Arggggg!!! How about that bunker money?

The TN GOP press release this afternoon starts with this:

As State Faces Massive Deficit, Gov. Bredesen Complains Republicans Stopped Him From Spending More

NASHVILLE – With Tennesseans facing a tough economy, the state budget facing a $600 million deficit, and a Democrat-controlled Congress itching to raise taxes, Democrat Gov. Phil Bredesen has just given the best explanation for why Tennessee taxpayers need a Republican majority in the state legislature: to keep the Democrats from spending too much.

Bredesen, campaigning in West Tennessee for state Senate candidate Randy Camp, a former lobbyist and administration insider, said voters should chose Camp rather than Republican Dolores Gresham because Camp would let him spend more money.

Said Bredesen: "The Senate in particular has been very partisan. This hurts me in education areas. There were things that I wanted to do in education. The free community college idea, for example, that would have helped this district." (snip)

You spent the money available on what you considered important, Governor.

From my post of December 2007 see what the price for that party bunker would have purchased:

1834 public school students
or
304 public school teachers
or
the per capita income of 429 constituents

and from Books From birth
participation for 426,666 children...

I'll know he's serious about the state budget when he expresses buyer's remorse over that $17 million party bunker.

Construction for Bredesen, but not children

Apparently Gov. Phil Bredesen can find $12 million to fund his party bunker from a very tight state budget but the hundreds of millions of excess lottery dollars just sitting around collecting interest cannot be touched to build classrooms for public school students despite the FACT that the TN Constitution allows this use of those funds.

Bill Hobbs has details and quotes from the Tennessee Journal (subscription needed).

Instead of coming up with another proposal to use some of the lottery surplus to fund school construction, Bredesen appears to be leaning toward a last-minute proposal from House Democrats to divert the money instead to a loan fund for projects that improve the energy efficiency of public school buildings, the TJ reports.

That makes no sense. You want maximum energy efficiency? Replace portables with brick and mortar. And loans? Not grants? Why do we have to further encumber our school districts by requiring them to go into debt for improvements when the cash is available?

Hobbs points out:

Nine school systems have more than 10 percent of their classes in portables.

Last year the best Bredesen could do was to create the Lottery Bank of Tennessee:

Gov. Bredesen has already suggested in his State of the State address that lottery funds be used for loans to local school districts.

So, high on the Governor's list of construction projects is a party facility for himself, the legislators, lobbyists and other unnamed swells. Low on his construction priority is classrooms for children. Oh, he'd loan the school systems the money but an outright grant to the systems to do what is best for the children? No.

Why is this party facility necessary? Why do the swells get more than comfortable accommodations and our school children don't even get safe and secure ones?

Mind your surroundings

He just doesn't get it, does he?

“One of the great things about being governor is you get to take taxes away and later give it back and people are happy,” Bredesen said. “Is this a great job or what?” WKRN

Well, I've no doubt the Ladies Hermitage Society is very happy but what about the rest of us? Our very wealthy governor seems completely disconnected from those of us who work hard for a living and sacrifice essentials in order to pay taxes. "You GET to TAKE taxes away..."

Yes you do and have, Governor, and you shouldn't be so happy about it. When you take it, it comes from families---lots of whom are struggling every single day to make ends meet.

Ironically, he made that astonishing comment after providing $1 million of that tax money very literally taken from families to pay for the maintenance of another wealthy politicians aging estate--Former President Andrew Jackson's Hermitage. Amazingly, after the weeks he's had defending his wife's pet project, vastly expanding the governor's mansion to include an obscenely unnecessary party facility for the swells to meet and greet, he rejoices in taking our hard earned dollars...and does it at the site of another political mansion.

What was that line in "Batman Begins"? Oh, yeah, "Learn to mind your surroundings."


Hat Tip: Taxing Tennessee

Mixed holiday message

My 10-year old gets it. "It's just kinda weird to have a Muslim girl on a Christmas card."

We didn't get one of these cards first hand--we saw it in this morning's paper.

The portrait on Gov. Bredesen's Christmas card is very reminiscent of the National Geographic cover of June 1985 which has been been replicated over and over in various mediums.

