Support Public Education

Support the True Cost of Public Education

Congratulations to the new members of the West Bend School Board. Now comes the hard part, actually governing. Fulfilling campaign promises to bring increased transparency and accountability to district financial operations, giving teachers a greater voice in how and what they teach and the rest will be easy compared to the much larger issues of securing adequate funding, state imposed limits on local control of funding and local resistance to increased taxes.

Currently, our public school funding comes from a mix of state and federal funds and local property tax revenues, all of which change from year to year as the political winds blow in Madison and Washington. Locally, public school funding is complimented by a foundation that raises funds for things the district needs, private donations from local businesses (Stuff the Bus and McTeacher Nights), fundraisers by individual school Parent Teacher Organizations (PTOs), GoFundMe pages and contributions by individual teachers to their own classrooms. I have been unable to find an accounting of the last four. They are not part of the district's budgeting process. 

Local funding is further complicated by the open enrollment funding drain and voucher payments required by school choice legislation. If a West Bend District parent chooses to enroll her child in a neighboring district's public school, that student's portion of the state aid our district receives follows the student to his new district. Currently, West Bend pays much more to other districts than it receives with students who open enroll into our schools. If a West Bend parent chooses to enroll his child in a voucher eligible private school, our district pays that school a substantial amount through the voucher system. 

Our school board has little to no control over any of these funding mechanisms. It already levies the maximum allowed by law on local property taxpayers because we get penalized by the state if we under levy through reduced state aid in subsequent years. What is left to Wisconsin school boards that want to increase spending are two types of referenda, operational and capital. Operational referenda can be one time or recurring and fund day to day district operations. Capital referenda allow district to issue bonds to raise money to build new schools or renovate old ones. West Bend has had three capital referenda in the last decade. It has never tried to pass an operational referendum to add new or bring back lost educational programs, increase educator salaries, reduce class sizes or provide for other ongoing expenses.

Even though district costs have increased along with everything else such as transportation, food, utilities, insurance, legal fees and administrative costs, revenues from outside sources has gone down or remained flat for a long time. Act 10 was supposed to help by reigning in teacher salaries and healthcare costs, but those savings vanished into other inflationary pressures and declining revenues.

Our new board will have its work cut out for it and must start by educating the community on the importance of public education to the future of the Republic and the survival of our local way of life. Many have lost sight of the impact public schools have on local property values and economic vitality. Great schools make communities attractive to young families and the businesses looking for new employees. Bad schools, not so much. When public schools are allowed to fail, and that is a choice, businesses leave and communities fail. Even if you do not have school age children, supporting public education is an great investment in your community's future.

Dealing with the true costs of properly educating our kids will require examination of the PTO fundraisers, private business donations and individual teacher contributions to their classrooms and students. How much is involved, where do these funds come from, what are they used for and how should we incorporate these needs into the budgeting process? What are the hidden costs involved? These are just as important as state funding questions to our commitment to adequate funding.

Two examples come to mind, one corporate and one personal. McTeacher nights take place in local McDonald's with teachers serving fast food to students and parents lured their by their presence and a desire to donate. The restaurants give a portion of their profits back to the schools. The Los Angeles Unified School District just opted out of this program because it did not want teachers promoting unhealthy food choices. Should we follow that example? Local teachers provide food and supplies to needy students in their classes who have fallen through the social safety net. Should they feel the need to do that or should those needs be recognized and funded through the district's. budget?

The new school board will have to grapple with these thorny issues as it addresses how we choose to educate those who will become responsible for our future. Let them choose wisely.

Save Social Security

Save Social Security

Social Security was created during the Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal and rescued many elderly Americans from the despair of the Great Depression. When jobs,  savings accounts and those few pensions that existed in the 1930s were wiped out in that upheaval, many seniors sank into poverty and had no support systems to fall back on.

Social Security was designed so the miseries visited on the elderly of low and moderate means after the stock market crashed would never happen again. Payroll taxes on working people and their employers who contribute, in equal amounts, about 12% of an employee’s gross wages, fund the system. These payroll taxes are placed in a separate Social Security Trust Fund administered by the government to maximize the returns payable to people when they reached the age of retirement. This was done purposefully to keep politicians from raiding the Fund for general revenue needs in times when the fund carried a surplus. Even back in the 1930s, we knew there would be fluctuations in the numbers needing benefits and a need to keep the Trust Fund solvent.

Conservative republicans hate the Social Security system. It embodies all that deemed wrong with big government doing what private business could do better. Those on Wall Street cast a covetous eye on the large surpluses in the Trust Fund that they cannot manage or use for investments or rape for profit. They cast aspersions on such a social safety net, demanding that people take control over their own retirement savings and investments or suffer the consequences. They have forgotten the trials and tribulations families faced during the Great Depression when elderly parents starved and died for lack of money.

Over time, conservatives in Congress have whittled away at the Social Security System by raising the age at which a retiree could start collecting benefits, capping the amount of an employee’s wages subject to withholding, imposing means testing for some benefits, limiting disability and spousal benefits, capping cost of living increases by tying them to less than relevant consumer price indexes and others. The biggest betrayal came during the Bush years when Congress took huge sums out of the Trust Fund surpluses in order to pay for other government programs and wars.

The ultimate result set up the big lie that Social Security needs to be scrapped and replaced because the current system will not be able to meet the benefit demands that will arrive as the baby boomer generation hits retirement and current payroll tax revenues decline because there are fewer people working. That date is currently somewhere in the 2030 range and changes as does the economy.

Conservative republicans tell us that Social Security is not sustainable in its current form. They have made it that way. Their solution is, of course, to give the Trust Fund to Wall Street to manage and then pay seniors what might be left after the profiteers take their cut, assuming the managers investments make a decent return.

Political campaigns for Congress and the Presidency depend upon the votes from seniors. They vote in higher numbers than other age groups in the electorate. Candidate Trump and many members of Congress promised not to touch Social Security for those already retired or close to retirement, thinking that would be enough to secure senior support.

Democrats of the populist ilk recognized and campaigned on other positions. Raising or eliminating the cap on payroll taxable income is the easiest fix. It would pump enough money into the Trust Fund to make it solvent for decades. It is only fair that wealthy wage earners continue to pay into the system on wage incomes over $115,000 per year. Bolder folks also campaigned on cost of living increases being tied to price indices more aligned with those items seniors actually buy like food, housing and medications. They also championed increasing benefits to a more sustainable level than the average current $1,400 monthly stipend.

With the failure of the republican repeal and replacement of the Affordable Care Act effort, conservatives now turn to tax reform looking for more ways to cut taxes for the wealthy.

One of the current proposed  “reforms” is to completely eliminate Social Security payroll tax withholding. The short-term benefit will be to put that money back into employee paychecks and employer bank accounts. That is a very attractive incentive. Who would not want what amounts to a $3500 plus annual wage boost?  What they don’t tell you is that it will kill the Social Security revenue stream and bankrupt the system for sure and much sooner than currently predicted.

As you communicate with your member of Congress at one of his town halls, call or write to him, please let him know that further damage to Social Security is not acceptable and that the system needs to be fixed by repaying the money taken from the Trust Fund and raising the cap on payroll taxes subject to withholding to at least $500,000 per year. Your elderly relatives will appreciate it and so will you when you retire.

War is not the answer

Violence and killing are not the appropriate response to violence and killing. Finding ways to achieve peace is the appropriate response to violence and killing.