information, the Assembly Republican budget expected to be passed today actually increases K-12 funding by $464 million dollars over the last budget. Rest assured, I will be certain to keep your support for even greater funding at the forefront of my considerations as budget deliberations continue.

Here’s what they really did. I have submitted this as a Guest Editorial to the Waukesha Freeman.

When the Assembly passed their budget this week, the Republican majority voted to short-change children in the classrooms of our public schools. Dept. of Administration analysis indicates Waukesha schools would endure an additional $2.6 million revenue loss, and the firing of 35.4 more teachers over the next two years. Elmbrook would suffer losses of $1.3 million, Muskego-Norway and New Berlin $.9 million, Kettle-Morraine $.8 million and Pewaukee $.4 million. Waukesha’s losses are in addition to the $3.5 million cuts made this spring and projected again for next spring.

In the Freeman on July 9, Rep Bill Kramer implies their plan will benefit schools:
“Although the proposal lists an $85 million cut in public education, Kramer said, the money is directed more at classroom initiatives and spends more than Doyle’s plan”. However —

-“directed at classroom initiatives” really means it takes money from students and classrooms.

-“spends more than Doyle’s plan” really means they put more state money into property tax relief, not classrooms. The Governor included $100 million in tax relief in his budget. The Republican budget adds another $100 million to the tax levy credit for taxpayers, while taking away $85
million from students and classrooms. The extra money going for tax relief lets them say ‘the state is spending more’.

Don’t be fooled into thinking that ‘more state spending’ means more money into education! When the Assembly politicians talk about ‘the state spending more’- they refer to who is paying, not what we are buying. This is only about the 2/3 formula and what percent of school spending is paid by the state and what percent is paid by homeowners.

This has no relationship whatsoever to school budgets. If a school budget is $100, there is zero effect in the classroom when the state/homeowner share of costs changes from $55/$45 to $66/$34. It’s when they reduce the $100, which is what the Assembly did, that you will see an effect in the classroom.

Their Assembly revenue limit increase is actually less than the Governor proposed (Assembly – $200 per pupil increase vs Governor – $264 per pupil increase). It forces more budget cuts because it increases the gap between state-dictated school revenue and state-mandated inflation costs. They also cut money in a special fund, not subject to revenue limits, that would have helped us.

If this budget actually passes, the school district will be cutting again before school starts, after we already cut the $3.5 million this spring and after teacher renewal contracts have been signed. Cuts needed for this fall would have to come from aides or non-teacher expenses. Teacher’s make up 85% of the budget – what is there to cut?

Simply put, with this Republican Assembly budget, schools get less, the state pays more, some homeowners get a little tax relief, and the politicians get to claim they ‘spent more money on schools’. It’s all about taxes and politics and nothing about supporting public schools.

These politicians are going to work hard to convince the public that their budget is good for schools. IT IS NOT!!! ” Their budget is a shell game of taxes and politics, at the expense of our children’s education.”

Make the case to properly fund schools to our elected officials, to your friends and neighbors, and on the editorial page of the local newspaper. Grassroots outrage on the immigration bill changed the outcome in Washington. Grassroots outrage is the only thing that can change this outcome. The future of Wisconsin depends upon it.

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Advocates for a Strong School System in Waukesha

Project ABC, Advocating on Behalf of Children
Ruth Page Jones, President
PO Box 1994, Waukesha, WI 53187-1994
262 521-2788

projectabc@projectabc.org
http://www.projectabc.org

Posted by Thomas J. Mertz (Thanks to Deb Gurke, ABC Madison: ABCMadisonschools@yahoo.com)

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Filed under AMPS, Budget, Gimme Some Truth, School Finance, Take Action

by | July 11, 2007 · 10:18 pm

Rep. Pope-Roberts Calls for Immediate Action on School Funding Reform

In a press release and letter to Rep. Donald Pridemore, chairperson of the Assembly Education Reform Committee, Rep. Sondy Pope-Roberts (D-Verona) expressed her disappointment that he had not scheduled a hearing on Assembly Joint Resolution 35 (AJR35), which calls on the state to change the school-funding system by July 1, 2009.

“I am disappointed in Representative Pridemore’s continued excuses for turning his back on students, educators and administrators desperate for debate on school funding. I have been told that Representative Pridemore has not scheduled Assembly Joint Resolution 35 for a public hearing because he has yet to receive a formal request from my office.

“This is nothing but a petty partisan excuse; he is making up rules and placing the blame elsewhere. I was hopeful at the beginning of this legislative session that we would be able to act together as legislators invested in education instead of continuing these political games. I have now formally requested a public hearing for AJR 35 which calls upon the legislature to make changes to the school funding formula by July of 2009.”

