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EDITORIAL
Bailout bribery
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President Obama and Congress sold their latest bailout of America's public employees as an emergency measure needed to prevent the layoffs of 160,000 teachers.
"We can't stand by and do nothing while pink slips are given to the men and women who educate our children," the president said Tuesday.
Then news trickled out that the debt-growing legislation was a payday loan, not a charitable donation. Some $10 billion in federal handouts can't be used to fill budget gaps created by recession-driven revenue shortfalls. No, the money must grow stretched education budgets, and as a condition of accepting the money, states must agree to maintain or increase education spending, as a percentage of total state revenues, next fiscal year.
It is, as Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said, a "federal government hijacking" of state budgets that will force lawmakers everywhere to raise taxes or slash spending elsewhere over the next year.
No worries for Nevada, where minor concessions by public education bargaining units and previous action by legislators had averted teacher layoffs long before Washington Democrats set about buying votes in November's midterm election.
But on Thursday, lame duck Gov. Jim Gibbons announced he would accept Nevada's share of the loot -- $83 million -- to hire 1,400 new teachers, about 1,000 of which will work for the Clark County School District.
Gov. Gibbons' spokesman, Dan Burns, said the governor's staff concluded that under the law, the state is not required to guarantee the new teachers jobs beyond the coming school year, which starts Aug. 30. The hires will be used to reduce class sizes and offer more reading and math instruction to students in need of remedial help.
"This at least will give 1,400 teachers a job for a year," Mr. Burns said. "I am not sure what the future holds."
We sure do.
Next year, when the 2011 Legislature is in session and lawmakers are building the two-year budget, the voting public will be subjected to months of moaning that unless taxes are raised through the roof, at least 1,400 teachers will be laid off.
School districts will build those teaching positions into their baseline budgets. Teachers unions will proclaim the positions invaluable to student achievement. The government will grow to a new level of "essential services," even though student enrollment is declining.
Congress provided nothing more than the means to grow government payrolls, expand union membership and boost union dues and donations to the Democratic Party. States will be coerced into hiring workers they can't afford. The wheels will be greased for the tax increases that will allow public employees everywhere to keep their generous salaries and expensive medical and retirement benefits. The tough fiscal decisions states need to make on their own will be delayed again -- until the next federal, strings-attached bailout.
This isn't saving jobs. This isn't permanent job creation. This is coercion. This is bribery. This is wrong.
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Pass an illegal alien law like Arizona and we will have more than enough teachers for the citizens of the US.
Don't worry, editors and other tightwads of these pages: even if you had to increase education funding next year, Nevada would still be bumping along the bottom of fiscal support for schools and performance as well among the 50 states. That ugly reputation will only be wrested from your cold, dead minds.
How about tax benefits for parents of children with good grades, test scores? How would that help parental involvement? Guarenteed we'd see a difference! NOT by hiring more teachers or paying them more! Universities have classes of 300; and good professors produce results! Think about that!
L-1 Identity Solutions will get this money as well as the border patrol funds. State computers crashed today in order to reboot with L-1 now a part of the network.They are hijacking the NV budget & Gibbons is assured a plush job with his bankster buddies. Multinationals are beholden to their shareholders & to profit-that's it.
he who pays the piper...
Corrupt Dems, like Harry Reid, giving handouts to their corrupt union masters with our money. Haven't you folks had enough of this nonsense? Fire Harry Reid and stop this foolishness!
One of the reasons Nevada lags in the bottom on education is because a lot of our teachers are not motivated to teach and educate our kids. They are there just to earn a living and are not proactive and barely do the minimum effort. They do not want to be accountable and evaluated with the students test scores. They know they are protected by the unions and don't have to be competitive and will keep their jobs even if they don't educate our kids.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, and you'll know we're both democrats.
I disagree that unions are winning. Their membership is in serious decline and has been for decades. Really the public sector is about the only place they still have a foothold. That foothold will not matter much in the current and future economy. If the money isn't there in the private sector it really does not matter what the public sector does. Unlike the Feds, the states can not counterfeit money.
John G, in case you haven't been paying attention, the R-J is anti-teacher and anti-public education. I don't understand how anyone can think that $35,083 a year (salary for a 1st year teacher with Bachelor's degree - i.e. the first one to get laid off) is a "generous salary." Furthermore, the government won't cut your taxes no matter what you do. They will just find other things besides education to spend it on.