CSBA follows State of the State address with ‘State of Our Schools’ letters
Published: January 6, 2010
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vowed midway through his State of the State address today to “protect education funding,” even after warning that additional cuts to the state’s general fund are unavoidable in the budget proposal that he will release Friday.
The promise came in the midst of legislative action on a controversial plan to help qualify California for additional federal education dollars, and just shortly before CSBA officials delivered hundreds of letters from the association’s “State of Our Schools” campaign to the governor’s office.
“As bitter as the words are in my mouth, we face additional cuts,” Schwarzenegger told a joint session of the state Legislature and a gallery full of guests including CSBA President Frank Pugh, who attended at the governor’s invitation.
“But I am drawing this line. Because our future economic well-being is so dependent upon education, I will protect education funding in this budget.”
“I would have been more impressed if the governor had led with that,” Pugh said following Schwarzenegger’s address. With $17 billion cut from K-12 funding in the past two years, Pugh said public education has already borne more than its share of the spending reductions all state programs have suffered, “so we shouldn’t be cut again.”
Following the address, Pugh was invited to attend the governor’s luncheon, where he had a chance to speak to the governor directly, and reiterate his preference that education be the first priority for the administration. “He told me that this has to be about ‘jobs, jobs, jobs,’” said Pugh. “but, he responded positively to the notion I put to him that a solid education system is good for the economy, too.”
“We’re pleased that the governor included that promise” to protect education, CSBA Executive Director Scott P. Plotkin said before adding, “we hope he’s able to live up to that commitment in the weeks and months to come.”
As Pugh joined Schwarzenegger and the state’s legislators at the luncheon following the State of the State speech, Plotkin delivered more than 500 letters from CSBA’s S.O.S. campaign to the governor’s office.
“This campaign has given us the opportunity to hear from school board members and superintendents across the state about the devastating consequences education cuts have had on our budget,” Plotkin told reporters.
“The state of the schools in my district is hemorrhaging,” a member of the Salinas Union High School District’s governance team wrote. “Our classrooms are impacted and our students have to wait too long for much needed services because our staff have been cut and the work has doubled! Our programs have been cut to the bone and some to the marrow. When, Mr. Governor, will our kids become California’s priority?”
The legislative action on what Schwarzenegger called “major educational reform” does little to soothe educators’ concerns. The night before the State of the State address, the state Assembly narrowly approved a pair of bills intended to boost California’s chances for funding under the U.S. Department of Education’s Race to the Top competitive grant program.
The Senate Education Committee approved the bills today. Full Senate approval is expected, and Schwarzenegger had said he will sign the package as soon as it reaches his desk.
“CSBA has always said we would support reforms that provide focus and sustainability,” Plotkin noted. RTTT, however, is not a sustained program, and it will aid only a limited number of local educational agencies—and only if California wins the competitive application process that will benefit just a few states.
“We have Depression-era cuts that the schools are living with, and for anyone to suggest that Race to the Top will fix that is false, and misleads the public,” Plotkin said.