“If Representative Pridemore isn’t even willing to hold a public hearing on this Resolution, I find it hard to believe he has any intention at all to “bring about meaningful reforms” that will help our education system or any intention of running this committee in a “fair and impartial fashion” as he wrote to me in January.”

In a letter to Pridemore, Pope-Roberts talked about the many phone calls, e-mails, and letters from all over Wisconsin asking that a hearing be scheduled on AJR35.

Please take a couple of minutes to contact Rep. Pridemore. He can be telephoned at 608-267-2367; faxed at 608-282-3699; e-mailed at rep.pridemore@legis.wisconsin.gov; or written to at State Capitol, P.O. Box 8953, Madison 53708. Make sure to ask him to copy your message to the members of the Assembly Education Reform Committee.

Robert Godfrey

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Filed under AMPS, Budget, Local News, Pope-Roberts/Breske Resolution, School Finance, Take Action

by | July 11, 2007 · 5:32 pm

More on the Assembly Budget

The assembly budget passed today with no ammendments. With the exception of Rep. Jeff Wood, R-Chippewa Falls voting against, it was a party line vote.

The DOA has issued a preliminary analysis of the impact on school funding. Madison would lose $1,586,393 this year, $3,346,026 the following and $4,932,419 the year after. That is in addittion to the “normal” $7 million to $9 million in anticipated annual cuts due to the structural gap between costs and allowed revenues. Ugly.

WiscPolitics has a nice set of links to reactions from elected officials to the Assembly’s proposed budget.

Governor Jim Doyle, joined by Mayor Dave Cieslewicz and Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk have scheduled a press conference for 2:00 PM today (7/11) at Fire Station #1 (316 West Dayton St.). Be there to show your outrage!

Some suggestions on contacting legislators in this post. Contacting the press is also a good idea (info here).

Thomas J. Mertz

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Filed under AMPS, Budget, Local News, School Finance, Take Action

by | July 10, 2007 · 8:50 pm

More Reasons to Keep the Pressure On!

The GOP controlled Wisconsin Assembly has formulated their budget proposal and the news for schools is not good.

Here are some of the lowlights (all figures or cuts based on the Joint Finance Committee budget, not current spending):

· Cut childcare subsidies by $52 million.
· Cut $85 million from general school aids.
· Reduce revenue limit adjustment to $200.
· Eliminate Safety and mentoring revenue limit exceptions.
· Expand the School Choice program to Racine.
· Eliminate the school choice funding restructure
· Expand Milwaukee school choice.
· Eliminate Chapter 220 integration aid.
· Cut school breakfast money.
· Cut the ELL aids.
· Cut $3 million from 4-year-old kindergarten funding.
· Make 2nd and 3d grade SAGE optional.
· Cut some SAGE expansion funds.
· Eliminate the Wisconsin Covenant higher ed guarantee.
· UW takes some big hits too…

Locally, the estimates are that under the Assembly budget MMSD would lose about $1.5 to $2 million in anticipated revenues.

The next step is for a conference committee to be formed. Time to put the pressure on all the legislators (click here to find out how). This becomes even more partisan now, so contacting Senate Majority Leader Judy Robson, Speaker Michael Huebsch as well as our local delegation might be a good idea.

For more information:

WisPolitics Budget Blog
Republican budget relies on massive cuts to avoid tax increases (Janesville Gazette)
Assembly GOP’s self-destructive budget (UppityWisconsin)

Thomas J. Mertz

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by | May 23, 2007 · 1:01 am

Everyone has a stake in the schools.

Mary Conroy: Make business pay fair share of taxes (excerpts), the Capital Times, May 22, 2007

Every year, Madison’s School Board gets a tsunami of suggestions on balancing the budget. And that’s as it should be: Everyone has a stake in the schools. It doesn’t matter if you have children, hire graduates or pay property taxes. It doesn’t even matter if you live in Madison.

Far-fetched? Not at all. Public schools are the building blocks of democracy. They are the foundation of our economy. They foster the curiosity that leads to discovery, the creativity that sparks new ideas, the social skills that build strong communities.

But our public schools are now in peril. Statewide, we’ve had one referendum after another. School districts have taken drastic measures, from slicing staff to slashing class offerings, from selling property to shutting schools. Citizens and school boards alike have initiated unusual ways to save money.

We need to take school budgets off the property tax rolls. Currently, our property taxes are so high that people on fixed incomes can’t afford to stay in their homes, even though they’ve already paid their mortgages. It’s not that older residents are against paying school taxes. Some of us on fixed incomes, including me, have never voted against a school referendum. But we may have to if Wisconsin legislators don’t act soon.

For quite some time, Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce has pressured the legislature to lower the total tax burden on corporations. If corporations here paid taxes at the national average, we’d have almost $1 billion in extra funds, according to a recent analysis by Jack Norman, research director at the Institute for Wisconsin’s Future.

