Posted by
Bill Crawford on Saturday, June 07, 2008 11:49:39 PM
There is a proposal up for grabs in New York that caps the rate of incrase of property taxes, which the bulk of NY school districts use to fund themselves.
It is being proposed from Nassau County on Long Island, where I hailed from until the property taxes turned into something that demanded the title of "vigorish". When the tax escrow is the largest part of your mortgage, leaving town is the order of the day.
Unfortunately, the new Governor will not go along with it any more than the State Legislature will. The teacher's unions won't have it.
One can never fully comprehend arguments for pro-choice until you understand that the first priority is not the fate of the child in question, but the control of a woman over her own body. Similarly, one can never fully comprehend the priorities of public school teachers until you understand that the education of children is secondary to the power of the unions.
This is why Ms. Weingarten allows the schools in New York City to rot at times, rather than do anything but kowtow to the pay structures, tenure systems and contract negotiation styles of the surrounding suburbs, where certified teachers are among the highest paid in the country.
In those golden suburbs, the districts and the teachers negotiate their contracts and then present the finished product to you as "administrative costs" in a budget. You balk at the price and you are presented as heartless towards the future of the little children.
If you get tired of your taxes being mandated to support this game even if you pull your children out and send them to private school, you are a basket case of a higher order. Even if you are a large group of parents in the Bronx or Brooklyn who think schools that need metal detectors are harebrained, but you can't afford anything else.
Not that it matters. New York is one of the many states with a Blaine Amendment in the state Constitution, which guarantees the tax mandate and no vouchers forever.
New York will continue to tax homeoners into migration. Long Island will be a land of professionals who can afford the insane taxes, Seniors who can't sell their houses and immigrants who pay rent. Either way, they will tend more and more Democrat in their voting habits, as has been the pattern since 1970.
You all deserve what you get, New York. I was born there, I loved living there. Thank the Lord I left.