What Do You Think?
Public Education and Property Taxes
Fred Lane
Fred Lane wrote:
For Immediate release
New York Tax Reform Organization
Freehold NY 5/12/04
Public Education and Property Taxes
Someone is either missing or conveniently ignoring the point in
regard to the annually proposed (and passed) school budget increases
in Greenville and across NY. Qualified teachers, upgraded schools
and well-educated students (according to the latest NYSUT Channel 6
TV ad, four out of five go on to college) are a very good thing. But
regardless of the accomplishments of the Department of Education in
NY, we taxpayers can no longer afford the cost that it imposes upon
us. There is nothing personal, selfish, irresponsible or un-American
about not having the money to continue to fund the enormous and ever
spiraling cost of government run education. What is personal is that
we have no options!! We are quite simply coerced into attending
public schools and extorted into funding them.
The real point is that we taxpayers can no longer financially float
the boat and prosper without working two jobs or leaving the state.
It is even worse for retirees and those on fixed incomes that remain
harnessed to an obsolete and unfair method of paying for "free"
public education". Funding public education is at the center of the
tax dilemma in New York. We can no longer financially withstand
(without drastically compromising our families financial security)
the continual annual school budget increases regardless of their
merits.
Yet year after year we go through the same processes of local
conflict with the schools that end with increased property taxes and
lasting resentments from across both sides of the table. Funding
school budgets through increasing property taxes divides a community
that would otherwise be good neighbors. It divides the parents with
children in school from those of us that do not and it divides
federal, state and local governments. In short it divides us all in
one way or another. Worst of all, school budget funding in its
current form perpetuates the self-evident fact that schools are
political. Admittedly or not, the AFT, NEA and NYSUT are submerged in
Albany politics through lobbying and even indirect special interest
groups that are under the AFL/CIO umbrella with them. This alone
undermines the representation of the individual taxpayer that is not
in a union or special interest group.
It is time for the voters/taxpayers across NY to just say "NO" to
budget increases and let them figure it out without cutting the
programs. You are no less an American, parent or person to do so. You
are not selfish, you do not hate kids and you are not `irresponsible'
as Dan DiNicola stated last year in his channel 6 News school budget
report. You are hard working people that can no longer afford a
product... regardless of its importance. I take offense to insinuations
and subtle attempts at stigmatizing an oppressed population of
taxpayers as cheapskates!! It is perfectly OK for us to just say "NO"
to budget increases and to demand tax reform.
There are solutions out there. Privatizing education and/or awarding
tax credits for those self educating or sending their children to
private schools are among a few. Finding new ways to tax individuals
that slip through the property tax method is yet another. But by and
far...we need to separate the school from the state in that it has so
much power and influence on our representatives through unions and
lobbying efforts.
Historically, New Yorkers have always good heartedly tightened up on
their home budgets to accommodate tax hikes. At a time when the
residents of NY and the entire country is in great economic straights
and with government waste, fraud and abuse running rampant...it is time
for many government funded organizations and institutions that feed
at the revenue trough at taxpayers expense to recognize the fact and
to tighten up on their budgets instead. We are not selfish or
callous. The lifestyle of the average income working man and woman in
this state is being greatly compromised and it is the direct result
of the tax burden we bear.
For Immediate release
New York Tax Reform Organization
Freehold NY 5/12/04
Public Education and Property Taxes
Someone is either missing or conveniently ignoring the point in
regard to the annually proposed (and passed) school budget increases
in Greenville and across NY. Qualified teachers, upgraded schools
and well-educated students (according to the latest NYSUT Channel 6
TV ad, four out of five go on to college) are a very good thing. But
regardless of the accomplishments of the Department of Education in
NY, we taxpayers can no longer afford the cost that it imposes upon
us. There is nothing personal, selfish, irresponsible or un-American
about not having the money to continue to fund the enormous and ever
spiraling cost of government run education. What is personal is that
we have no options!! We are quite simply coerced into attending
public schools and extorted into funding them.
The real point is that we taxpayers can no longer financially float
the boat and prosper without working two jobs or leaving the state.
It is even worse for retirees and those on fixed incomes that remain
harnessed to an obsolete and unfair method of paying for "free"
public education". Funding public education is at the center of the
tax dilemma in New York. We can no longer financially withstand
(without drastically compromising our families financial security)
the continual annual school budget increases regardless of their
merits.
Yet year after year we go through the same processes of local
conflict with the schools that end with increased property taxes and
lasting resentments from across both sides of the table. Funding
school budgets through increasing property taxes divides a community
that would otherwise be good neighbors. It divides the parents with
children in school from those of us that do not and it divides
federal, state and local governments. In short it divides us all in
one way or another. Worst of all, school budget funding in its
current form perpetuates the self-evident fact that schools are
political. Admittedly or not, the AFT, NEA and NYSUT are submerged in
Albany politics through lobbying and even indirect special interest
groups that are under the AFL/CIO umbrella with them. This alone
undermines the representation of the individual taxpayer that is not
in a union or special interest group.
It is time for the voters/taxpayers across NY to just say "NO" to
budget increases and let them figure it out without cutting the
programs. You are no less an American, parent or person to do so. You
are not selfish, you do not hate kids and you are not `irresponsible'
as Dan DiNicola stated last year in his channel 6 News school budget
report. You are hard working people that can no longer afford a
product... regardless of its importance. I take offense to insinuations
and subtle attempts at stigmatizing an oppressed population of
taxpayers as cheapskates!! It is perfectly OK for us to just say "NO"
to budget increases and to demand tax reform.
There are solutions out there. Privatizing education and/or awarding
tax credits for those self educating or sending their children to
private schools are among a few. Finding new ways to tax individuals
that slip through the property tax method is yet another. But by and
far...we need to separate the school from the state in that it has so
much power and influence on our representatives through unions and
lobbying efforts.
Historically, New Yorkers have always good heartedly tightened up on
their home budgets to accommodate tax hikes. At a time when the
residents of NY and the entire country is in great economic straights
and with government waste, fraud and abuse running rampant...it is time
for many government funded organizations and institutions that feed
at the revenue trough at taxpayers expense to recognize the fact and
to tighten up on their budgets instead. We are not selfish or
callous. The lifestyle of the average income working man and woman in
this state is being greatly compromised and it is the direct result
of the tax burden we bear.