However well intended Gov. Bredesen's Christmas greeting, he did miss the mark. In trying to please many, I dare say he pleased few. It's hard to tell who his target audience was with this mixed message. Jesus being THE Savior of THE world doesn't work very well in society's tortured attempts at inclusiveness.

I can agree with the Governor here:

The back of the card closes with, "May the miracle of Christmas help bring peace to this young woman and her wounded land."

Let's be clear though--the miracle of Christmas was the birth of a Savior, God's only son born of a virgin, for a fallen world that He loves dearly and wants to restore to full relationship with Him. When that restoration happens, there will be peace on Earth and good will toward men.

Saturday 12/09/06

From here and there--

Bredesen's legacy target: Comprehensive pre-K--

He may devote about $25 million more to continue to expand pre-K in the state’s next budget.

“That would get us to a comprehensive pre-K program by the end of my time as governor,” Bredesen said, “which I would consider a great legacy.” (snip)

But their older brothers and sisters--

The governor wants to add truancy officers in all of the state’s 400 public high schools to improve attendance and, hopefully, result in more high school students graduating.

Adding those positions would cost more than $16 million annually, which Bredesen isn’t 100 percent confident the state can fully afford in its next budget. City Paper

Attendance does not equal education. As I've said many times before--these pre-K children have time yet but there are thousands of near adults leaving the system frustrated and lacking basic skills every year and for too many that directly leads to criminal behavior that endangers us all. THAT's where the focus needs to be. We can't just consider them lost causes and turn our backs on them in favor of toddlers. The mantra 'for the children' usually conjures up images of those cuddly small ones but those high school drop outs are still children too.

We'd save more than $350M I'm sure--

The Alliance for Excellent Education, based in Washington, D.C., estimates that if all Tennessee high school students graduated, the state government would save $350 million a year. The project was funded by the MetLife Foundation and is based on evidence that high school graduation is an essential element in upward mobility. (snip) The savings, calculated for each state, is based on a dropout's utilization of Medicaid and other public expenditures. Tennessee has made huge strides in graduation rates, raising it from 59 percent in 2001 to about 64 percent today. But that's still behind the national average of about 74 percent. Memphis Business Journal

Oversight?

[Hamilton County Mayor Claude] Ramsey said Loftis, as the lobbyist for Hamilton County Schools, has met with the governor, education commissioner, state senators and representatives.

He added "Governor Bredesen says it's a positive thing. He agrees with us, or the four large counties, that we're getting short changed and he's going to make some changes."

While no one disputes Loftis' work has been good for schools it was made public recently that he never registered as a lobbyist with the Tennessee Ethics Commission. (snip)

Tennessee Ethics Commission records show Loftis registered as a lobbyist for Hamilton County Schools last Thursday. WTVC Chattanooga

Core Curriculum--

“A lot of us struggle not with finding a warm body, but a warm body that comes to work every day,” said Gary Dies of Saia-Burgess Automotive Actuators Inc. “When you get [workers] below about 32, there’s a substantial difference in attitude, willingness to take responsibility. There’s a huge gap.” (snip)

There are a number of trends that could be contributing to the decline. Zinkiewicz points first to rising teenage unemployment levels, brought about by more older workers, welfare recipients and immigrants competing for jobs in industries like retail and fast food that were traditionally good places for teens to get their first jobs. (snip)

Herrman said Metro Schools recently received a six-year, $6 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education that, in part, takes measures to incorporate soft skills into the curriculum by decentralizing and personalizing Nashville’s eight largest schools, which all have at least 1,000 students. City Paper

KY Special Need scholarships--

In Kentucky, a prefiled bill [BR 98] by Lexington Rep. Stan Lee [R-Lexington] would not only make the commonwealth the fifth state to offer such scholarships, it would also be the Bluegrass State’s first statewide school-choice program controlled by parents.

State law currently allows special-needs students to attend schools providing educational services not available in their resident district schools. However, this system is largely ineffective and relatively few students participate because school districts – not parents – control the process. Edpresso

And--

If just 1 percent of Kentucky’s special-needs children – roughly 1,100 students – could have participated in the proposed scholarship program in 2005, state and local school districts would have realized an estimated savings of $5.7 million. Ed News

I hope some Tennessee legislators will consider following suit.