Friday, June 24, 2011

URGENT: Senate to vote today on $1B voucher giveaway

Worried StudentTake Action to Stop SB1- another attack on public education and local property taxes

The Pennsylvania senate is about to vote on a bill that will raise your property taxes and lower the quality of public education. I’s called SB1, and it will cost Pennsylvania taxpayers between $500 million and $4.5 billion.

The Republican leadership is trying to ram this through today. Please take action NOW before they vote on this outrageous legislation.

According to No Voucher Tax.org:

SB 1 will raise your property taxes. The public schools aren’t going away, and if the state takes billions away from local school boards, your local property taxes will go up.

SB 1 creates a new Harrisburg bureaucracy. The bill creates a brand-new agency in Harrisburg, with staff, offices and equipment.

SB 1 is unconstitutional. Article III, Section 15 of the PA Constitution states: “No money raised for the support of the public schools of the Commonwealth shall be appropriated or used for the support of any sectarian school.”

SB 1 is a huge unfunded liability for taxpayers. Cost estimates for SB 1 are based on just 10% of low-income families. Dr. Woodrow Sites of the PA Association of Rural and Small Schools testified that the real price tag could be more than $4.5 billion a year.

SB 1 has no accountability. SB 1 would send taxpayer dollars to private school operators with no requirement that they do a good job teaching kids. Isn’t that what’s wrong with education already? Even worse, there are numerous reports of financial fraud and other scandals in private school operations.

Take action now! Click here to tell your State Senator to vote NO on SB 1.

1 comment:

Heisey said...

You state that SB1 has no accountability. Who is making sure that our tax dollars are being used to educate students in the public schools. Too much is being wasted on padding pockets of administrative staff and not going to pay teachers and educate students.

Give money to schools that need it. Schools that are educating students for less and doing a better job.