Wisconsin State Representative Jennifer Shilling discusses motion 3591 before the May 27, 2011 meeting of the Joint Committee on Finance. The motion adjusted funding to ameliorate the cuts to K-12 public education under Governor Walker's proposed budget.
Thank you.
You know, if you had to tell a business that they needed to cut $800 million from the assembly line of the product that they make, that product would probably suffer. And now we're looking at our schools and we're saying "you need to cut $800 million." That educational experience will undoubtedly suffer. And I think the proposal that we have before us, it does demonstrate that we are committed to public education. That when we do have revenue available that we want to put it into the general school aid funding formula to help our schools out.
And talking with schools in my area, the superintendent has said "well, that first year is going to be difficult, but we will make it. We'll be able to do it. It'll be difficult, not without challenges, but it's the second year that we haven't really heard a lot of discussion about. And that's the one that will really, really be difficult for us. We can get through one year, but then the second year will be even more difficult." So I think talking about that foundation of education here in the state and I recognize it is the number one area that we put in our state dollars in our budget. But as we talk about our values here in the state of Wisconsin, the pathway to being competitive in the workforce and being prepared and having those skills necessary as they come out of high school and go on to higher education or go into the workforce that does that valuable educational experience. And we in Wisconsin are nationally recognized for the innovative things going on in our schools, the high test scores that we have from our students, and really that dedication that we have from those professionals in our classrooms.
And I think as we talked about where we could spend that some of that new revenue2 and I heard leaders on your side of the aisle talk about recycling, I heard them talking about roads aids, but your side was silent until today about education. And from day one we were talking about trying to mitigate the cuts to public education. We were talking about investing in our technical schools. And today when you came out from your meetings from yesterday and trying to find some sort of area... we know what you're going to do in schools and we don't think it's enough. We don't think that it is enough with the opportunities that we have here to really say that our schools have been under the revenue caps and controls since 1992-93. I mean, the governor wanted to go back to those '93 spending levels. And they have continued to tighten their belt, it's cutting into the fat, it's talking about personnel in our schools and our programming that are available in the curriculum. And I think that today what we have before us will demonstrate our commitment to public education in this system, in our state. So I know we're going to hear rhetoric on the other side about this, but really as we look at that pathway to success: the foundation that is necessary to be competetive in a global economy, it is about education. It is all about education, and we need to continue to invest in Wisconsin's best resource, which is its people, which is the children, which is our future workforce.
The motion failed by a 12-4 party-line vote. Representative Shilling is running for the state senate in the 32nd district in a recall election set for July 12.
1 Legislative Fiscal Bureau summary:
Motion 359 would make a number of funding adjustments in the general aid area. It would provide around $333 million in general aid, school aids in '12-'13, eliminate the high-poverty aid appropriate and fold that into the general school aid, put in low-income pupil weighting, a minimum aid payment of $3000 per member. Within the aid formula secondary costing would be at 100% rather than 90%. Special adjustment aid, similar to the bill, would be at 90% rather than 85% under current law. It'd create a hold-harmless aid appropriation so that as a result of all these aid changes no district would lose money compared to the prior year, the current law concept. Essentially a number of these provisions would be similar or identical to the State Superintendent's aid proposal. There's some elements that would not be part of this that are in this proposal, but this would accommodate or incorporate a number of the provisions in the State Superintendent's proposal.
2 Rep. Shilling here refers to allocations of money from significantly increased revenue projections recently released for the Wisconsin State Budget.
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