Accessibility menu
State Representative Tom Hackbarth
100 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
651-296-2439
For more information contact: Austin Bleess 651-296-5529
NEWS COLUMN
THEY ARE LEAVING OUR SCHOOLS BEHIND
By Tom Hackbarth
State Representative
In yet another brazen move the Minneapolis liberals are now bragging about how they have left our local schools with less money. Recently Democrat Rep. Joe Mullery, a liberal from Minneapolis, sent out information to his constituents bragging about how he, along with the liberal Democrat House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher and liberal Democrat Senate Majority Leader Larry Pogemiller, which both live in Minneapolis, got 46% more per pupil funding than the state average. In fact they got more per pupil funding than any other school district.
Because of the Democrats, Minneapolis students receive $12,968 per pupil. Thanks to the DFL our students in the St. Francis School District will about $4,800 less than each Minneapolis student. The funding disparity gets even worse in other parts of the state.
If you’ll recall this past fall, over 100 school districts went to the voters to ask for more money. The Minneapolis liberals are forcing our school districts to raise property taxes to pay for our students, while they send our income tax dollars to their students. It’s apparent these liberal legislators are only concerned about taking care of themselves, not any one else.
The K-12 Finance Division Chair, liberal Democrat Rep. Mindy Greiling, from Roseville, is the person who authored this bill to give Minneapolis schools the large disproportion of the money. She has gone on the record saying education needs another billion dollars. If history can show us anything, it would point to the fact they would spend the majority of this new one billion dollars on Minneapolis! Minneapolis doesn’t need more money; the rest of Minnesota’s students deserve the money.
The Minneapolis liberal Democrats are promising the moon to everyone. They want to take more money out of our pockets and give it to their pet project. They are fleecing us, the middle class, who don’t live inside the beltway. They seem to think we do not matter. They seem to think we want to pay more taxes, without getting anything in return. Well I am here to say they are wrong! We do not want to pay higher taxes.
The greatest shame of this funding disparity is the fact that Education Minnesota, the educators union, supported this funding disparity! I’m sure everyone has seen their billboards or television commercials where they say “Put Students First!” Well it’s quite obvious they mean “Put Minneapolis students first and everyone else should be happy with the scraps that are left over”.
For an organization to claim they put students first to support such a bill is a slap in the face to every student in our area. Our students deserve equitable funding. Every student in Minnesota should be treated with the same respect and be given the same opportunities.
So next time you see the commercials saying our schools need more money take time to call Education Minnesota and tell them they should support our students, not just those in Minneapolis.
-30-
News Items
- Dems propose to spend and tax - (Posted: Mar 22 2013 12:00AM)
- Statewide insurance plan makes headlines - (Posted: Mar 15 2013 12:00AM)
- Bill is the poster for government waste - (Posted: Mar 7 2013 12:00AM)
- Archived News Items
- Subscribe to RSS News Feeds
- Read more about RSS.