A close friend of mine and I always debate the issue of wasteful spending by school districts throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. I've always believed that the best way to control spending is to eliminate the pot of gold that greedy superintendents and school boards keep dipping their hands into in order to raise revenues.
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that the the current system of funding school districts is broken in Pennsylvania because there is no mechanism to control costs. Just look at your school property tax bill at the end of each year. School boards have the power to increase your property taxes regardless of whether you can afford to pay them or not. They are the only entity in PA that does not have a millage cap so they can raise property taxes as much as they want.
What is the result of this systematic flaw?
Today we have teachers who make over $50,000 to $75,000 a year and school superintendents who make anywhere from $150,000 to $250,000 per year. On top of a pretty decent salary, they also get a lavish pension after they retire. This is a heavy price to educate a child considering the thousands of parents who are unhappy with the way their children are being educated in the public school system.
In the PA 30th Senatorial District voters were outraged in 2005 when former President Pro Temp of the Senate, Bob Jubelirer voted to increase his pay by 30% and increase his salary to $175,000 a year. Not to bad when you consider that Dr. Dennis Murray the Superintendent of the Altoona School District located in the 30th District makes anywhere from $200,000 to $250,000 a year. All of this is outrageous when state police officer who risks their lives only make on average $40,000 to $50,000 a year. And the police officers actually work year round.
Why isn't there the same outrage when you seriously look at these numbers? Something has to change.
Sam Rohrer's plan to end school property taxes will create more tax fairness and will put more mechanisms in place to control school district spending by taking away their abusive tax authority.
It’s time Pennsylvania voters realize we need to change the way we fund education in order to gain more control over education. We have state Rep. Sam Rohrer who has continued to work for school property tax elimination for several years. We desperately need to support his plan to eliminate school property taxes. We can't afford not to!
No comments:
Post a Comment