California School Spending: Easier to Blame Arnold
Posted by Flap in Arnold Schwarzenegger, California, Politics, Special Election 2005
California Assembly Speaker Nunez, Controller Steve Westly and School Superintendent Jack O’Connell.
Dan Walters of the Sacramento Bee has Errant educators, not governor, to blame for school deficits.
The vast majority of California districts don’t run deficits and it’s evident from the record that a lack of money, per se, is not the underlying problem but rather a dereliction of civic responsibility. Consistently, school board members and administrators in those problem districts have signed contracts with the CTA and other unions that outstripped revenue expectations, have refused to close schools as enrollments declined, and in other ways have failed to act prudently.
O’Connell and Westly could – and should – have made it clear that the failures of school trustees and administrators are primarily responsible for the troubled districts and could have included unions that get friendly trustees elected and then pressure them to approve unaffordable contracts. But that would have taken some courage, as well as intellectual honesty, and the two politicians just couldn’t resist the temptation to pander to the CTA and blame Schwarzenegger.
Dan Walters has it right. The local school systems often controlled by the CTA do not have the political will to control spending. The Unions do not care if taxes are raised as long as they get their cut.
And that is why the CTA and the Alliance for a Better California are running those nasty duplicitous television ads attempting to demonize the Governor.
The Governor has so far failed to answer but as Flap understands from talking to some representatives of the Governor HE’LL BE BACK and soon.
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