Cherokeean Herald (Rusk, Tex.), Vol. 156, No. 28, Ed. 1 Wednesday, August 31, 2005 Page: 3 of 16
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OPINION
^abor Day Deadline
Our office will be closed Sept. 5th for Labor Day. News and advertising deadlines are Friday, Sept. 2nd at 3 p.m.
Cherokeean
HERALD
Page 3
Wednesday, August 31,2005
Legislature's failure to agree on school reform is not the fault of educators
DR. JIM LARGENT
Rusk
I have remained silent as I
have seen several articles lately
in which Speaker Craddick and
locally. Rep. Leo Berman of
Tyler, blamed the Legislature's
failures on educators.
After seeing the ad Mr.
Berman ran in the Tyler paper
last week once again blasting
educators, I could not remain
silent Regard-
ing the failure
of the Legis-
lature to pass
anything... the
last time I
looked, edu-
cators didn't
have a vote on
the floor of the
capitol. If we
did, we would have voted for
the Hochberg amendment, or
the Eltife/Ellis plan.
While neither was perfect,
they wouldhave beenbeneficial
to all students and educators in
our great state, instead of pro-
viding unfair benefits to a few
districts and adding millions of
dollars of unfunded mandates
as HB2 would have done.
While some misguided and
¡fl¡|
Dr. Jim Largent
misled legislators were call-
ing for more accountability
our staff was going through
the mounds of paperwork and
test results from the 48. tests
we are required to administer
to our students. These data are
broken down by grade level,
subject area, learning objec-
tive, ethnicity and economic
level, and we must "hit the
mark' in all areas or else we
are deemed failures by people
hke Mr. Berman.
Two weeks later, we got
another report letting us
know whether or not we made
"adequate yearly progress ' as
part of the Ño Child Left Behind
project.. .again, more mounds of
data to digest and more plans
to produce to address areas of
concern.
We have. TAKS tests, SDAA
I and II tests. Performance
Based Monitoring, transpor-
tation and food service audits,
TPRI results, LPAC's, ARD's,
LEP's, IEP's, AEP's, PEIMS
reporting and many more
state and federal programs
that we must account for on a
daily basis.
CLARIFIGWION
Accident victim's wife was misidentified
On the front page of the Aug. 24 issue
of the Cherokeean Herald, Abby Linder-
man, the wife of one of the accident
victims, was identified incorrectly.
To update the story, Mrs. Linderman's
husband remained in critical condition
Monday at East Texas Medical Center,
Tyler.
The 22-year-old was injured when
the vehicle in which he was riding had a
blow-outtire, flipped and rolled into Mud
Creek near Reklaw on Aug. 21.
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While Mr. Berman and
others were calling for "educa-
tion reform" we all watched as
they introduced (once again)
vouchers, a cap on recapture
(to allow already wealthy dis-
tricts to retain more dollars and
widen the funding gap between
rich and poor school districts),
a later school start date and
November elections for school
board members.
These are just some of the
"reforms" they proposed, none
of which has anything to do
with helping educators teach
students. This is in addition
to our testing program that
has gone from TEAMS to TAAS
and now TAKS, and every time
schools across the state show
that we can meet the expecta-
tions, the bar gets raised and
a new series of tests are devel-
oped along with a new series of
unfunded mandates.
On the other side of the
coin is the so-called property
tax reduction. The plan would
have lowered property taxes,
but it raised sales taxes and
increased fees on such things
as car purchases andhougehold
goods.
Unless you make over
$140,000 you would have seen
a net increase in what you cur-
rently pay in taxes and fees.
This doesn't sound like a tax
reduction to me.
Provisions to add a payroll tax
to businesses and end loopholes
in the tax law that give huge
benefits for many companies
were defeated by those lobbies
and taken out of the bill, while a
payroll tax on schools to supple-
ment TRS Care remains.
In the end, legislators like
Craddick and Berman led the
way in denying educators a
much-deserved raise, watered
down the teacher retirement
system, and then as a final
farewell, gave all educators a
kick in the teeth by blaming us
for the failure of the legislature
to act, while at the same time
giving themselves a nice pen-
sion increase.
I have a suggestion for these
legislators. The next time you
are called into session, why
don't you actually listen to
people who have dedicatedtheir
lives to educating children?
Those of us who are in
schools every day and work
directly with students might
have a little insight on what
could be done to make our
schools better.
Instead of bashing us every
chance you get and blaming
us for your failures, why not
work with us to write a bill that
is good for all the children in
Texas? How about a new
"reform'' that recognizes the
importance of public education
andprovides equitable funding
and resources to actually pay
for the high expectations and
standards you demand?
I am proud to say that Repre-
sentative Hopson andSenators
Eltife and Staples listened and
sponsored bills and amend-
ments to help all children.
Unfortunately they could
not counter the stronghold
the leadership had on many
legislators hke Mr. Berman,
which resulted in yet another
failure of the legislature to p a ss
a school finance bill.
Dr. James M. Largent is the
Busk ISD school superinten-
dent.
Deficit
projections
lowered
JEB HENSARLING ^
Washington, D.C.
As a member of the Budget
Committee, I am pleased to
report that deficit for the cur-
rent fiscal year - originally
projected to be $427 billion -
will fall to $333 billion. While
this is still a large number, it
represents an outstanding $94
billion decrease in the federal
deficit. Tax revenues are up
nearly 15 percent this year.
This reduction was spurred
by the tax relief passed by
Congress. But increased
tax revenues should come as
no surprise to economists.
Congress, or small business
owners. Every time Congress
has significantly cut marginal
income tax rates in the 1920s,
1960s and 1980s, economic
growth has followed and tax
revenues have gone up.
These encouraging reports
show once again that tax relief
is paying dividends.
Jeb Hensarlingis a U.S. Con-
gressman for Dist. 5.
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Whitehead, Marie. Cherokeean Herald (Rusk, Tex.), Vol. 156, No. 28, Ed. 1 Wednesday, August 31, 2005, newspaper, August 31, 2005; Rusk, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth152694/m1/3/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Singletary Memorial Library.