Consider these facts:

In 1977, homeowners paid 50 percent of all property taxes. Now they pay 70 percent, because businesses pay so much less.
Twenty years ago, the corporate income tax produced 10 percent of state revenue. Now it pays about half of that.
Most Wisconsin corporations pay no corporate income tax, according to the Department of Revenue.
The worst thing is that the state Legislature has enabled businesses to avoid paying their fair share of taxes. It exempts some businesses from sales taxes. It gives tax credits for research, development and investment in “development zones” (including some areas in which developers would build anyway). The Legislature also exempts manufacturing equipment and business computers from the property tax.

Even ATM machines qualify as computers for that exemption.

Who’s making up for what corporations are too cheap to pay? Lower- and middle-class residents are. As a result, they can’t afford to send their kids to college.

It’s not enough to ask state legislators to make corporations pay their fair share of taxes from now on. It’s time for corporations to pay more than the rest of us do. After all, they’ve been paying less than we have for far too long.

So write to your representatives. Tell them to stop being puppets of the business lobby. Ask them why you should meet your tax duty while corporate Wisconsin gets away with murder.

Mary Conroy is a Madison-based freelance writer.

Thomas J. Mertz

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by | May 16, 2007 · 3:22 am

Good News from JFC

The Joint Finance Committee dealt with some education matters today and the news is mostly good. The Special Education categorical aid increase proposed by Governor Doyle advanced intact, as did the SAGE funding. GOP attempts to make the revenue caps more draconian, via a permanent annual increase limited to $100 failed. Much more at WiscPolitics, including this from Madison’s own Mark Pocan:

Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Madison, mocked the Republicans’ budget cutting proposals, saying their “rhetoric on taxes” and “zeal to reduce government” is at odds with the priorities of the people of the state.

“You’re like a teenage girl who sees Brad Pitt, but in your case it’s when you see Grover Norquist,” Pocan said.

The reality of the Republican proposal is it will lead to school closings and consolidation, larger class sizes, and program cuts, he said.

“This is a cut in education no matter what way you try to paint it,” Pocan said.

I’m proud to say that he is my Rep.

Other “good” news is the Republicans Luther Olsen and Alberta Darling sided with Democrats on key votes. Olsen and Darling are not my favorites, but they were both members of the Special Joint Committee to Review the School Aid Formula and they heard and listened to the realities created by our broken system. They might not “get it” all the way, but their heads are out of the sand.

The letters, emails, calls, visits all helped. Keep the pressure on!

Thomas J. Mertz

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Filed under AMPS, Budget, Local News, School Finance, Take Action

by | May 15, 2007 · 9:47 pm

ABC Madison Meeting, 5/16

ABC Madison is the group that has emerged from the state funding advocacy work of the BOE Communication Committee. We will be meeting on Wednesday May 16th at 6:30 PM in the Doyle Building, rm 103.

Please join us and spread the word.

Thomas J. Mertz

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Filed under AMPS, Local News, School Finance, Take Action

by | May 15, 2007 · 4:09 pm

Part of the problem

This reporting below is symptomatic of a larger issue that we have been unsuccessful at conveying to our state legislators so far, the need for fundamental school finance reform. It’s not a question of taking money from one school and giving it to another. It’s about funding all our schools adequately. This issue really comes down to a question of our future priorities as a society. The quicker we get the dialogue shifted to a new level of discourse, the quicker we will see real and sustainable reform.

A legislative resolution calling for school funding reform by July 2009 is purely politics and won’t get to a vote in the Assembly, a North Woods legislator said Friday.

State Rep. Dan Meyer (R-Eagle River) said school funding reform is such a difficult issue that little progress will be made until the governor’s office makes it a priority.

“The problem is that we’ve got 99 Assembly people who are all representing different school districts,” said Meyer. “I’d support it if my district got more money, but then we’d be taking from someone else. Do you think Milwaukee will jump up and down and support it? Not if they are going to lose money.”

The statements came in response to Assembly Joint Resolution 35 and Senate Joint Resolution 27, which call upon legislators to reform the school aid formula by July 1, 2009. They were co-authored by Sen. Roger Breske (D-Eland) and Rep. Sondy Pope-Roberts (D-Verona).

The resolutions say that the present funding system is not working, problems are aggravated by declining enrollment, more and more referenda are being held to exceed revenue limits, and it is the job of the Legislature to change it.

Meyer, who sits on the powerful Joint Finance Committee, said budget hearings across the state have attracted teachers and school administrators who all have the same message: The formula needs to change and they need more money.

“A lot of that testimony came from educators in areas of the state where they get a lot more aid than schools in my district,” said Meyer. “The problem is, none of the schools are happy even though more than 50 cents of every state tax dollar goes to education.”

Robert Godfrey

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Filed under AMPS, Gimme Some Truth, Pope-Roberts/Breske Resolution, School Finance, Take Action, We Are Not Alone