Dear friends,
Please remember that our school board members do not like making these decisions and had no idea they would have to be in this position when they ran for office. They just thought they would be able to help make our schools better not worse when they chose to run for school board. They will have to make many unpopular, decisive and hurtful decisions and even though they chose to lead - they thought it would be fun to help make Davis schools better - not this mess they find themselves in.
Therefore, we need to make sure they understand that as a community, we will not let the Davis schools deteriorate just because the State is cutting our budget.
Now is the time to LEAD!! We need to let the school board know that the Davis community is totally committed to raising the 3 million by May 15th and each and every one of us who speaks needs to solidly pledge to support and volunteer in any way possible to pass a November ballot $200 parcel tax. Why? Because the school board members are afraid to ask for a parcel tax. Except for Richard Harris, I don't believe any of them has stepped up to the plate to lead on the revenue issue because they don't think it's their job! They see their job as just implementing the cuts (and of course, in order to avoid being taken over by the Yolo County Board of Education, they needed to propose those cuts).
However, if we let them know that we will support increasing revenues - it will give them the COURAGE and HOPE to pursue these options. And if they think that the community will support a long-term solution, they might be inclined to make decisions that do not hurt all of us longterm.
The school board isn't the problem - it's REVENUES!!
If the state legislature passes tax increases this fall and saves the schools, then GREAT! But that won't happen to save our situation now and more importantly, we just cannot rely on the State to make that happen because unlike 47 other states, California requires a 2/3rds vote to pass tax measures and state budgets and that will be very difficult.
If the State does pass a tax increase sometime this fall - GREAT AGAIN - more money for Davis. We still would get our fair share, regardless if we pass a parcel tax in November (we missed the deadline to get on the June ballot).
We cannot just ask, beg, demonstrate and plead our cases tonight - we must promote permanent solutions.
1 comment:
I go to Emerson as a 7th grader and I have realized how other school get more funds. We are having to ask upon the students to help by selling things just to keep a basketball team. I find this very unfair and I think we should be funded in the same way as every other school so we can all face difficulties together as the Davis JR high school district.
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