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Hannon (SD-6) Joins Marcellino (SD-5) in Willingness to Cut School Aid

by: nassaupolitics

Fri Oct 24, 2008 at 10:43:15 AM EDT

(Again, what say you, Dean Skelos? Be sure to check out the video below the fold. - promoted by phillip anderson)

(cross-posted from www.nassaugopwatch.blogspot.com)

Yesterday we posted a video of Senator Carl Marcellino saying he is willing to cut school aid from Albany to fix the state budget. That sorta ruined the foundation of Dean Skelos' attack on Democratic Senator Malcolm Smith last week.
Today we have Sen. Kemp Hannon, another Skelos BFF, saying essentially the same thing Macellino did.

nassaupolitics :: Hannon (SD-6) Joins Marcellino (SD-5) in Willingness to Cut School Aid

When asked by News12 debate moderator Scott Feldman about the budget, Hannon said "Nothing could be off the table. What you're going to have to do is take an across the board approach. You're going to have to say 'What's absolutely essential. What do you need for public protection, what do you need for education, what do you need for health.' Nothing though can be sacred. You're going to have to have a general belt-tightening."
When pressed by Feldman on school aid, Hannon backtracked a little "That's not been on the table yet. That would be the last thing we want to do."
But his initial answer was that education aid was an area to find savings in.
Skelos really needs to get his people on the same page as him.

Video Below:

Tags: Malcolm Smith, Dean Skelos, Kemp Hannon, (All Tags)

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Hannon (SD-6) Joins Marcellino (SD-5) in Willingness to Cut School Aid | 3 comments

Hold 'em to it (0.00 / 0)

Since Long Island has long gotten far more education funding from Albany than their fair share (because Joe Bruno was trying to keep the Island solid red), I have no problem with cutting some of that down.

by: Dan Jacoby @ Fri Oct 24, 2008 at 18:34:15 PM UTC

Big SD-5 announcement coming soon... (0.00 / 0)

by: Roatti @ Fri Oct 24, 2008 at 20:53:02 PM UTC

LI ed cuts--Hell No (0.00 / 0)

It is not acceptable to cut education anywhere, especially on LI.

We have over 2 million residents and an incredibly diverse population. While an argument can be made that there should be some limited consolidation of Districts, it wouldn't save all that much money.

The fact remains when you look a state aid from a District to District standpoint there are countless Districts upstate and in Western NY that exit on 80-90% state funding. That means they are funded solely from downstate income taxes.

Thus, if we were to enter the Lord of the Flies approach to education funding, I could make the argument that some rural community doesn't deserve to have a school District since it can't be even moderately self-sufficient.

The bottom line is that for 20 years every 2-bit politician has talked about "education reform." You know what, standards have been raised, accountability exists, and the profession has improved. This has happened though without Federal and State assistance that is even moderately equivalent to the cost of the performance, service, reporting and equipment mandates.

Add to that communities changing from Middle class, English only into first generation immigrant, multilingual populations and the cost to educate skyrockets. Other than in a few Western NY areas, that problem doesn't exist there.

Also, this model is exactly the scenario that Christie Whitman brought to NJ after beating Florio in 1991. She cut state Ed spending and state taxes. Since the services still needed to be given local taxes skyrocketed and residents (except the very rich) ultimately paid more out of pocket than they did under Florio.

If that happens here along with adding a cap, you will devastate the future of kids from poorer communities. Sure the Roslyn's and Port Washington's may survive, but not the Patchogues, Lindenhurst and Elmont's.

Our society will become even more stratified. As we are progressives, this is something that we should all be opposed to.

by: jacksonian dem @ Fri Oct 31, 2008 at 01:22:27 AM UTC