The response to our survey on Educational Priorities was overwhelming. to publish the results, I decided to write more than one article. This article is an overview of the first question.
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Posted by PA Views on 2011-05-01 12:49:12
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We asked our audience to rank what was important to them. The results were complex, yet revealing. Here are the perfentages to the first question: please Rank these items. The perecent who responded is shown below.
Balancing the State Budget
Least Important Most Important
20% 20% 21% 38%
Funding to State Universities
16% 20% 38% 9%
Funding to Local School Districts
17% 24% 28% 29%
We received hundreds of comments, some of which are shown below. It is revealing that the issue of Marcellus Shale came up so often as a way to help fund education AND balance the budget, even though this was not on the survey.
Comments on First Question
By law the budget must be balanced, but it does not have to be at the expense of education or any other service when we have Pennsylvania natural gas being extracted and piped into other states of which should be severence taxed.
For too long we have not had any fiscal responsibility in the legislative body and it has to start somwhere. Now is the time!
Funding to other necessary needs: the aged, disabled, retraining people without jobs, among others. (is equally important)
Tax the gas companies, or better yet, stop the drilling! The environmental cleanup will cost a fortune.
Cutting the number of state employees by 25% or more. Thankfully we now have a Governor that can make the necessary decisions.
If "local school districts" means even greater salaries and generous pensions for the same teachers we already have, then it's not at all important. In fact, it's a negative. Adding more teachers and putting in place performance metrics are the only reasons to not slash local district funds. As long as the union blocks those efforts, then slash away their budgets.
Tax the Shale PLAY NOW. You will be happy later.
Education should be the number 1 priority in PA. nothing is more important to our long-term viability. This budget ignores that. There are hundreds, maybe thousands of other ways to balance the State budget without killing education in PA.
Governor is out of touch with reality. Property taxes are too burdening especially to seniors. Marcellus shale drilling must be taxed and the State income tax raised.
Early childhood education is the most critical. Developmental opportunities lost cannot be regained.
How can you increase prisons by 11% and cut public education by 15-20%. Over 80% of Pennsylvanians reject cuts to public school budgets. Over 2/3rds also reject publicly-funded tuition vouchers. Over 70% want natural gas taxed.
Higher taxes for big businesses & wealthy.
I am so sick of the power that Penn State has over the legislature. If it weren't for all the freebies Penn State hands out to them, the budget would be passed as the Governor has proposed. It's time to support someone who is actually trying to get the State moving again.
Senior administrators seem to take the $ available and then look to reduce programs. If they would cut salaries and benefits, they could keep the programs by reducing their costs.
(What is important is) Funding for the most vulnerable in our state. Corbett is taking tobacco settlement money, which costs the taxpayers nothing, away from health care programs for low-income families and putting it into a business loan program. People should come first.
The Govenor has the right ideas.
School Teachers' salaries have reached ridiculously high levels. It now costs the taxpayers over $100 for every hour a teachers works, if one looks at pay, fringes, taxes, retirement, post retirement benefits. How can one justify paying a art, gym, social studies teacher $100 an hour in compensation.
PA acknoweldges it is losing educated young people. How will reducing educational opportunities remedy this problem? It will not, pure a simple. In fact, after 20 years as an officer of the PA Supreme Court, I am now focused on insuring that my daughters (straight A stundents in the public school)obtain a base outsinde of PA due to the fact that opportunities for a decent life (see 4 below)
This is a poorly constructed question since the state budget must always be balanced. The issue is not choosing to balance the budget or fund education!
Both school districts and Universities MUST cut spending on non-education items. Parents must pay a portion of activities their children participate in, and yes this means music and sports outside of class
An increase in my son's PSU tuition is less palatable when I hear the Pres salary and how some money is spent. I'm a less affluent resident in Chester County. I feel for folks in other counties. My business is way down. Teachers HAVE to be brought inline with reality.
Why target specific areas when you could cut all areas? Set an across the board decrease in funding to all areas....I would hope that we are all in this together. "Lead by example"....if you propose others to freeze their pay, would you not want to set an example and freeze your own?
There is alot of waste in school districts. Too many administration and silly positions. When I wwent to school we had one guidance counselor, now they have three. Teachers have become lazy and only want 15 kids in a class. By cutting budgets maybe schools will become more efficient
We must find a way to generate additional resources. One easy source is a gas severance tax, next is to create an income tax which spreads the burden of paying for PA local schools to all citizens not just property owners. We need to continue to fund our Universities as they are source of revenue and attraction for others to settle in PA.
The budget must be balanced. I work in a community where my budget is consistent balanced in spite of many unfunded mandates. I am visited periodically by state auditors who hide out at my office and work 4-5 hour days. I let them hide out to develop a good relationship with them. But one extremely nice auditor even told me that he was less likely to have a finding if his municipalities were nice to him. Perhaps the governor should look to cut in his own backyard.
The least important is blindly funding SEPTA when there is no oversight of their spending...they can achieve a great increase in ridership on the regional rails with no cost and low cost solutions, instead they are closing stations, decreasing scheduled stops and wasting money on parking garages. Money must be spent wisely. Infrastruture repair should be the priority then an overhaul of schedules and an elimintion of the top heavy management that SEPTA employees.
